Collated by Bruce Gagnon, 18 October 2023
October 5 Protest at the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, Scotland.
Opposing the construction of a rocket launch facility in a pristine environment that would inevitably turn military like all the rest have around the globe.
Lockheed Martin is turning up in control of new rocket launch sites from New Zealand to the UK. Promises are made of lots of jobs, only civilian launches, no enviro harm, and an exciting ‘space race’ future.
It’s actually all about the new gold rush to be part of the explosion of spending on plans to militarily control space on behalf of the west. They are now at war with China and Russia and space is just the latest battleground.
Santa Rosa, California
Make Space for Peace – no weapons in space vigil.
7 October Croughton UK
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Keep Space for Peace demonstration which took place at Croughton U.S. military and high-tech intelligence communications base in the United Kingdom near Oxford.
Video with various clips of the day.
‘Peace Pioneers’ video capturing comments made by guest speakers John Gittings and
Tom Unterrainer (CND Chair) about recently departed British peace activists April Carter and Pat Arrowsmith:
Photos from the day in an album on Flickr.
October 7 Keep Space for Peace Week protest at Bath Iron Works (BIW) in Maine
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This is where Navy Aegis destroyers are built. In 2008 the Pentagon used interceptor missiles on these destroyers to knock out an outdated US military satellite in space proving that these warship-based interceptor missiles could be used as anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons. These technologies are now in the hands of the US Space Force.
October 7 Asheville, North Carolina space week protest
90 flyers were handed to a mostly distracted and/or disinterested public as the folks walked through downtown with the banner and their signs. One side of the flyer was about space week and the other side about Raytheon’s role in space and war fighting production. Photo by Pamela Mumby
October 7 Jeju Island, South Korea.
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Standing at the gates of the navy base that the people fought against for many years. US warships routinely port there now in Gangjeong village as part of Washington’s pivot to Asia to encircle China with US bases. Note they took our space week poster featuring crowded orbits and translated it into Korean once more
October 10 – protest at the US NSA spy base at Menwith Hill in North Yorkshire, England.
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From this base the US intercepts all phone, fax and emails from Europe and does industrial espionage as well on behalf of US corporations. The base also plays a key role in US space directed war fighting.
Every week the Menwith Hill Accountabilty Campaign holds a protest at the base. They have an arrangement with the police where all vehicles are stopped as they leave the base and demonstrators can present their placards/sign for a short time before the vehicle leaves.
On this day Yorkshire CND joined the protest to commemorate Keep Space for Peace Week.
Bob Anderson wrote from Albuquerque, NM: “At this demo about [zionist attacks on Palestine] I spoke on the use of space for these wars.” Bob is a board member of the Global Network and has been a leader on the issue for many years. What he did at this protest was very important. Space weaponization often gets excluded from the broader movement connection making process. By talking about how space-tech coordinates all warfare these days during anti-war protests we expand the ability of the public to view the full picture. After all the taxpayers are paying for all this madness.
Art Laffin at the Pentagon: There were only 2 of us at the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker weekly Pentagon peace vigil on Oct 10. At the end of the vigil, I was able to take this photo of me holding the Keep Space for Peace sign. Maybe it can be of some use. I also held a sign decrying the horror taking place in the Holy Land and US complicity. What a time! Keep up the great work. A bow of gratitude.
12 October – Crowded space: why the increasing militarisation of space could risk nuclear war – CND webinar
The increasing militarisation of space is contributing to a wider problem: it’s becoming dangerously crowded. Currently there are 27,000 human-made objects floating in space, and there are plans for this number to increase sharply. Billions of pounds are being spent by multiple countries – including the UK – on militarising space. This includes satellites, ground-based stations and new technologies such as armed drones, controlled through satellites. Not surprisingly, a crowded space has major implications for security, including increasing the risk of nuclear war. Find out more in this webinar.
Chaired by Kate Hudson (General Secretary, CND) with speakers: Mélusine Lebert, Dave Webb and Bruce Gagnon + Q&A
