-------- activists

-- du plowshares

Plowshares moved - 3 of 4
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2000 15:04:17 +0000
From: Elizabeth McAlister disarmnow@erols.com

New addresses and numbers for 3 of the 4 plowshares:

We heard today from all 4 of the plowshares vs depleted uranium. Liz called from Towson early to say that Susan was moved out at about 6:00 a.m. Then Susan called from Jessup to announce arrival and address.

This afternoon Phil called from downtown Baltimore to say that he and Steve were in the Diagnostic Center. For the time being (and this will definitely change for Phil and Steve) here are their new addresses and numbers:

Susan Crane #916-999
Maryland Correctional Institution for Women
PO Box 535 Jessup MD 20794

(mail is sent to that address; if you happen to want to enclose a money order that need to be addressed to PO Box 306; the rest of the address remains the same)

Philip Berrigan #292-139 and Rev. Steve Kelly S.J. #292-140
MRDCC (Diagnostic Center)
550 E. Madison St
Baltimore MD 21202

Sr. Rosalie Bertel shared with us the letter she wrote to Judge Smith. I append it here; you may want to write in similar or different fashion; I don't put much store by his willingness to change his mind but there is value in letting him know that people know about what he did and are outraged. As the spirit moves you...

To us, Rosalie wrote: "This letter may be too "soft", but perhaps it will touch this vindictive judge. I will send you a hard copy with our letterhead stationery." Rosalie

27 March 2000

Judge James T. Smith, Jr. Circuit Court for Baltimore County 400 Bosley Ave. Towson MD 21204, USA

Dear Judge Smith,

Re: Ploughshares vs Depleted Uranium

You must be somewhat disturbed over the trial of Philip Berrigan, Susan Crane, Stephen Kelly, SJ, and Elizabeth Walz. Your sentencing was so excessively vindictive that I would guess that the action of these men and women deeply challenged your "faith" and belief that Catholic doctrine supported US military activity, regardless of the judgement of the Church?s more prophetic members.

By eliminating expert witnesses in this case, you eliminated my testimony. I am a Grey Nun of the Sacred Heart (Motherhouse in Yardley Pennsylvania), and also President of the North American Association of Contemplative Sisters. I am also an Epidemiologist with 30 years experience with communities exposed to uranium mining and milling, and related polluting activities. I have been working for the last three years with the veterans of the Gulf War who are seriously ill. It was in recognition of my expertise in the health effects of radiation, especially from uranium compounds, that I was asked by the defendants to testify to the rationality of their actions.

In your better moments, you must find that shooting radioactive waste at one?s enemy is outrageous behaviour. How much more outrageous is it to undermine the health of one?s own military personnel, and the women and children of the land which you have polluted. There is no war theory which condones indiscriminate poison. By the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission regulations, depleted uranium can be handled only by licensed and trained personnel, and all releases to the environment must be cleaned up. It is legally recognized as a poison.

I hope that even though you expressed your moral distress and confusion in an inappropriate way in the court, you will on sober reflection realize that your silencing of the defendants did not make the depleted uranium problem go away. As a Catholic Judge, you should be prepared to hear unwanted truth, and respect the righteous actions of those who clearly see and denounce a wrong. I will pray that you find a way quickly to redress the wrong which you have done and reduce the sentences of the Ploughshares defendants. Silencing the messengers and prophets has long been the pattern of behaviour of false leaders. Do not continue on this wrong path.

Sincerely, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, GNSH President

---- du - other

You might want to go check out Hafemeister's website at
http://www.apci.net/~haferod
Articles by Rod Hafemeister

Rod Hafemeister is a reporter at the Belleville (Ill.) News Democrat, a Knight Ridder newspaper located near Scott Air Force Base and across the river from St. Louis Mo.

About Rod Prior to joining the News-Democrat in 1992, Rod spent about a decade writing on military affairs for a variety of magazines. He served on active duty in the U.S. Army from 1974 to 1982, including a tour with 2nd Ranger Battalion, Fort Lewis, Wash., from November 1977 through March 1982. As a member of the Individual Ready Reserve, he was called to active duty in January 1991 in support of Operation Desert Storm and spent six months as a platoon sergeant with a motorized infantry company at Fort Lewis.

--

Gulf War Illness Articles
http://www.apci.net/~haferod/gwi.html

Gulf War Illness Stories

7/23/1995 Gulf War Veteran Details His Illness Reichert can even tell you the flight in March 1991 that made him sick. "It was the first or second of March," he recalled. "We flew into Kuwait City, which had just been liberated."

9/3/1996 Chemical weapons found before blast A special chemical weapons detection team saw evidence of suspected chemical weapons at an Iraqi ammunition depot before it was blown up by U.S. troops but didn't tell them, local Gulf War veterans say.

9/3/1996 sidebar Investigator: Veterans knew of chemical signs Veterans of a former metro-east Army Reserve unit either saw evidence of chemical weapons at a controversial Iraqi ammunition depot or saw them at a separate site the Pentagon hasn't acknowledged yet, a former congressional investigator said.

10/1/1996 Reservists Questioned About Weapons Military commanders suspected almost immediately that chemical weapons had been released by blowing up a huge Iraqi complex and sent a team to gather evidence, according to local Gulf War veterans.

10/2/1996 Local Gulf War Veterans' Accounts Are Investigated At a Pentagon press conference Tuesday, Assistant Secretary of Defense Ken Bacon said that, based on wind patterns and the number of weapons in the pit, a large number of troops may have been under the chemical cloud released March 10, 1991.

12/10/1996 Gulf War vets call for criminal inquiry of Pentagon Veterans are calling for criminal investigations into the Pentagon's handling of Persian Gulf War documents. The call comes after the Pentagon admitted last week that it has 20 confirmed detections of chemical agents, despite three years of denying the reports existed.

12/25/1996 Weapon linked to Iraq -Biological warfare used, report says Iraq may have used a biological weapon in the early stages of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, according to an investigator who was abruptly fired last year from the White House panel looking into Gulf War Syndrome.

1/14/97 Veteran Saw Gulf Weapons --U.S. May Believe Claim Of Chemicals An area Gulf War veteran says he saw Iraqi chemical weapons stored at an airfield about 70 miles from where U.S. troops blew up chemical agents at war's end.

1/19/1997 Focus Ghost from the Gulf : Six years after the Gulf War, are veterans being stalked by an invisible killer? Jasmine Palmore Battle never volunteered to go to war, and she never volunteered to get sick. Six years ago, she watched the Gulf War from the front row as a dental hygienist for the civilian oil company Aramco Services Co. Today, she is fighting a brain tumor, lung failure, gynecological disease, rashes and other problems she thinks were caused by Iraqi Scud missiles and smoke from oil fires.

1/20/1997 Analyst presses gulf case -- Ex-CIA employee sues for documents A former Central Intelligence Agency analyst is suing the CIA and the Department of Defense to obtain thousands of documents he says will prove U.S. troops were exposed to Iraqi chemical and biological weapons during the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

8/10/1997 Ex-Members Of Scott Unit Notified About Chemical Exposure The Pentagon is notifying the former members of a disbanded metro-east Army Reserve unit that they might have been exposed to chemical weapons when an Iraqi ammunition depot was destroyed in March 1991.

9/21/1997 The Wrong Stuff? Study: Gulf Uniforms Were Permeable A secret Pentagon study three years before the Gulf War found that the uniform issued to protect American troops from chemical weapons would not stop chemical agents Iraq had used in its war with Iran. Part one of a two part series which won an Illinois Press Association Award

9/22/1997 The Wrong Stuff? U.S. Equipment Failed To Detect Chemical Agents In Gulf On the third day of the Persian Gulf War, a message flashed through military command centers across Saudi Arabia: A Czech unit had detected chemical weapons. Part two of a two part series which won an Illinois Press Association Award

10/19/1997 Service Took His Strength William White once harbored visions of playing in the National Football League. Now, White has visions of his own death. They come to him when he sleeps. He dreams that he's drowning in a pool of water, or that someone is holding something over his nose so he can't breath.

10/19/1997 sidebar Aid for Veterans Delayed Gulf War veterans often criticize the Department of Veterans Affairs as being overly bureaucratic, more concerned about rigidly following sometimes incomprehensible rules than helping sick veterans.

10/26/1997 Paperwork is key, Gulf War vets say Persian Gulf War veterans say the mystery of missing paperwork shows why the investigation of Gulf War illnesses should be taken away from the Department of Defense.

11/10/1997 Researcher: U.S. risks lives of some gulf vets The federal government is treating Persian Gulf War veterans wounded by radioactive shrapnel as guinea pigs, the Army's former top researcher on depleted uranium told a gathering of Gulf War veterans this weekend.

11/10/1997 sidebar Gulf Vets Get Apology From Lawmaker Persian Gulf War veterans this weekend got something they have waited six years for - an apology from a government official for the way their mysterious illnesses have been handled.

1/10/1998 Veterans Were Exposed To Uranium- Toxic Ammo Levels Found In Gulf War The Pentagon quietly admitted this week that thousands of veterans may have been exposed to dangerous levels of depleted uranium ammunition fired by Allied weapons during the Persian Gulf War.

1/18/1998 Weapons 'Nuked' U.S. Troops In Gulf-- Majority Of Troops Possibly Exposed Seven years ago, U.S. troops nervously waiting for the order to take on Saddam Hussein's army frequently joked that the allies should just "nuke 'em" and get it over with. They didn't have a clue that thousands - as many as three-quarters of the troops there - soon would get nuked by their own weapons.

1/26/1998 Many CIA documents touch on war The Central Intelligence Agency has 1.5 million documents and "a number of studies" that could shed light on Gulf War illnesses, according to a CIA report released Friday. As many as 100,000 of the documents could be directly relevant to the question of Gulf War illnesses.

2/22/1998 Pentagon Says U.S. Troops Vulnerable-- Biological, Chemical Dust Can Penetrate Suits As tensions mount in the Persian Gulf, a top military expert said American troops are vulnerable to chemical and biological weapons, or so-called "dusty agents."

3/1/1998 Troops Unaware They Detonated Chemical Weapons, Records Show U.S. troops who unknowingly blew up hundreds of Iraqi rockets filled with deadly nerve agents after the Persian Gulf War should have been alerted to the danger, recently declassified documents show.

3/2/1998 Deplete Uranium is a Threat Veterans Say

Veterans say a gathering in Washington today will expose the Pentagon's efforts to downplay the effects of deadly radioactive bullets on hundreds of thousands of Gulf War veterans.

8/5/1998 Report: Gulf reservists went to different site Local reservists did not fly into Khamisiyah, the site of an accidental release of chemical weapons at the end of the Persian Gulf War, a new Pentagon report states.

9/19/1998 Dismissive comments challenged by doctor The doctor heading a study of veterans hit with depleted uranium ammunition disagreed on Friday with statements by the Pentagon's chief Gulf War investigator that the exposures were not medically significant.

9/21/1998 Scientist may have found way to diagnose Gulf illness A California researcher has found what he believes is a biological marker common to the wide variety of illnesses affecting some Gulf War veterans.

9/21/1998 Investigative reporter Hersh tells group military avoided Gulf War illness issue Pentagon leaders did not engage in a massive cover-up of Gulf War illnesses, but were too consumed by self interest to admit veterans were sick, investigative reporter Seymour Hersh said Sunday.

--

http://www.apci.net/~haferod/anthrax.html

Anthrax Vaccine Stories

12/28/1997 Vaccines Will Not Suffice-Fight Vs. Anthrax Needs Other Ammo The Pentagon's plan to give everyone in the military an ounce of prevention against anthrax will not eliminate the need to have pounds of cure on hand if an enemy unleashes the deadly disease as a biological weapon.

12/28/1997 sidebar Scott officer: Anthrax program complicated The process of vaccinating millions of service members against anthrax is complicated but necessary, the top medical officer at Scott Air Force Base said.

2/6/1998 British Avoiding Vaccines For Troops In Gulf British military leaders are not giving biological warfare vaccinations and anti-nerve agent pills to troops heading to the Persian Gulf because of concerns they could start a second round of Gulf War illnesses, London papers reported this week.

3/4/1998 U.S. troops to receive anthrax shots this week U.S. troops in the Persian Gulf will start getting vaccinations later this week to protect them from the thousands of gallons of anthrax weapons Iraq is thought to have, Pentagon officials announced Tuesday

5/25/1998 Anthrax Vaccines Expired The U.S. Navy injected sailors in the Persian Gulf with a 5-year-old batch of anthrax vaccine, two months after federal regulators said the vaccine had been given a new expiration date improperly.

5/25/1998 sidebar Scientists describe anthrax vaccine as an outdated 'disgusting mix' Researchers have described the anthrax vaccine the Pentagon intends to give millions of troops as "1950s technology unimpeded by medical progress."

5/29/1998 Letter from Lieutenant General Ron Blanck U.S. Army Surgeon General response to May 25, 1998 story (see above)

Or see the letter posted at http://www.defenselink.mil/other_info/blanck.html

6/30/1998 Veterans group files lawsuit - Anthrax vaccine's use is questioned A veterans group Monday filed a lawsuit demanding the government prove its anthrax vaccination program is safe and effective while the latest group of sailors heading for the Persian Gulf reportedly are refusing to take the shots.

Spokesman Cynthia Vaughn also corrected a May 29, 1998 letter (see above) from Lt. Gen. Ronald Blanck, the Army surgeon general, published in the News-Democrat on June 4. Blanck claimed that the FDA had "inspected and approved every lot of anthrax vaccine," including the one used in the gulf.

8/8/1998 AWOL soldier wants vaccine hearing -Says he was forced to take anthrax drug A 20-year-old soldier is requesting an official inquiry into his claim that a top sergeant threatened to strap him down and forcibly vaccinate him if he refused anthrax shots.

8/17/1998 Army forces anthrax vaccinations As the Pentagon expands its anthrax vaccination program this week, Army officials are saying they have the right to forcibly restrain and vaccinate soldiers who refuse the shots.

9/16/1998 New anthrax shots criticized Sailors in the Persian Gulf say the Navy is no longer using a batch of anthrax vaccine that was improperly relabeled after it expired, but the new batch is one that also was criticized by federal inspectors for quality control problems.

3/15/1999 Resistance to vaccination is growing Faced with a small but growing rebellion against mandatory anthrax vaccination, the Pentagon has unleashed an extensive public relations campaign to convince troops the vaccine is safe and effective.

5/8/1999 Colonel suspends shots One of Air Mobility Command's wing commanders has suspended anthrax vaccinations at his base, the biggest wrinkle yet to the Pentagon's mandatory vaccination program.

5/14/1999 Anthrax vaccinations set to continue at air force base The commander of Dover Air Force Base ordered the resumption of anthrax vaccinations Tuesday. A week ago the commander halted the controversial program at the Delaware base because medical personnel could not adequately answer airmen's questions.

2/7/2000 Resistance growing to anthrax vaccinations A growing resistance to the Pentagon's mandatory anthrax vaccinations is shoving Air Mobility Command into the national spotlight, as one of its pilots is choosing to face a court martial rather than take the shots.

2/7/2000 sidebar Pentagon, foes locked in complex battle In its war of words with opponents of the anthrax vaccine, the Pentagon has frequently found itself firing dud ammunition and even shooting itself in the foot.

3/27/2000 Defense contradicts itself in question over anthrax vaccine Although the Pentagon has long maintained that its controversial anthrax vaccine is licensed for use against aerosol exposure from biological weapons, military leaders now are asking to amend the license for such use.

3/27/2000 sidebar Pentagon now admits reactions much higher As many as one-third of all military personnel who receive the anthrax vaccine may have systemic reactions such as aches, rashes, chills, fevers or nausea, Pentagon officials now admit. That includes Lt. Gen. Ronald Blanck, the Army's surgeon general who oversees the program.

---- sign-on

PLEASE SIGN ON NOW & SPREAD THIS TO OTHER LISTS, ORGANIZATIONS & INDIVIDUALS.

REPLY TO: yablokov@voxnet.ru NOT to me!!!!!!
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2000 04:57:46 -0500 (EST)

Statement of non-governmental environmental organizations on the plan to export-import spent nuclear fuel

At the present time, countries that have developed nuclear energy have run into the problem of storage and burial of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste. Not wanting to use its territory for the repository of these dangerous materials, the governments and nuclear-energy companies of these countries are trying to transport them to other countries that are experiencing economic difficulties, in particular, to Russia. Earlier attempts by industrial countries to establish international repositories for spent nuclear fuel in Australia, South Africa and Namibia were not successful. Proposals by private companies to construct such a repository on one of the islands in the Pacific Ocean that belongs to the US caused a sharp negative reaction by the White House.

Russian legislation forbids the import of foreign radioactive materials for storage and burial on Russian territory. The Ministry of the Russian Federation on atomic energy (Minatom), which is counting on receiving the material into its custody and developing its potential, is lobbying to change this law and is making preparations for organizations of commercial storage and for the reprocessing of foreign radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel in its facilities. The Russian authorities, which are facing a continual budget deficit, are ready to change the law.

The administration of the US, worried on the one hand about the security of fissile materials and the possible leaking of nuclear specialists from Russia, and on the other hand, not wanting to store spent nuclear fuel on its own territory from countries that use in their reactors nuclear fuel that was produced in the US, may consider granting permission of the commercial storage of foreign radioactive materials in Russia.

The United States, in exchange for giving permission to Russia to import spent nuclear fuel from Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Switzerland, Germany, and other countries, requires that Russia stop reprocessing spent nuclear fuel and further accumulation of plutonium. But the accepted conception in Russia of a closed fuel cycle envisages such reprocessing. Minatom promises (under the conditions of constructing many new nuclear power plants) to curtail the production of plutonium for only 200 years. Having at its disposal large stock of Russian spent nuclear fuel, Minatom is ready to agree with the US requirement to give up reprocessing of foreign spent nuclear fuel today in order to be able to use it in the future in its facilities, which are constructed with "radioactive" money.

Minatom maintains that the resources they receive from storing radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel will go first to remediate land that has been polluted by radionuclides during the Cold War. However, it is clear that a primary part of the resources that are received in the waste business go into building new nuclear power plants, factories for reprocessing spent nuclear fuel, and other environmentally and politically dangerous projects.

The waste business, in which Minatom intends to earn money, will result in the deterioration of the environmental situation in Russia and create significant additional risks for the population during the transport of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste and the management of dangerous wastes.

It is disturbing to us that negotiations on the management of radioactive and nuclear materials, which affects the interests of the whole world, go on in secret from the public. We hold that this leads to the weakening of international and national environmental legislation and undermines the foundations of civil society.

We hold that countries, in which long-term radionuclides were obtained in reactors, should take full responsibility for their safe storage during the time it is necessary for full decay of all long-term radionuclides.

We hold that the Russian and US governments and other nuclear countries should first take care of the safe storage of the large quantities of already manufactured plutonium.

We categorically come out against the import and export of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste. We are against earning "dirty" money in the morally unacceptable "waste business," which carries numerous misfortunes for current and future generations, we are against double standards.

We hold that reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel, which inevitably leads to the management of a large quantity of radioactive waste and to extraction of new quantities of plutonium, should be stopped in all countries.

We are in favor of every future generation living in a less dangerous world.

Signed,

L. Popova - Center for nuclear ecology and energy policy, Moscow; e-mail: seulidia@glasnet.ru;
A. Yablokov - Center for Russian environmental policy, Moscow, fax +7(095)952 80 19; e-mail: yablokov@glasnet.ru;
E. Kriusanov - Russian NGO's Program on nuclear and radioactive safety, Moscow, e-mail: atomsafe@glasnet.ru; atomsafe@online.ru;

--- greenham common

From: Janet Bloomfield [mailto:jbloomfield@gn.apc.org]
Sent: Monday, March 27, 2000 2:40 AM
Subject: Greenham Fence to come down on April 8th, 2000

Dear Wonderful Sisters, I found out about this whilst visiting friends in Newbury this weekend. Here is evidence that change takes place after persistent campaigning. A nuclear site is being transformed back into common land. Please forward to all who might be interested.

From the West Berkshire Council:

"On Saturday 8 April 2000 the perimeter fence at Greenham Common (base for US nuclear Cruise Missiles and site of many women's protests in the 1980's) begins to come down. The base will once again be open to the public for all the enjoy. This is a significant moment as it symbolises the return of this vast area of open space filled with wildlife to the local community. It is the beginning of the restoration process which will see; the re-establishment of heathland where there were once concrete runways, the increased use of the Commons by local people and the grazing of the Commons by livestock. At 11.00 am on Saturday April 8th there will be a ceremonial entrance onto the airbase at Blue Gate opposite School Green. People are invited to gather on School Green, where they will be entertained by the the Watership Brass Band, and then participate in removing the fence and reclaiming the airbase A sculpture, a life size replica of a Cruise Missile, will be designed and built by the Youth Group and will be displayed on the day. This work will be made from materials that were once part of the base."

It would be wonderful to have a good turnout of people who campaigned to get rid of Cruise....

See you there? And if you can't be...be there in spirit. Love and peace, Janet

Janet Bloomfield 25 Farmadine Saffron Walden Essex CB11 3HR England Tel/Fax: +44 (0)1799 516189 e-mail: janet@atomicmirror.org

-----

From: Charles F Hilfenhaus <chilfenhaus@juno.com>

Thu, 27 Mar 2000
THE WASHINGTON POST

The Energy Department plans to renovate more than 6000 aging nuclear warheads during the next 15 years, almost double the number the United States is allowed to deploy under the START II arms reduction treaty according to senior U.S. officials.

The plan to keep an "inactive reserve" of 2,500 to 3,000 more warheads than permitted to be deployed under START II is the product of a little-publicized Clinton administration nuclear policy called "lead and hedge." It was described to Congress in 1996 by Harold Smith, Jr., then assistant to the secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical and biological defense programs.

He said that while the administration "leads"by pushing for force reductions in arms-control negotiations, the United States has to "retain the ability to hedge by returning to START I levels."

Smith said the policy was approved by President Clinton in September 1994 as part of a Nuclear Posture Review, an annual document setting guidelines for america's nuclear forces.

ATOMIC VETERANS RESPOND

The timing of these past decisions and the start of subcritical testing at the Nevada Test Site proves, if anyone needed proof, that these tests never had any purpose not related to nuclear weapons. Much of the renovation work could take place in Nevada at the DAF (Device Assembly Facility) complex on the Nevada Test Site built during the 1990's but never used.

From a purely military standpoint the existence of an "inactive reserve" of nuclear weapons combined with the U.S. dependance on cruise missiles, which have always been designed to be used as either conventional or nuclear delivery systems, leaves the U.S. with the option to double its nuclear force overnight.

Senate rejection of the CTBT, threats to abrogate the ABM Treaty, congressional prohibitions on cutting US forces below START I levels until the Duma ratifies START II, even though the Russians are unilaterally moving toward a 1,500 warhead arsenal that they propose for START III, all question the United States commitment to observe any arms control treaty unless there is some military advantage to do so.

The military industrial complex DOES run the United States

Charlie Hilfenhaus Alliance of Atomic Veterans Director, Atomic Workers Division chilfenhaus@juno.com

-------- alternative energy

Navajos Move Toward Solar Power

Yahoo News
Morning Coffee Edition for Monday, March 27, 2000
By MICHELLE RUSHLO
Associated Press Writer
http://www.infobeat.com/stories/cgi/story.cgi?id=2565219777-969

DILKON, Ariz. (AP) _ On the breezy grass plains where generations of Joanne Jackson's family have been born and raised, a wood bungalow with faded tan paint is alive with electricity.

The three-room house was built years ago in this western part of the Navajo Nation using her husband's veterans benefits. And though it had white plastic outlet plates on the walls and lights in the ceiling, they were merely decorative _ until September.

It was then that Mrs. Jackson, 62, and her husband, Raymond, 82, became the first inhabitants of the Navajo Nation to get power through a solar generator program whose founders hope to eventually deliver power throughout American Indian reservations.

Of the 37,000 occupied structures on the Navajo Reservation, only 9 percent have electricity and 14 percent have utility gas, according to 1990 Census Bureau statistics. Most other Navajos cook and heat with wood, coal or fuel oil.

Large spreads of open land frequently separate the homes on the reservation, which at 4.8 million acres covers an area slightly smaller than New Jersey.

The rambling expanses make hooking into the power grid eye-poppingly expensive. Stringing power lines costs roughly $30,000 per mile, according to Arizona Public Service _ an impossible sum for most families in this region where the unemployment rate hovers around 50 percent.

By comparison, a one-kilowatt solar generator, which can provide for basic needs, costs roughly $10,000.

The solar systems are ideal for Indian reservations because they are less expensive than power lines and don't tear up the landscape, said Gregory Kiss, president of Native American Photovoltaics, the non-profit corporation that helped install the Jacksons' system.

NAPV, launched last June with a $220,000 federal grant, started a lease-to-own program in the southwestern portion of the reservation, offering families one-kilowatt systems. The solar generators provide enough power to fuel a refrigerator, lights, television, water pump and computer for an average family of four.

It costs the Jacksons nothing to own the generator _ it was installed so they can show others how it works _ but normally a one-kilowatt system would cost $50 per month through the program. A family would agree to a three-year lease and, if they choose to buy it at that time, the money paid toward the lease would be applied to the purchase price.

The program, still in its infancy, should have 20 systems installed in the next six months, said Kiss, a New York architect who specializes in integrating solar systems into buildings.

Other government programs and individual homeowners have installed thousands of solar generators on the reservation over the years, Kiss said, but many generators do not function today because they were never maintained.

The maintenance required for the systems is minor. The solar-charged batteries, which are similar to golf cart batteries, need water and occasional service, Kiss said. But without that maintenance, the systems die. In some cases, the Navajo have not been taught how to maintain the systems.

To combat that and provide some badly needed jobs on the reservation, NAPV will train unemployed Navajo to service and maintain the systems periodically. Kiss is hoping to eventually create a self-sustaining industry.

``We're trying to make the program behave like a distributed service,'' he said.

So far, the Jacksons, who received their generator as a demonstration system, are thrilled.

Mrs. Jackson has a refrigerator for the first time, sparing her trip after trip in an old pickup truck 10 miles down the dusty rutted road from her home to the market. She keeps a few tomatoes and soda cans in the small refrigerator, smiling proudly as she shows it off to visitors.

``I like the whole system,'' Mrs. Jackson, who speaks primarily Navajo, said through a translator. ``I have been really wanting a refrigerator.''

Anna M. Frazier, whose duties in this Navajo community of 2,000 are similar to that of mayor, said many of the roughly 1,200 Dilkon residents have no power. They use lanterns for light, wood stoves and propane for heat and cooking.

``That's just how we've always lived,'' Frazier said. ``To have electricity, we had to adjust our lifestyle.''

Yet, she and others say electricity does provide convenience and safety for Navajo families.

At minimum, it means Navajo children can do their homework at night and maybe one day access a computer, Frazier said.

For Mrs. Jackson, it means her husband can safely descend the rough wood steps at the front of the house by porch light at night.

It's a minor convenience in an urban area but an enormous help here_ where the nearest street light is 30 miles away.

``The porch light is on,'' Mrs. Jackson said. ``That's one thing I like.'' ___

The one-kilowatt solar generators use a series of batteries that are similar to golf cart batteries.

The 20 batteries sit in metal cases and are connected to thin silvery sheets that create a shade area roughly large enough to cover a mid-sized car.

The units can fuel a radio, television, small refrigerator, water pump, telephone, computer and lights, even on the cloudiest days. On bright, sunny days, they can generate twice as much energy as needed to supply all of the appliances.

---

Non-polluting cars to get the fast lanes

Washington Times
March 27, 2000
By Thomas D. Elias SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://208.246.212.80/national/default-200032722374.htm

LOS ANGELES - Imagine cruising along alone in the car-pool lane of your local interstate, driving right past the usual traffic jam, passing state highway patrolmen stuck in heavy traffic and not getting a $280 ticket for it.

This will soon be reality in California, but only for drivers in zero-emission cars powered by electricity or natural gas or some hybrid combination.

Starting this summer, a new state law will allow solitary drivers in non-polluting alternative-fuel cars and light trucks to use the car-pool lanes. It's a new use for the world's largest network of high-occupancy vehicle lanes, which are now used only to about one-eighth of capacity. State officials see the extra freeway space as a way to induce motorists to buy "green" cars.

The idea of rewarding buyers of clean cars came from Republican state legislators, some of whom have long seen the car-pool lanes as a waste that slows traffic in other lanes.

And what a reward it will be. A 23-mile rush-hour commute from suburban Pomona to downtown Los Angeles on Interstate 10, the San Bernardino Freeway, now takes single drivers an average of 48 minutes, according to the California Department of Transportation. Use of high-occupancy lanes that run nearly that full distance generally cuts the time almost in half.

The benefits are even greater on Interstate 405, the constantly clogged San Diego Freeway that sports fast-moving HOV lanes through most of Los Angeles and Orange counties, while the rest of the roadway usually resembles a vast parking lot between 7 and 10 a.m. and again between 3:30 and 7 p.m.

"I think it will be great to get a little perk like that," said Bernard Kirkman, who travels daily from Huntington Beach in Orange County to an aerospace engineering job in El Segundo, just south of the Los Angeles International Airport. "I bought a General Motors EV1 for the fun of it last year, and now I'm going to get to use the diamond lane."

The EV1 is one of five non-polluting electric cars now for sale in California, where many public garages feature special parking spaces where they can be recharged. By the 2003 model year, several more battery-powered models will be offered, along with some natural gas and natural gas/ electric hybrids.

That's because 10 percent of all new-car fleets offered for sale in California must be zero-emission vehicles by that year under rules adopted in 1994 by the state's Air Resources Board. That is America's strongest clean-car mandate and opening the car-pool lanes to them is also the strongest buying incentive offered anywhere.

Like the EV1, most new models are expected to cost more than $20,000. Some will be gasoline/ electric hybrids, able to switch back and forth between power sources. Anything using any gasoline will not be eligible for special treatment in carpool lanes.

Sales of the EV1, the first electric car to reach the market, have been slow so far, with fewer than 800 sold in a two-year period, largely due to price, according to market research surveys.

"The reason to give special access to alternative vehicles is you want to have some social benefit for people who are making some sacrifice," said Robert Bienenfeld, manager of alternative-fuel vehicle sales and marketing for American Honda, headquartered in suburban Torrance.

Adds Republican state Assemblyman Tom McClintock, long a critic of HOV lanes, "The more we can open the underused diamond lanes, the better. But this is a stunning admission that the car-pool lane is not promoting car-pooling to any major degree, so they must find new justifications for this enormous loss of highway capacity."

Not many cars will be able to use the new privilege right away. "We expect less than 10,000 of these vehicles in the next year, so there will not be a huge overload on the car-pool lanes," said Jerry Martin, spokesman for the Air Resources Board.

But there may be confusion at first among police officers, some of whom may not immediately recognize all zero-emission cars and pull drivers over.

Meanwhile, those driving electric cars are chomping at the bit. "This car's a rocket," said actor Ed Begley Jr., long a fan of electric cars and one of the first EV1 buyers. "Unless you've got a souped-up Lamborghini, this car will blow right by you.

"I love the idea of using the diamond lanes. And I like the idea of opening them up to other people using EVs. When you have a huge problem with air quality, you need to do everything you can to get people to help solve it."

-------- britain

Broadcast can be seen online today----beginning 4 pm EST.

Atomic Alert
Monday 27 March 2000
Reporter Gerry Northam
Producer Fiona Campbell
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/events/panorama/newsid_416000/416234.stm

Two companies with serious concerns over their safety records are about to take over the running of Britain's top-secret nuclear weapons site. Gerry Northam investigates why British Nuclear Fuels - who've been found guilty of "systematic management failure", and Lockheed Martin - officially criticised over safety at several American sites, are part of the new consortium at Aldermaston.

--

Atomic Alert

Monday March 27 2000
Reporter Gerry Northam
Producer Fiona Campbell
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/events/panorama/newsid_416000/416234.stm

Panorama reveals that two of the three companies in the new consortium due to take over control of the Atomic Weapons Establishment have seriously blemished long-term safety records. The programme includes the first interview with a nuclear whistleblower at a top-secret plant in Idaho, who was sacked after raising the alarm over poor safety standards. A month after he was sacked, a worker was killed in an avoidable accident.

This week the government has to confirm its decision whether on not to allow the new consortium to take over the running of Britain's Aldermaston nuclear weapons site from April 1st - the only place in Britain where nuclear bombs are manufactured.

While British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. (BNFL) has been severely criticised over lax safety procedures, Panorama reveals that US firm Lockheed Martin has an even worse safety record. The UK government originally announced last December that it had awarded the contract to manage Aldermaston from April 1st this year to the consortium including BNFL and Lockheed Martin.

The programme has visited three sites in the US where the American defence giant has suffered six major accidents in recent years, been heavily criticised by several government reports and where its operating licences have not been renewed. The company has also been accused of widespread environmental pollution.

The Idaho Plant

In Idaho, Lockheed Martin's management of a nuclear reactor development plant was criticised by the government following a fatal accident in 1998.

Jim Osborne, a safety worker at the plant, had been sacked by the company as retaliation for his disclosure of , what the DOE called "a dangerous lack of safety inspections".

Speaking out for the first time to Panorama, Osborne tells the programme: "I went from doing 45-50 inspections per month to a maximum of two [which] has a significant reduction in safety. I told them that we were going to kill or injure somebody severely and I was told by my manager at that time that it was none of my concern that if we did kill somebody or injure somebody that management would handle it." Mr Osborne has been reinstated after the DOE report vindicated him. Following the US government's official verdict that the accident was "avoidable" and revealed an organisational safety problem the Department of Energy refused to extend Lockheed Martin's contract.

I told them that we were going to kill or injure somebody severely and I was told by my manager at that time that it was none of my concern that if we did kill somebody or injure somebody that management would handle it

A government memo obtained by Panorama says that the company's managers "have not established an underlying culture of rigor, discipline and sustaining leadership. " It added "a serious question remains whether Lockheed Martin has the necessary commitment to act in the Government's interests at all times."

Y12 Plant in Oak Ridge

Lockheed Martin runs the US cousin of Aldermaston. The Y12 plant in Oak Ridge, Tennessee is responsible for the manufacture and refurbishment of the thermonuclear components of nuclear weapons.

In 1994, a safety audit uncovered 1284 separate violations of criticality safety - the risk of setting off a critical incident leading to a nuclear chain reaction. The government's safety board inspection showed "the apparent breakdown of administrative controls" Following the report, the whole plant was shut down, and Lockheed Martin have still not been given permission to restart the most dangerous operations using uranium. Ralph Hutchison, the Presbyterian minister who has led protests against the site, tells Panorama that these 1284 "non-compliances" meant "that it wasn't just one mistake, it meant that they had an utter and complete breakdown of their criticality systems."

Explosion at Y12 injures 10

Last December, a week after the UK government awarded the Lockheed Martin/BNFL consortium the management contract for Aldermaston, there was an explosion in the Y12 uranium plant, which injured ten workers.

The US Government report on that explosion called safety management "significantly deficient," and said that had the company learnt proper lessons from previous accidents, the explosion need not have happened.

Dr David Michaels, U.S. Assistant Secretary of Energy tells Panorama that "on site, in that building, were materials unused by workers or management , were materials that said 'don't do exactly what you're doing'. He added "the safety management system that we demand of our contractors, wasn't followed. We don't think it [the explosion] was a problem of the individual workers at all. It was simply a management problem."

We don't think it [the explosion] was a problem of the individual workers at all. It was simply a management problem."

Paducah, Kentucky

Lockheed Martin ran the uranium enrichment plant at Paducah, Kentucky between 1984 and 1998. Although they inherited a heavily polluted site, environmental contamination worsened during their management, according to Panorama.

Environmental Consultant, John Tillson, tells the programme, "they allowed it [the pollution] to spread and get worse, and once it gets worse it's economically impossible to clean up."

As long ago as 1990, a Department of Energy report found that "environmental monitoring programs were not being effectively implemented."

The Lamb family well has been locked by the Government

Ronald Lamb, a local car mechanic, drew his water from his family well. After his family began to feel unwell from drinking the water, the government sealed up the well and piped in water from a supply ten miles away.

Warren Smith, a local farmer has a creek flowing through his land which has been fenced off as a public hazard polluted by toxic waste and radioactivity. Below his land is an underground lake of radio-active water spreading at around a foot a day.

Along with other residents, Smith is now suing Lockheed Martin, which has told the BBC that it "finds the allegations without merit" and intends "to contest them vigorously in court"

---

From: wheezin2@aol.com

The following attachment is the transcript of the BBC's "Atomic Alert" program shown recently. It shows the international implications of the Lockheed Martin / BNFL marriage, and includes some Oak Ridge and Paducah connections. It's in Microsoft Word, if you have problems opening, or want it broken down into parts (to avoid and attachment), let me know. Glenn

BBC: TRANSCRIPT PANORAMA "ATOMIC ALERT" 27/3/00
TRANSCRIPT PANORAMA "ATOMIC ALERT" 27/3/00

GERRY NORTHAM Britain's nuclear bomb factory is to have new bosses, but their safety records are disturbing.

LAURENCE WILLIAMS We told the company that they must improve before it got to a situation where we were likely to be in a danger of having a nuclear incident.

NORTHAM Plants run by the American partner have had a succession of serious accidents.

JIM OSBORNE I reaffirmed the fact that we were going to kill or injure somebody severely.

NORTHAM Can these companies now be trusted to manage the British nuclear stockpile? For almost 50 years the peaceful Berkshire village of Aldermaston has housed Britain's bomb. Recent prosecutions over safety here and risk to the environment have raised national concern. This is the top secret factory which built the atom bomb, and now maintains Britain's armoury of trident warheads any one of which any day could blow Berkshire, and far beyond, sky-high.

DAVID RENDEL MP LIBERAL DEMOCRAT, NEWBURY The Aldermaston plant is the UK's major nuclear weapons site. It's enormously significant in the constituency, not just because a number of people are employed there. But of course if anything were to happen on the site, then that could devastate a large part of the area that my constituency is in.

NORTHAM On Friday the private company which has managed Aldermaston for the government since 1993 will reach the end of its contract. It failed to win the new one. New managers have been picked to take over on Saturday. They'll inherit most of the 4,500 Aldermaston staff and with them the perils of running an inherently dangerous site. Surface water from the atomic plant is contaminated by mysterious sources of radioactivity. No-one has been able to trace them. An alert government inspector caught the current management pouring this radioactive water illegally into the open stream which runs through the local village.

IAN JACKSON NUCLEAR SITES INSPECTOR, ENVIRONMENT AGENCY Over a period those discharges began to dramatically increase, so by June of 1998 over 70% of Aldermaston's total liquid discharge of tritium was via the Aldermaston stream.

NORTHAM Did the management know that this was happening?

JACKSON Yes, they certainly knew that this was happening. The discharges were indeed managed by the company.

NORTHAM Last December, in an unprecedented environmental prosecution, Aldermaston's management pleaded guilty to polluting the stream and making false statements about it. The company was fined heavily.

Dr JOHN CROFTS DIRECTOR, HUNTING BRAE We were guilty. There was a technical breach. We should have asked for an authorisation. Because we thought that everybody understood what was going on, we thought the data was in the public domain, we omitted to ask for an authorisation.

NORTHAM Aldermaston's Management Company was also fined in 1998 for a criminal breach of nuclear safety in which two workers accidentally inhaled plutonium, the most lethal element on earth.

CROFTS We made a mistake because we have a thing called an exclusion zone. There's a piece of work and within a given distance all people should wear protective equipment and the exclusion zone was defined badly, it was as simple as that. And yes, two people were then contaminated and that's a matter for regret.

NORTHAM To Hunting BRAE, these two landmark prosecutions were mere blips in a seven year record of openness and public accountability, so losing the contract rankles.

CROFTS I thought we'd done a damned good job in the 7 years. We delivered the programme, we decommissioned the free fall bomb, we'd improved waste management, we built schemes such as this.

NORTHAM Are you feeling sort about it?

CROFTS Personally, a little bit, yes.

NORTHAM A little bit.

CROFTS Yes.

GERRY NORTHAM Late last year the government announced that this contract had been won by a consortium including British Nuclear Fuels and the American defence giant Lockheed Martin. Panorama has researched the records of these companies in managing other nuclear plants and found them both distinctly troubling. While the failures of British Nuclear Fuels have been widely publicised, we found that if anything the history of its American partner, Lockheed Martin, gives even greater cause for concern. Lockheed Martin took over the uranium enrichment plant at Paducah, Kentucky in 1984 and ran it until 1998. When the company arrived Paducah was already one of America's most notorious nuclear dumping grounds. After 14 years of Lockheed Martin management, it still is. It has 50,000 barrels of contaminated waste, and 65,000 tons of polluted scrap metal, including the infamous drum mountain, leaching radioactivity and toxic chemicals into the landscape.

JOHN TILLSON It's made of approximately a quarter million crushed barrels so you have a little bit of uranium, a little bit of plutonium and neptunium, technetium and some other radioactive elements.

NORTHAM In 14 years of Lockheed Martin company's management of this plant, did the environmental contamination get worse or improve?

JOHN TILLSON ENVIRONMENTAL CONSULTANT Oh it got worse. What they did was they took kind of a weird approach in that they did not go to the people who had accidentally caused the contamination or caused the contamination when the rules were not as stringent. In essence they allowed it to spread and just get worse, and once it gets worse it's economically impossible to clean some of this stuff up.

NORTHAM Lockheed Martin's management at Paducah was criticised the American Government as early as 1990. A Department of Energy report found that "environmental monitoring programmes were not being effectively implemented". Panorama wanted to ask Lockheed Martin about its environmental record, one of the key areas of concern over new management at Aldermaston. The company refused to be interviewed. For those living around the Paducah plant within earshot of its warning sirens, fear of the environment has become a way of life. Ronald Lamb, a car mechanic, lives and works nearby. Ronald grew up on the 120 acres his father re- established after the war. The family drew its drinking water from a well sunk close to Big Bayou Creek running out of the nuclear site and carrying radioactive waste. Ten years ago members of the Lamb family suffered debilitating gastric illnesses which seemed to defy medicine.

RONALD LAMB They checked us for bacteria, amoebas, parasites, everything commonly known to man. They treated us for things that.. you know, just gave us the treatments and it didn't work. Our life changed considerably. I mean we gave up a farming operation because we didn't feel like we could continue to do it. We just didn't feel good.

NORTHAM Eventually the family's well was sealed by the US Government along with other wells nearby. Sampling had confirmed that some contained radioactive and chemical pollution. No direct link was proved with any illnesses but at great expense tap water was piped to all local homes from the supply to the city ten miles away. Lockheed Martin, according to residents, tried to minimise any corporate responsibility.

Did you, at the time, approach the management at the plant and ask what was going on?

LAMB Yes, my dad went over there to ask them, he just point blank asked the question and they said they didn't have anything over there to cause our problems.

NORTHAM When residents around that plant complain not only that their land water have been contaminated but that they were not told the truth in recent years, are they right?

Dr DAVID MICHAELS U.S. ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR ENERGY It's certainly true that residents and workers were for many years not told that the Uranium that was used at that plant was contaminated with plutonium, neptunium, technetium and other materials, so it's certainly reasonable to think the residents weren't formally told, and they certainly would have no reason to know that that was what was out there.

NORTHAM So Ronald Lamb, with dozens of his neighbours, is now suing Lockheed Martin, alleging that the company not only polluted their land and water, but also acted to conceal the risk this created.

LAMB Basically, you know, our property's been damaged. I think it's been damaged to the point that we couldn't sell it. It's been damaged to the point that I'm afraid to live on it in one respect. I mean we don't raise a garden anymore. It took a lot of enjoyment away from our.. I mean my family. Things are different.

NORTHAM The lead Plaintiff in the residents' legal action is Warren Smith who farms next to the plant on the land where he was born just over 70 years ago. His family has made a living on the smallholding since 1856. Warren's farm, too, is blighted by the nuclear plant. He has another of its outflows, Little Bayou Creek, running through his land. The Government has fenced the creek off as a public hazard contaminated by toxic chemicals and radioactivity, but the fence doesn't stop the creek from flooding and polluting Warren's farm land.

How high does the water in the creek rise?

WARREN SMITH Oh it gets from hill to hill here. It goes.. well on both sides of the creek, it goes 50 yards on each side of the creek, give or take.

NORTHAM So if the creek is contaminated, what does that do to the land?

SMITH That's my question. That's my question. I can't grow strawberries no more, so...

NORTHAM Did you used to grow all these things?

SMITH Oh yes, yes, I had some of the finest strawberries, water melons.. water melons weighed 25- 30lb.

NORTHAM And now?

SMITH No.

NORTHAM It's not only the stream. Warren's farm is also on the edge of a hidden underground lake of billions of gallons of radioactive water slowly spreading out from the plant beneath local properties.

Your farm is where?

SMITH My farm is right in here. The area of contamination there...

NORTHAM Is it moving?

SMITH Well they say it's moving ?? at a foot a day.

NORTHAM It's moving at a foot a day.

SMITH That's what they say.

NORTHAM In a brief written statement the corporation told Panorama: "Lockheed Martin has not found any information that would suggest its companies misled workers or residents as to the state of workers safety or environment protection." It's early morning in the cold north western state of Idaho and Jim Osborne sets off for work as an inspector at a nuclear reactor development site. Last year Jim was at the centre of a case which Lockheed Martin contested vigorously and lost. After a number of near accidents in 1998 Jim warned that the company's cutbacks in plant inspections were beginning to threaten his fellow workers.

JIM OSBORNE PRINCIPAL INSPECTOR, IDAHO NATIONAL ENGINEERING AND ENVIRONMENTAL LABORATORY Equipment that we used to inspect, they were having people inspect it that weren't certified.

NORTHAM And what effect did that change of policy have on the number of quality inspections that were carried out?

OSBORNE To my background, which is an electrical type inspector, I went from doing 45 to 50 inspections per month to maximum of 2.

NORTHAM And if there's a reduction in quality assurance inspections, what implication does that have for the safety of workers at the plant?

OSBORNE It has a significant reduction of safety.

NORTHAM The reactor plant where Jim Osborne works is hidden 50 miles out west into the desert and heavily guarded. He has a long history there and tried raising his concern within the company, up the supervision and management chain of Lockheed Martin.

OSBORNE I told them that.. I reaffirmed the fact that we were going to kill or injure somebody severely, and I was told by my manager at that time, with my directors present, that it was none of my concern. That if we did kill somebody or injure somebody, that management would handle it. I just could not believe that I was given that answer.

NORTHAM Frustrated by Lockheed Martin's reaction, Jim Osborne threatened to take his warnings outside the company to the US government. His concern proved costly. Within weeks Jim Osborne was placed under investigation by the company on suspicion of fiddling his time sheets. Three months after he first raised his voice he was sacked. A government investigation of his case has found that the time sheets were a pretext. In reality, Jim Osborne was fired by Lockheed Martin in retaliation for his disclosure of a dangerous lack of safety inspections. Soon after Jim Osborne's dismissal, on 28th July 1998 his fears were realised. At ten past six in the evening, a team of electricians was carrying out maintenance in the test reactor area.

ROBERT ALVAREZ SENIOR ADVISOR, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, 1993-99 A fire suppression system was accidentally set off which released a huge amount of carbon dioxide in an area where I think there were some 13 workers. The workers were instantly inundated with this gas. Workers were severely injured, largely from oxygen depravation. One person perished. This was one of the more severe accidents to occur for many, many years. I think it was pure luck that other workers did not die. And not only that, it was very clear in the aftermath of this accident that this accident could have been prevented.

NORTHAM How closely did the facts of that accident bear out the warnings that you had given several months earlier?

OSBORNE It was the exact thing I was warning them about. It was a system that normally we would have been involved in and we were cut out of it.

NORTHAM You were checking the quality.

OSBORNE Yes.

ALVAREZ When you have a death and you have people who are almost killed and severely injured because of an accident that could have been prevented, again where there were precursor accidents, and nobody did anything to fix these problems, he's correct.

NORTHAM Jim Osborne is right.

ALVAREZ Yes.

NORTHAM Kerry Austin, the electrician who suffocated, was 47. If Lockheed Martin had managed safety properly, the accident need never have happened.

How did you react when you read the news?

OSBORNE I called the local DoE representative here that I'd been working with and I told him.. I said, see Rick? It happened.

NORTHAM And he said?

OSBORNE He said "Jim I never doubted you for a minute".

ALVAREZ I'm not sure, you know, how high the standard needs to be for gross negligence in a courtroom but at least my own personal opinion that certainly comes damned close to it.

NORTHAM Uncertainty over the safety of workers here has damaged the American Government's confidence in Lockheed Martin. The official verdict on the fatal accident is that it was avoidable and revealed an organisational problem over safety. The company had cut costs without adequate evaluation of the risks for workers.

How serious a management problem did that accident reveal in your view?

Dr DAVID MICHAELS U.S. ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR ENERGY That was a very serious management problem. It's a problem that we face throughout the complex, that we expect that all our contractors follow our safety management system, which requires planning the job and looking at the hazards before it begins, involving the workers from the very beginning, considering what the risks are and planning and following through those plans accordingly, and this was an example where that wasn't done and it was a tragic example.

NORTHAM A government memo released to Panorama says "The company's managers have not established an underlying culture of rigour, discipline and sustaining leadership." At another point it says: "A serious question remains whether Lockheed Martin has the necessary commitment to act in the government's interest at all times." Late last year Jim Osborne was legally reinstated in his job. Lockheed Martin, meanwhile, has left Idaho. It's contract was not extended. We wanted to ask the company about the case of Jim Osborne and how it would deal with workers at Aldermaston who voiced concern over safety. Lockheed Martin refused to be interviewed but told Panorama the company does not condone or tolerate any form of retaliation. Lockheed Martin has also run into trouble at the showpiece nuclear weapons facility it runs in East Tennessee. This is the United States cousin of Aldermaston. A secret plant hidden in the mountains at Oak Ridge, and still known by it's code name, Y-12.

[Newsreel] Oak Ridge, Tennessee, site of one of the huge secret factories producing atomic bombs.

NORTHAM It was part of the Manhattan Project in the 1940s. Here they produced the explosive for the first atomic bomb.

ALVAREZ The Y-12 plant is responsible for the manufacture and refurbishment of the thermal nuclear component of the nuclear weapon. About 189 metric tons of highly enriched uranium is stored there.

NORTHAM On Sunday evenings, just outside the plant perimeter, a small group of peace protesters gathers for a vigil. In the early 90s they questioned the safety hazards of the plant, particularly the risk of a critical incident setting off a nuclear chain reaction. They were questions Lockheed Martin seemed eager to answer.

RALPH HUTCHISON Throughout that conversation they assured us over and over again criticality safety is the one thing that we do right, which was slightly unnerving because we hoped they were doing many things right. But if you're only going to do one thing right, that is the one most important thing it seemed to us. It also was the one thing we had to take their word for because they couldn't show us how they handled the highly enriched uranium.

NORTHAM But in 1994 a government inspector discovered a breach of nuclear safety which supervisors and managers didn't bother to correct. When the whole site was checked, the result was unnerving.

HUTCHISON We learnt that their audit had uncovered 1,284 separate violations of criticality safety procedures. They called them 'non-compliances'.

NORTHAM And what did that enormous number mean?

HUTCHISON Well it meant to me that it wasn't just one little mistake. It meant that they had an utter and complete breakdown of their criticality safety systems there.

NORTHAM But that's the most important form of safety.

HUTCHISON It was the one thing they did right.

NORTHAM That's what they'd said.

HUTCHISON Right.

NORTHAM There was anxiety over these results in the Federal Safety Board. It said the inspection showed "..the apparent breakdown of administrative control.."

JOSEPH CARSON SAFETY ENGINEER, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY What it indicated about the management of the plant is 'see no evil, hear no evil'. They did not want to hear about the problems. It was basically just a paper programme. If someone identified problems, we'll write something down that we'll fix it some day, but then just put that in a file. No action needs to be taken.

NORTHAM Did that mean the plant was not safe?

CARSON It means that the plant was not in compliance with the safety procedures which means it was not adequately safe.

NORTHAM The whole plant was shut down. Even now parts are still closed because of safety concerns. Lockheed Martin declared itself ready last November to restart the most dangerous operations with uranium. Government inspectors found new violations, blamed the management and again stood operations down. One month later, the British Government awarded Lockheed Martin a share in the management of Aldermaston.

[Newsreel] This is 6 Eyewitness News at 5:00 Several workers are injured, dozens evacuated after a chemical accident at the Department of Energy's Y-12 Plant.

NORTHAM The following week, there was an explosion in a Uranium building at the Y-12 plant which shook still further the confidence of the American government.

MICHAELS I was in Y-12 the day of the explosion. The explosion occurred at 9.30 in the morning.

NORTHAM Emergency crews were called out to take the injured off for treatment.

[Newsreel] ..waiting ambulances there for some of the other patients. Scruggs received second and third degree chemical burns over 25% of his body.

MICHAELS Ten workers were injured, three were hospitalised, one was hospitalised for an extended period of time and has still not fully recovered several months later.

NORTHAM And this was a building with uranium in it.

MICHAELS Yes, and in fact the explosion includes some depleted uranium and there was some small but.. you know, we don't.. small radioactive material that ?? used and we take that very seriously.

NORTHAM The accident happened while workers were cleaning up a hazardous spill. They first sprayed it with oil and then, using a metal rod, inadvertently set off an explosive chemical reaction. Once again the accident revealed a gap in Lockheed Martin's safety management.

MICHAELS On site in that building, unused by workers or management, were materials that said don't do exactly what you're doing.

NORTHAM Why then did they not either read them or take notice of them.

MICHAELS Because we believe it was because the safety management system that we demand of our contractors wasn't being followed in this case.

NORTHAM So it's a management problem. Not simply a problem of the individual workers?

MICHAELS Yes, we don't think it was a problem with the individual workers at all. It was simply a management problem .

NORTHAM The American Government has issued a devastating report on the explosion here which says that the implementation of safety management is significantly deficient and blames senior Lockheed Martin managers for lack of involvement in safety. The company, it says, did not learn proper lessons from past accidents, and if it had done, this explosion need never have happened. Six serious accidents here and in Idaho show a similar pattern of failure in safety management, and until Lockheed Martin puts its house in order, the American Government concludes, accidents are likely to continue. Again Lockheed Martin refused to give an interview. The company says it has restructured management at the plant and that safety and security continue to be of the utmost importance. Last December Lockheed Martin's tenure at Oak Ridge was shortened. The government had previously announced an extension of the company's contract to run the plant until June next year. Now, that's been cut by 8 months.

The American Government have said to us that safety standards at Lockheed Martin plant had not met the American Government's requirements. Why would they meet yours at Aldermaston?

BARONESS SYMONS MINISTER FOR DEFENCE PROCUREMENT I too have spoken to the American Government about Lockheed Martin. They have had some criticisms about the way in which Lockheed Martin has operated at some of their installations, but they've also said very firmly, that they don't regard Lockheed Martin as being in a position not to be able to bid for American contracts, and indeed they've expressed admiration for the way that Lockheed Martin has conducted itself at some of their installations?

NORTHAM Have you read the report which says that "looking at six serious accidents at Oak Ridge and at Idaho, the same systemic deficiencies appear in management as the cause of those accidents and that accidents are likely to continue because Lockheed Martin persistently don't put things right. Have you read that report?

SYMONS No, I have not read individual reports.

NORTHAM Why have you not read that report?

SYMONS Because ministers do not read all the detail. What we have to rely is the people...

NORTHAM But this is a report on a company which is coming to Aldermaston....

SYMONS If I may say so....

NORTHAM It makes this fundamental criticism.

SYMONS .. I wouldn't necessarily be able to understand all the bits of reports and the import. I have to rely, as I suggest most of us do, on people who have real expertise, in this country....

NORTHAM Let me see if you can understand these words. They don't seem very difficult to me. They look at six accidents, serious accidents involving three fatalities. "Similar deficiencies led to these accidents. Those include lack of management involvement and supervision, and accidents are likely to continue because Lockheed Martin will not be able to implement safety management fully and effectively." That's perfectly plain Minister, why are they suitable for Aldermaston?

SYMONS I have told you that the United States believe that Lockheed Martin are suitable and you have to go on the assessment of the experts of the records, not only the American experts, but the experts in this country. When I say I wouldn't necessarily understand, I have sufficient humility to know that I'm certainly not a nuclear scientist.

NORTHAM But you don't need to be.

SYMONS But there are those.. there are those who are and who understand the implications of these reports in full.

NORTHAM The Government's difficulty doesn't end with Lockheed Martin. Another company in the winning contract at Aldermaston is also in deep trouble - British Nuclear Fuels. Over the past year doubt has grown, too, over its management of safety at Sellafield.

LAURENCE WILLIAMS CHIEF NUCLEAR INSPECTOR Nuclear Installations Inspectorate I started to notice a number of incidents coming across my desk. I did call in the.. my head of division that looks after BNFL and say is this a trend, are we seeing something developing here. So they went away and had a look at it, came back and a couple of months later and said "Yes, we think there is a trend increasing." You know, the inspectors are not happy with some of the things that are going on.

NORTHAM Nuclear inspectors already had Sellafield under investigation when the government awarded the contract for Aldermaston. BNFL also came under suspicion over data on pellets of reprocessed mixed oxide nuclear fuel known as MOX, for which the major customer, Japan, demanded a third set of quality checks.

JOHN KANE GMB CONVENOR, SELLAFIELD What had actually gone on, on some occasions, a mixture of both pressure of work and, to be fair, in some cases people wanting a bit of extra time to themselves. They'd actually bypassed that process, they hadn't measured the 200 pellets. They'd called up on computer, the previous batch, and they'd just used that data for that batch.

NORTHAM This too was known by the British authorities before BNFL was awarded part of the management of Aldermaston. The fuel pellets, meanwhile, were still being shipped to Japan to fire nuclear electricity. When it emerged that some quality data were fake, Japanese protesters were outraged.

[Protesters' chant BNFL - never again. BNFL - never again.]

NORTHAM And so was the extremely important nuclear customer.

SHIGERU KUWABARA KANSAI ELECTRIC POWER COMPANY, JAPAN [Translated] The fact of the matter is, we have lost our trust in the quality of BNFL fuel, so I think the most important thing is that BNFL can once again guarantee the quality of the fuel that they are supplying.

NORTHAM John Taylor, BNFL chief executive, was forced to make a hurried, humiliating visit to Japan.

JOHN TAYLOR Personally, and on behalf of BNFL and all it's employees, I wish to offer my very sincere apologies.

NORTHAM What the inspector says is so troubling about that, is not just the operatives did this, but that the management system allowed them to do it. How was it possible that they could do that and the management not stop them?

JEREMY RYECROFT THORP GROUP COMMERCIAL DIRECTOR, BNFL Well we've asked ourselves obviously the very same question. There are deficiencies in the management system but it did happen, and what we're now setting about is looking at ways of tightening up management.

NORTHAM So when the inspector says of that incident, "management present was clearly insufficient in terms of both time and having a questioning attitude", that was right was it?

RYECROFT Yes, yes indeed.

NORTHAM You're pleading guilty there.

RYECROFT We accept that, yes.

NORTHAM Then more faked data were discovered for BNFL's supplies of reprocessed fuel pellets to a nuclear plant in Germany.

GILA ALTMANN GERMAN ENVIRONMENT MINISTER At the end of January, then we were informed that there were falsifications of documents concerning German deliveries as well, and when we came to know about there was irregularities we were very upset because the most important thing to managers is that the quality checks and the safety checks that they are okay.

NORTHAM The German reactor was shut down and all reprocessed fuel shipments from BNFL have been suspended by the German Government. British nuclear inspectors meantime reported to the government that failures in safety management are widespread at Sellafield.

STEPHEN BYERS SECRETARY OF STATE FOR TRADE & INDUSTRY [Speaking publicly 15th February 2000] I think the events do show a fundamental flaw in the management at BNFL, and that has to change.

LAURENCE WILLIAMS CHIEF NUCLEAR INSPECTOR NUCLEAR INSTALLATIONS INSPECTORATE Clearly what we have seen at Sellafield is that managers who have day to day control of the safety related operations did not have the resources or sufficient time to do the job properly.

NORTHAM That's terrifying.

WILLIAMS It is saying that we have detected a deterioration in standards which we are not prepared to accept and we have told the company that they must improve before it got to a situation where we were likely to be in a danger of having an nuclear incident.

NORTHAM Late last week Swedish and Swiss Governments also suspended reprocessed fuel shipments from Sellafield, and the American Government declared 'business as usual' is over with BNFL, threatening more than £60 billion's worth of current and potential business in the US.

JOHN KANE GMB CONVENOR, SELLAFIELD We're not sure yet whether the damage is irreparable, but I do believe as a company we are being put on the brink of extinction. That's my personal belief.

NORTHAM The company on the brink of extinction?

KANE With this, yes, I honestly believe that.

JEREMY RYCROFT THORP GROUP COMMERCIAL DIRECTOR, BNFL What we are saying is that re-building the company and rebuilding the confidence of customers, so we develop our business, is very challenging. That's the thing that's going to be difficult, and what we want to do is to rebuild our relationship with customers so we win more orders and have a viable company.

NORTHAM Even after the international public shame of British Nuclear Fuels with major contracts around the world, and now the entire future of reprocessing under threat, the Government's inspectors are advising that the contract to manage Aldermaston should go ahead as planned in five days time. Which must raise the question how BNFL, which has done so baldly on it's home ground in Sellafield, would perform if it were allowed into Aldermston.

RYECROFT We will work to Aldermaston's site management of safety system and our people are perfectly competent to work within that system, and we're ensuring that the people put forward to work at Aldermaston are certainly not tainted by involvement in any of the issues or any of the difficulties that have taken place at Sellafield.

BARONESS SYMONS MINISTER FOR DEFENCE PROCUREMENT The people involved in our contract at Aldermaston have not been involved in any wrongdoing, they have no taint of wrongdoing.

NORTHAM But the whole management was criticised by the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate.

SYMONS Well I'm afraid you again have to come back....

NORTHAM That's the fundamental flaw that Stephen Byers has spoken of and you're bringing them to Aldermaston.

SYMONS But the same Nuclear Installations Inspectorate have told us categorically that those managers who are coming to Aldermaston, if indeed we go ahead with the contract, are not tainted, and that they, the very people who made the criticism, are confident about them coming to Aldermaston.

NORTHAM As the government minister responsible for this, you are telling people who live near Aldermaston, if the new contract goes ahead, Aldermaston will be safe.

SYMONS I am telling you that we will not let the contract go ahead unless we believe Aldermaston is safe.

NORTHAM This week the government has to decide if the new Aldermaston contract should go ahead. If it does, the management of Britain's atomic weapons establish will include two major nuclear companies with records of failure over the most vital issue - safety. The government insists that they would pose no danger at Aldermaston. We can only hope they're right.

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Nuclear Plant in Britain Admits Sabotage

New York Times
March 27, 2000
By ALAN COWELL
http://www.nytimes.com/00/03/27/news/world/britain-nuke.html

LONDON, March 26 -- With an international outcry building for the closing of one of Britain's most troubled nuclear fuel processing plants, its operators acknowledged today that a saboteur had severed cables controlling robotic operations in a radioactive area of the installation.

The admission added to a growing catalog of safety-related problems at the sprawling Sellafield plant on the Irish Sea in remote northwestern England. The problems began to emerge late last year when inspection documents accompanying a shipment of nuclear fuel pellets bound for Japanese reactors were found to have been falsified.

Since then, the United States has said it would send safety investigators to the plant, operated by British Nuclear Fuels, a government-owned company that has been granted multibillion-dollar contracts by the American government to help with nuclear waste disposal. The United States energy secretary, Bill Richardson, said recently that "business as usual is over" with British Nuclear Fuels.

German, Swedish and Swiss authorities have also suspended contracts with Sellafield following the Japanese debacle. Last month, German authorities said they, too, had been sent nuclear fuel with falsified documentation.

Switzerland suspended contracts over the weekend, halting shipments of spent fuel rods to be reprocessed at Sellafield. Sweden also said it would stop sending spent fuel for reprocessing.

Concerned about nuclear contamination of the Irish Sea, the Irish and Danish governments have said they would discuss joint action tomorrow to press for closing the plant.

Labor unions there have taken the highly unusual step of urging the 10,000 workers to identify the suspected saboteur in their ranks.

"This was clearly an inside job," said Jack Dromey, a spokesman for the labor unions represented at the plant, which lies near Britain's Lake district. Referring to the impact of the sabotage some time last month on pressures for the plant's closing, he said, ''This is the last chance for Sellafield."

Even though unions were asking workers to inform on colleagues, he said, "no one is more at risk from a Sellafield saboteur than the work force." The police and government inspectors are investigating the incident.

British Nuclear Fuels said the sabotage affected a robotic arm handling nuclear waste used in maintenance proceedures that controlled six separate operations. There has been no explanation of why it was done, and the company said it did not affect safety.

The Sellafield plant, dating to the 1950's, has always drawn strong criticism from environmentalists and advocacy groups concerned about issues ranging from radioactive contamination of the Irish Sea to health risks for people living nearby.

But the newest series of complaints have raised new concerns about the plant's future in a region where, in addition to its own staff and contract work force, another 10,000 people, such as storekeepers, depend on its existence for their jobs.

Britain's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate, a supervisory authority, said recently that, in addition to issuing false documentation, the Sellafield plant had also included shipments of dubious quality to Japan. Japanese authorities are pressing for Britain to take the shipments back.

The chief executive of the company, John Taylor, was forced to resign, but only a handful of workers linked to the falsification of documents have been dismissed.

In a letter to the work force following the sabotage incident, the labor unions represented at the plant called the situation there "drastic."

"No one should underestimate the potential impact that this incident has upon all our futures at Sellafield," the letter said.

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British Nuclear Plant Investigates Possible Sabotage

Reuters
March 26, 2000 Filed at 10:21 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-britain.html

LONDON (Reuters) - A controversial British nuclear reprocessing plant said Sunday it had launched an investigation into an apparent sabotage attack.

The Sellafield plant in Cumbria in northern England is already the subject of an international campaign to force its closure led by Ireland and Denmark, which will meet in Dublin on Monday to discuss their concerns about safety failures.

British Nuclear Fuels, which runs Sellafield, called in the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) internal security force after several remote maintenance tools were found to have been disabled.

``There is an investigation ongoing into an incident that happened about a month ago,'' a spokeswoman for BNFL told Reuters. ``It was one isolated incident and safety was not affected at all.''

The damage under investigation occurred at Sellafield's vitrification plant, which employs some 300 people full time, where liquid high-level waste is turned solid by being mixed with glass.

Six machines which allow maintenance tools to be operated remotely were discovered to have had their wire cables cut.

``It is likely that it was someone who is employed at the plant,'' she said.

Six unions at Sellafield have sent a joint letter to the site's 10,000 workers urging them to provide information about the saboteur.

BNFL is under international pressure to close Sellafield over safety and environmental worries.

Saturday, Swiss authorities suspended shipments of spent fuel to Britain following similar bans by Germany, Japan and Sweden, all of which have been angered by reports of safety problems at the plant.

Joe Jacob, a minister at Ireland's Department of Public Enterprise, will meet Danish Energy Minister Svend Auken in Dublin Monday to discuss their concerns about the plant.

``Successive Irish governments have taken a robust attitude to Sellafield but the time has come to up the ante,'' Jacob told Ireland's Sunday Tribune newspaper.

``After the recent damning reports by their own safety inspectors, I believe the time is now right for a concerted effort to shut the plant,'' he added. Sellafield lies just over the Irish Sea in north-west England.

Britain's nuclear safety watchdog detailed ``systematic management failure'' at the site in a February report and said a lax safety culture allowed some staff to falsify data on certain consignments sent overseas.

Jacob and Auken will discuss joint Irish and Scandinavian action on Sellafield and strategies ahead of a meeting of the Oslo-Paris Commission (OSPAR) planned for June in Copenhagen.

OSPAR is a 15-nation grouping which seeks to protect the marine environment of the northeast Atlantic. Britain is among its members.

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British Nuclear Plant Investigated

Yahoo News
Morning Coffee Edition for Monday, March 27, 2000
http://www.infobeat.com/stories/cgi/story.cgi?id=2565220473-350

LONDON (AP) _ Police were investigating a possible act of sabotage at the Sellafield nuclear power plant in northwest England, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. said Sunday.

The probe was launched last month after cables were cut on a robotic arm that handles nuclear waste. The cables allow the machine to be operated from a remote location, BNFL said.

The revelation is just the latest safety concern involving BNFL. Germany and Switzerland suspended dealings with Sellafield earlier this month after Britain's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate discovered workers deliberately falsified records relating to the quality of fuel bound for Japan.

Union representatives have written a joint letter to Sellafield's 10,000-strong workforce asking them to cooperate fully with the latest investigation, even if their information would implicate a co-worker.

BNFL refused to comment on allegations that there was a saboteur among the staff, although a spokeswomen said the company took the matter ``very seriously'' and were prepared to prosecute if necessary.

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Fresh blow to nuclear plant Plan to end reprocessing of waste fuel at Sellafield

Patrick Wintour and Martin Wainwright
Monday March 27, 2000
The Guardian

The government is expected to abandon nuclear reprocessing altogether at the strife-torn Sellafield plant in a green paper on nuclear waste to be published in the next two months.

A senior minister said the crisis of credibility in British Nuclear Fuels management, exacerbated by a worldwide loss of markets and weekend reports of internal sabotage at the plant, had left the government with no option but to accept that the Cumbrian plant had no future in reprocessing.

It is understood that the former managing director at BNFL, John Taylor, had already told ministers he accepted that Sellafield's future lay in waste storage, not nuclear reprocessing.

The green paper is also likely to propose a more independent body of nuclear experts to examine the scientific options for storing existing nuclear waste, either in sealed bunkers underground or on the surface. It will propose, additionally, an elaborate public consultation exercise designed to win support for the hugely sensititive task of locating sites for waste storage.

After a planning inquiry ruled out Sellafield as a long-term option, government insiders said that some of the most likely store sites were in East Anglia.

A switch from a reprocessing system - which separates spent nuclear fuel into plutonium, uranium, and nuclear waste - would mean the closure of Sellafield's Thorp site, which was opened in 1993 at a cost of more than £1.8bn. A separate MOX (mixed oxide) reprocessing plant has been built for £300m. It has yet to open and would not do so if reprocessing were abandoned.

Sellafield employs about 6,000 workers, although 1,500 are involved in reprocessing. Before stopping reprocessing, contracts with major clients would have to be renegotiated.

In a severe blow to BNFL last week British Energy, which accounts for a third of Sellafield's reprocessing industry, confirmed that it wanted to shift from reprocessing to waste storage because it was cheaper. Japan, which accounts for another third of BNFL's contracts, has already banned all shipments from the plant after the discovery that key safety data on its fuel rods had been falsified.

The environment minister, Michael Meacher, has long been privately pressing for an end to reprocessing, but has met resistance from the Foreign Office, the Department of Trade and Industry, and Downing Street. The Foreign Office has defended reprocessing since its abandonment might damage Anglo-Japanese relations, but those relations have now been soured by the false documents.

A House of Lords select committee last year called on the government to accept that Britain's rapidly exanding plutonium stocks should not be regarded as a resource, but as waste. It pointed out that the collapse of the fast-breeder reactor industry in Japan, Britain and France had left little commercial purpose for the use of plutonium.

The committee proposed that the government maintain a minimum strategic stock of civil plutonium and declared the rest to be a waste. A senior minister said events at Sellafield and the commercial world were propelling them to accept this recommendation. He said: "BNFL's prospects are not good at all at the moment. They deserve everything they get. It would be ridiculous to let it go entirely. There is an immense amount of capital and expertise tied up there. It may survive as a lower-level nuclear waste-management operation."

The minister added that there was now no prospect of a majority stake in BNFL being sold before the election.

The change in government mood came as the hunt was stepped up yesterday for a saboteur among the workforce at Sellafield. The normally deeply loyal union leadership at the plant mounted an unprecedented appeal to 10,000 staff to inform on a disaffected colleague who had cut robot cables in a radioactive processing unit.

A joint union letter to all Sellafield staff describes the situation as "drastic", following the halt on all major foreign contracts after staff were discovered to have compiled fraudulent quality control data on batches of reprocessed radioactive waste.

The Irish energy minister, Joe Jacobs, is meeting his Danish counterpart, Sven Auken, in Dublin today to formulate legal moves to ban waste discharges from Sellafield, to be put to Scandinavian countries at an international energy conference in Copenhagen in June. MPs from the Irish capital, where concern has grown about tidal pollution bringing traces of radioactive waste across from Cumbria, also want a start on plans for a safe, permanent closure of the plant.

Depression bordering on despair was described as the growing mood at Sellafield, which is by far the biggest employer in west Cumbria, and which would leave economic and social devastation if it were to abruptly close. Union leaders criticised "ostrich-like" attitudes among their own members and accused a "shell-shocked management" of failing to stress how desperate the situation had become.

"Our workforce has to realise that this is the most critical time in our history, but for many people it doesn't seem to have sunk in," said John Kane, plant convenor of the General and Municipal Union. "They are thinking that the problem will either go away, or that we don't have a problem." The unions' letter asking staff to identify the saboteur is designed to revitalise the search by UK atomic energy authority police for the culprit who disabled six robot arms last month and closed a major reprocessing unit for three days. Fingerprints are being taken from up to 300 workers on the vitrification line, where the robots are used to seal liquid high-level waste in molten glass, before cooling and burial in concrete for storage.

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Profit Beats Prudence on China

By William R. Hawkins
Monday, March 27, 2000; Page A27
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-03/27/014l-032700-idx.html

The American business community, as part of its campaign to grant China "permanent normal trade relations" with the United States, has come up with a booklet called "Corporate Responsibility in China." It is published by the Business Roundtable, an association of CEOs of leading U.S. corporations.

The report is meant to show that economic ties have a positive effect in China. "When U.S. companies set up operations in China, they bring with them U.S. ethical and managerial practices," reads the study, and "through these practices, U.S. companies set a positive example of corporate citizenship."

The booklet looks much like those put out 20 years ago to show how business was helping South Africa move away from apartheid so that economic sanctions would be lifted. That argument was not persuasive then and is less so now.

China presents a more dangerous problem than South Africa. While both involve moral affronts to our values, South Africa did not pose a strategic threat to U.S. national security interests. China does, and it is in this context that the Business Roundtable's report actually strengthens the argument against commercial ties with the Beijing regime.

The report is filled with examples of how business is helping build China's industrial base. For example, "Rockwell has established industrial automation training laboratories in 10 of China's better universities" and "was the first foreign company to install an in-house automation technology training lab in a Chinese state-owned enterprise."

Honeywell Aerospace proclaims its "unprecedented" agreement with Aviation Industries of China (AVIC). This Chinese conglomerate is under the direct control of the state council. It owns 111 enterprises, 36 research institutes and six universities. It is the core of Beijing's aerospace complex and is responsible for developing and manufacturing both military and civil aircraft, missiles, engines and other equipment. It also has extensive research capabilities in aerodynamics, materials and manufacturing technology.

Honeywell claims it provides extensive training for AVIC's "best engineers," including bringing them to U.S. plants to learn about our technology. The results: "In the past there were serious problems with the quality of Chinese military aircraft. Chinese aircraft manufacturers' quality control tended to be uneven," says a report on the AVIC by the Federation of American Scientists. But "in the wake of joint ventures with the United States and Europe in the area of civilian aircraft . . . Chinese combat aircraft are now reported to have a much smoother surface than before, suggesting a flow of personnel and expertise from civilian to military production lines."

In addition to Honeywell, AVIC has enjoyed the help of Boeing. Boeing is listed in the BRT report as having "instructed over 9,600 Chinese aviation professionals. Over 5,600 of those receiving instruction are pilots, maintenance and flight operations people." Boeing also provides Chinese aircraft factories with productivity and industrial engineering help.

When the business community looks at China, it knows that it is not a "big emerging market" for U.S. exports. The growing trade deficit with China ($68.7 billion last year) is the result of Beijing's strategy of internal development, which discourages imports. Instead, what corporations want is to share in China's growth. As the Chamber of Commerce has put it: "Notwithstanding the current large U.S.-China trade imbalance, China's vast infrastructure needs will mean tremendous business opportunities for American companies in the power generation, telecommunications, petroleum and other industries."

That these are also strategic industries that contribute to Beijing's drive to shift the balance of power in Asia in its favor is not a concern of the Chamber or the Roundtable. It should, however, be the primary concern of Congress.

It is clear that economic resources provided to Beijing will be used to support policies hostile to long-term U.S. security interests. The cost of meeting these challenges swamps the private commercial gains to business in scale and meaning. Congress should be looking at ways to curtail the transfer of technology and production skills to China's military-industrial complex, not new ways to expedite these dangerous flows.

The writer is visiting fellow in national security studies at the U.S. Business and Industry Council.

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One-China Fallacy

New York Times
March 27, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/letters/l27tai.html

Related Articles
Political Earthquake in Taiwan (March 20, 2000)
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/early/03200020mon1.html

To the Editor:

According to a March 20 editorial, "preserving the one-China formula remains the surest basis for maintaining peace across the Taiwan Strait." Nothing could be further from the truth.

Two separate political entities have existed since 1949.

Each has exercised the rights of sovereignty, like holding elections (bogus in one case) and collecting taxes.

The "one China" concept was false from the instant Henry A. Kissinger seized upon it as a convenient ruse.

The cost of this Faustian bargain is becoming apparent. China threatens to use force to annex Taiwan, asserting that the United States, having accepted the one-China principle, has no right to interfere in its internal affairs.

A vacillating Clinton administration declares its continued adherence to a patent falsehood.

This dangerous myth is the real threat to stability.

JUNE TEUFEL DREYER Coral Gables, Fla., March 20, 2000

The writer is a professor of political science at the University of Miami.

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Europe May Halt Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing

March 27, 200
http://ens.lycos.com/ens/mar2000/2000L-03-27-04.html

BRUSSELS, Belgium, 0 (ENS) - The Sellafield nuclear data falsification scandal has eroded confidence in the British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. reprocessing facility throughout Europe. Fallout could include a suspension of reprocessing in Western Europe.

The Danish government made a bid Friday to end nuclear reprocessing in Europe because of concerns over radioative contamination of the marine environment. Denmark called on contracting parties to the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic (OSPAR) to agree to "suspend the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel, with immediate effect."

Nations that are parties to the OSPAR include: Belgium, Denmark, the Commission of the European Communities, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

Danish Environment Minister Svend Auken (Photo courtesy Office of the Minister)

The proposal was forwarded by Danish Environment Minister Svend Auken to the OSPAR Secretariat for consideration at June's ministerial meeting. It reminds OSPAR parties of their 1998 agreement to make progressive and substantial reductions in marine radioactive pollution, with the ultimate aim of achieving close to zero concentrations of artificial radioactive substances.

The move marks another ratcheting up of political opposition to nuclear reprocessing following serious criticisms of safety management at the UK's Sellafield plant made in February.

The UK Nuclear Installations Inspectorate, part of the national health and safety agency, reported in February that workers were able to falsify records on the size of mixed uranium and plutonium oxide (MOX) fuel pellets for delivery to Japan in September of 1999 because of a "systematic management failure."

British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. Sellafield facility (Photo courtesy BNFL)

Falsified MOX data from Sellafield was also linked to Swiss and German MOX shipments. Sellafield manufactures nuclear fuel rods, reprocesses spent nuclear fuel from nine countries and treats and stores radioactive wastes.

Any suspension of reprocessing agreed to at the OSPAR meeting would equally affect the other main European reprocessing plant, COGEMA, the French state-owned facility at La Hague in France.

OSPAR officials predicted "tough political discussions" on reprocessing at the June meeting, but admitted that the chances of a ban were slim. For Ospar decisions to be binding, they must be agreed unanimously by all members of the organisation. A three-quarters majority is possible, but the resolution is not then binding on members voting against, as France and the UK certainly will.

The Danish proposal notes that a 1994 agreement in the OSPAR framework to assess alternative options for spent nuclear fuel management had led to a report by the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development "demonstrating that implementing the non-reprocessing option [dry storage] for spent fuel would eliminate the discharges and emissions of radioactive substances that currently arise from reprocessing it."

Switzerland, Sweden Dump Sellafield Reprocessing

Switzerland's nuclear safety inspectorate (HSK) has suspended further transports of spent nuclear fuel to the UK's Sellafield plant for reprocessing. "Until the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate gives us the assurances we need, we cannot give the green light for fuel transports to Sellafield," Tony Treier of HSK said Friday.

The Swiss parliament is currently debating a new nuclear energy law, which would phase out reprocessing as a management option for spent fuel from the country's nuclear power stations while allowing existing contracts to run their course. HSK says that its decision does not contradict this, since its ban is temporary.

HSK says it was concerned not only by February's official report on Sellafield, but also by "new elements" that have since emerged, including indications that reprocessing equipment at the plant had been deliberately rendered faulty.

Sweden, which also held a contract with Sellafield operator BNFL for reprocessing spent fuel, has already imposed a ban.

Swedish Environment Minister Kjell Larsson (Photo courtesy Office of the Minister)

Sweden has cancelled a shipment of 4.8 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel from a research reactor to Britain's Sellafield reprocessing plant, the government announced February 29. Environment Minister Kjell Larsson said the delivery had become "very difficult, if not impossible" to justify in the light of the current safety scandal, which has aggravated long standing Nordic fury over radioactive discharges into the North Sea.

The issue is particularly sensitive in Sweden, where successive governments have struggled to find the least traumatic way of implementing a 1980 referendum decision to close down all 12 of the nation's nuclear power plants by 2010.

BNFL has been given two months by the UK Nuclear Installations Inspectorate to put in place safety recommendations. The firm claims that it is currently implementing NII recommendations and would "welcome the opportunity to meet HSK on an early timescale to provide them with the reassurance they require."

{Published in cooperation with ENDS Environment Daily, Europe's choice for environmental news. Environmental Data Services Ltd, London. Email: envdaily@ends.co.uk}

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EU assembly set to launch "spy" system inquiry

March 27, 2000
By Yves Clarisse
From: "Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space" globalnet@mindspring.com

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The Green Party's European deputies said Monday they had garnered enough support to begin an inquiry into allegations that the United States uses an electronic surveillance system for industrial espionage.

"We have the signatures of more than 160 parliamentarians," Isabelle Zerrouk, spokeswoman the European Parliament's Green Group, told Reuters.

Under the assembly's rules, 160 of the 626 parliament members must endorse the demand for a committee.

The creation of a committee of inquiry is a rare event in the EU. The last such inquiry probed so-called "mad cow" disease and succeeded in extracting proposals from the 15-nation bloc for tighter food safety arrangements.

The new committee will probe the Echelon electronic surveillance system developed during the Cold War by the United States in conjunction with Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

The system is able to intercept millions of telephone, fax and e-mail messages.

The parliamentarians demanded the probe last month after a British journalist Duncan Campbell presented the assembly with a report saying that Echelon was used by the U.S. for military and industrial espionage.

The report charged, among other things, that the United States used Echelon to beat the European consortium Airbus to an aircraft deal with Saudi Arabia in 1994.

Charges that Britain had helped Washington drew angry reactions from other EU countries, notably France.

The United States has denied spying for American firms. Britain has also denied misusing the system.

A former CIA director, James Woolsey, said earlier this month in reaction to the spying allegations that most European technology was not worth stealing.

The European Parliament is to issue a statement on the Echelon system Thursday. The European Commission, the EU's executive body, has stressed that there is no formal proof of the alleged espionage.

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US Bases in this country are being used to protect America, not Britain
They're not defending our realm

Comment & Analysis
by Richard Norton-Taylor,
the Guardian
18th November 1999
http://www.gn.apc.org/cndyorks/yspace/articles/writ2.htm

It was, on the face of it, an innocent confirmation of a cosy, almost personal, relationship. 'HMG" it said, referring to her majesty's government, and the United States "are pleased to announce that the European Relay Ground Station for the new Space Based Infra-Red System will be established at RAF Menwith Hill ... HMG welcomes the opportunity to strengthen US/UK cooperation in this field".

It went on to explain that the space-based system, which like most things military is known by its acronym, SBIRS, was the world-wide satellite-based network providing early warning of ballistic-missile launches. It added that construction at Menwith Hill, which is near Harrogate in north Yorkshire, would include up to four new radomes (golfball-shaped satellite ground stations) and that local planning would be sought in the normal way.

That was in 1997 when the post-cold war emphasis seemed to be on arms control and on monitoring breaches of agreements designed to make the world a safer place. Two years later that little-noticed announcement has taken on an entirely new significance. Menwith Hill, like the nearby Fylingdales early-warning station and, sooner or later, the deep space surveillance centre at Feltwell on the Norfolk-Suffolk border, will play a key role in America's planned anti-missile shield.

Washington says the missile defence system is designed to protect the US from the potential new threat of missiles fired by sucg "rogue" states as North Korea, Iran and Iraq. It will not protect western Europe. US bases in Britain will be used not for the defence of Britain, or even of continental Europe. They are being expanded to satisfy a growing lobby in the US, fuelled by hi-tech corporations, for a kind of son-of-star-wars system which both reflects and promotes American isolationism.

Far from cementing the transatlantic alliance, the project is in danger of causing deep cracks in it. Though Washington insists it is not aimed at Russian missiles (not, at least in its initial stage) its plan for what it calls "theatre missile defence" contravenes the anti-ballistic missile treaty signed between the US and the Soviet Union which Moscow says is the cornerstone of strategic balance.

George W. Bush, frontrunner for the Republican party presidential nomination, said this week the ABM treaty should be scrapped if Moscow refused to amend it. "I can't tell you how important I think it is for America to develop not only theatre-based but strategic-based anti-ballistic missile systems," he said. He added: "The world has changed since the treaty was signed in the 70s. This is now a world of uncertainty... As I say in my ads, there are madmen and dictators and missiles."

Britain's European allies have already made it clear, as Joschka Fisher, the German foreign minister has put it, that the proposed US missile shield would lead to "split security standards within the Nato alliance". The British government is equally alarmed, but appears to take the view that given its special. relationship with the US, quiet diplomacy wou1d be the most effective strategy.

Though Menwith Hill is described as an RAF station, in reality it is a US National Security Agency base used to eavesdrop on military diplomatic, commercial, and civil communications for more than 40 years. It is believed to be capable of carrying out two million intercepts an hour.

The attitude adopted by the government whenever questions have been been asked in parliament about its role has been a mixture of insouciance, obfuscation and denial of responsibility. Two years ago, Norman Baker, the indefatigable Liberal Democrat MP for Lewes, asked how many RAF servicemen worked at RAF Menwith Hill, and what were their functions and powers. John Reid, then armed forces minister, replied: "There is a small number of RAF personnel at RAF Menwith Hill. I am withholding the further information requested ..." This summer, Baker asked the government to disclose the terms of any agreements covering America's use of Menwith Hill. Doug Henderson, Reid's successor, referred to a 1951 Nato "status of forces" pact "and other arrangements appropriate to the relationship which exists between the governments of the United Kingdom and United States for the purposes of our common defence". He added: "These arrangements are confidential".

While he was at it, Baker also asked Jack Straw to list all agreements with the US about the interception of communications. "There are arrangements", the home secretary replied "appropriate to the relationship which exists between the governments of the United Kingdom and the United States for the purpose of our common defence. It is the long-standing practice of this government and previous administrations not to comment on the detail of such confidential arrangements."

Baker persisted. What international treaties, he asked John Spellar, Henderson's successor, covered the use by the Americans of Menwith Hill? Spellar replied: "The United Kingdom is not party to the anti-ballistic missile treaty. Questions on its interpretation should be addressed to the USA and Russia. Article IV of the Outer Space Treaty requires that the moon and other celestial bodies should be used exclusively for peaceful purposes ... It imposes no limitations on other military activities in outer space."

Another person who has tried to get information about the Menwith Hill base is Lindis Percy, a tireless campaigner who has fought, and sometimes won, her battles against byelaws surrounding US bases in Britain, and has spent time in prison refusing to abide by court injunctions preventing her from entering them. She is now suing named US and RAF officers over the use of the Menwith Hill base, citing the ABM treaty and the 1967 outer space treaty. She may not get very far in her private action. But the issues thrown up by the new and, it seems, irreversible, US proposal for an anti-missile shield in which Britain willy-nilly participates, though not for its benefit, deserves rather more than dismissive responses from government.

The project is in danger of causing deep cracks in the alliance

Ministers refer to the US and Britain's "common defence". Yet the British government (albeit sotte voce) is making it plain that, in its view, the US missile shield plan directly threatens that notion. By definition, a project which gives unique protection to the US questions the whole concept of common defence.

Britain's response will also be eagerly watched by its own continental allies, at a time when the government is placing itself at the forefront of moves towards what the EU calls a European security and defence identity. More and more questions, too, are already being asked across the channel about Britain's role in the US-dominated world-wide eaves-dropping network, codenamed Echelon, in which Menwith Hill plays a leading part.

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US builds 'son of star wars' at RAF base

21st November 1999
by Richard Norton-Taylor,
The Independent on Sunday
http://www.gn.apc.org/cndyorks/yspace/articles/writ3.htm

An RAF base in Yorkshire is being used secretly by America's National Security Agency for the installation of a space-based anti-missile system.

Although on British soil, RAF Menwith Hill, near Harrogate, is totally under American control. No British minister has ever visited it. It is being developed as the ground station for the most advanced defence system in the world.

SBIRS (space-based infra-red system) is the successor to a proposed American ground-based shield that has already been opposed by all of Washington's European allies - including Britain - because of fears it could erode Europe's security and unleash a new arms race.

The scheme has been dubbed "son of star wars" after the defence project first proposed by Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. Under the plan the US would set up a series of "brilliant eyes", low earth orbit satellites already being developed by American defence company Rockwell, armed with tactical high-energy lasers to destroy "rogue" ballistic missiles.

They would be warned within seconds of the launch of a missile anywhere in the world by tracking stations such as Menwith Hill, but the system, according to the American government, would be used only to protect the US from "rogue states". Critics claim both SBIRS and its gound-based forerunner are in breach of the US-Russian anti-ballistic missile treaty signed in 1972.

It was thought that the British government had opted for discreet diplomatic lobbying to dissuade President Bill Clinton from ratifying the $100bn (£63m) project, but a series of Commons written answers has revealed that Britain has already given the US permission to install the ground based systems for SBIRS at RAF Menwith Hill. The news will shock Britain's French and German allies who are trying to stop the US setting up another ABM site in Alaska which would also receive early warnings of launches from Menwith Hill.

TheABM treaty restricts Russia and the US to one ABM site apiece. Russia has 100 anti-ballistic missiles deployed around Moscow; US missiles are concentrated at a large silo in North Dakota.

America's European allies believe the project, which is due to be agreed by President Clinton next summer, will "lead to a split in security standards", according to Joschka Fischer, Germany's foreign minister.

Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean, Foreign Office minister, said the Government had granted the US permission to develop SBIRS at Menwith Hill in March 1997 after a series of consultations.

Since then the Ministry of Defence has used its government immunity to grant planning permission for up to four new radomes (golf-ball-shaped satellite ground stations).

Baroness Dean maintained that the British government retained legal possession and control over Menwith Hill, but analysts such as Simon Davies of Privacy International believe that control is nominal.

Norman Baker, the Liberal Democrat MP for Lewes, recently proved that the Americans were effectively "squatting" at the base. The US government's lease on Menwith Hill expired in May 1997 and has not been renewed.

Mr Baker, who has doggedly tried to unlock the secrets of Menwith Hill, said: "I believe what is happening is contrary to international agreements and against the national interest of this country. The Government should come clean about Menwith Hill and should be putting British interests first. Every time you lift a Menwith Hill stone something nasty crawls out."

Menwith Hill is better known for housing the Echelon eaves-dropping system which enables the National Security Agency to listen in on two million telephone, e-mail and fax operation conversations an hour. Many European countries suspect that the base is used for industrial espionage, an allegation denied by NSA.

Opened in the late 1950s on land purchased by the Crown, it was taken over directly by the NSA in 1966 and became its Field Station F83. It is now the NSA's largest listening post in the world. Sprawling across 560 acres, it has a 24-hour operation centre and on-site town.

There are now 25 radomes, not including the three under construction, and the size of the staff has grown from 400 in 1980 to 1,770, of which 1,400 are American - a staff as large as MI5.

A Ministry of Defence spokesman said: "The Government is fully aware of what is going on at Menwith Hill and is an equal partner in the development of the equipment,"

See also Comment from the Independent on Sunday.

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You thought the nuclear arms race was over? Think again

Comment, The Independent
Sunday 21st November 1999
http://www.gn.apc.org/cndyorks/yspace/articles/writ4.htm

American plans to establish a 'Son of Star Wars' anti-missile system threaten to undermine the global balance of deterrence and weapons control. By Elizabeth Young and Wayland Kennet.

It sounds like something from a previous era. But if you thought talks on nuclear missiles were a relic from the Cold War, think again. Last week officials from the US State Department returned from Moscow after failing to get their counterparts there to agree to rewrite the 1972 Anri-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. It was not a happy end to the encounter.

The Americans were hoping to persuade the Russians to change the terms of the treaty to allow the US to deploy a nationwide ant-missile defence system - allegedly to protect them against attacks from so-called "rogue states" such as Iraq, North Korea or even Iran. This follows a much-disputed CIA warning that the US could face an intercontinental ballistic missile attack involving nuclear, chemical or biological warheads within the next 15 years. The proposal is essentially a return to President Raegan's Star Wars project.

The Russians refused point blank. One of their military leaders last week threatened "retaliatory steps" if the US goes ahead with plans to build a "Son of Star Wars" anti-ballistic missile system. General Anatoly Kvashnin, the chief of the Russian General Staff, insists that "rogue states" are not the real targets. "The selection of the deployment areas makes the objective of the national system clear," he said. "It is to intercept ballistic missiles launched from Russia and China."

The Russians have said no. So have the Chinese. So have the French. But what of the British? Usually Tony Blair has been eager to support Mr Clinton in his military activities: sometimes, as with the bombing of an aspirin factory near Khartoum, too eager, as he himself must surely realise. But this time the stakes are much higher - as high as they could possibly be.

It is important that Mr. Blair should understand why so many nations are firmly opposed to the US proposal. For it could re-open the sluice gates that at present hold back not only the old-style arms race but also new ones. There has been a revolution in military affairs since the treaty was signed. Ever more sophisticated techniques for hacking into and disrupting hi-tech computer systems could lead to a devastating new style of "information warfare".

Anti-ballistic missiles may at first glance appear to be purely defensive: a shield, as Ronald Reagan thought of his Star Wars project, to protect you from attack. But in fact their role in nuclear deterrence strategy is not simply, or principally, defensive: they also provide their owner with protection against an enemy's second-strike retaliation to his own first-strike attack. Thus they undermine the mutual fear of retaliation which is the essence of "stable deterrence".

Margaret Thatcher understood this. She also knew that a substantial Russian system would neutralise the British independent nuclear deterrent - which is why she visited President Reagan in December1984 and secured from him a commitment not to endanger the ABM Treaty or indeed deterrence itself with Star Wars. He agreed to confine Star Wars to "research" and accepted that anything beyond that should be "a matter of negotiation". These commitments bound him only and have long since lapsed. The research has already swallowed $l00bn.

At present (and possibly Mr Blair does not appreciate this) Britain is preparing to take part at least as landlords in the American National Missile Defense System. At what is misleadingly called "RAF" Menwith Hill in Yorkshire, the US is already installing the ground parts of the new space-based infra-red system that would form the listening post for the "Son of Star Wars" which President Clinton and the US Congress are intent on setting up.

At Menwith Hill in Yorkshire, the US is already installing the ground parts of the new space-based infra-red system.

Although this base is on our soil British officials have no role in it. "Operational control rests with the United States," as the Ministry of Defence puts it. No British government minister has been there. The necessary planning approval for the present expansion was given under Ministry of Defence auspices in March 1997 by the Major government. And Menwith Hill is governed by only one of 500 or so bilateral UK/US defence agreements, many of them dating from the Cold War, which have never been reviewed.

The uses made of the information gathered by US electronic systems at Menwith Hill and elsewhere in the UK and British Overseas Territories may well not be compatible with the Prime Minister's hopes (elaborated at St Malo a year ago and reiterated in the past few days) of promoting a real European security identity. Much of the material gathered will be of commercial than military use.

But there is more to it than that. The ABM Treaty saved by Thatcher -remains the essential cornerstone of the Russian/American StrategicArms Reduction Treaties, Start I and Start II, and - as the Russians have pointed out - of the treaty banning all intermediate-range missiles in Europe. For it is only when both sides can count on their "retaliation" getting through that they feel able, in tandem, to reduce their nuclear forces.

But more than instability would follow the loss of the ABM Treaty. Facing an opponent's anti-ballistic missile system, you have two choices: you can build a similar system of your own - a new, hugely expensive, arms race - or you can simply build more missiles (or develop other weapons) to overcome or to bypass the system. This leads to more instability. The Chinese and the Russians have both said this would be their response to any American missile defence system.

Then there is the recently reconfirmed 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Article 6 of which binds the five states, which in those days had nuclear weapons, to nuclear disarmament. But this treaty, too, is a fragile affair, at risk from the nuclear weapons built by India, Pakistan and Israel and reportedly being developed in Iraq, North Korea, Iran and most recently Japan.

Behind the "Son of Star Wars" proposals lies a habit of "worst-case analysis" which combines America's most deadly paranoias with the commercial interests of a vast, ethics-less industry. If the United States, after spending trillions of dollars on nuclear weapons, and currently spending nearly $300bn a year on defence, is still afraid of the world outside, what hope of safety and security can it ever have? Can it wonder why the rest of the world fails to see the attractions of its weapon-bedecked leadership?

Except for the British government. We, the UK, seem somehow to have bound ourselves to the paranoid view of the world. After our Strategic Defence Review, out forces are configured to act alongside American forces. We support and participate in the American bombing of Iraq, in the American desire to deprive the Serbs of fuel, in the American refusal to re-open the Danube. Even our legislation against anti-personnel landmines has a careful loophole to allow British troops to do everything alongside American troops but actually lay the mines - our troops may still hand mines to theirs to lay.

It is time that Mr Blair began the process of developing a foreign policy of our own. The alternative is to allow the complete militarisation of all international realtions and to connive in opening the sluices again to an arms race without end.

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Peacemaking Frustrating Clinton

Associated Press
March