IN the past you have kindly published letters from me penned from my “pied a terre” in downtown Patrick. This is the first letter I have sent from jail.
I am in prison pending my trial on August 3 because I refused to accept the bail conditions not to approach within 100 yards of Faslane or Coulport. This was following my arrest along with four others for blockading the road to Coulport. We “locked on” with our hands joined inside metal tubes. This was done to prolong the blocking by impeding our removal from the scene.
We are part of a movement known as Trident Ploughshares employing peaceful, non-violent direct action against Trident. We act on the principles of Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King and Dorothy Way of the American Catholic Worker movement.
During our action, the police behaved with exemplary courtesy and consideration, although it is a pity that the Chief Inspector refused to respond to the suggestion made by my fellow arrestee Angela Zelter that he and the other police officers collectively reconsider their position of supporting the deployment of Trident.
We acted not to impose points of view on others, but because of the manifest illegality of Trident. As the weapon of mass destruction ne plus ultra, it unquestionably belongs to the class of prohibited weaponry.
Our action took place two days after 122 states in the United Nations agreed a draft treaty banning nuclear weapons. This closes the gap in law whereby chemical and biological weapons are banned by international agreement; nuclear weapons are not specifically dealt with. Britain and the other rogue states boycotted the process. We claim to support multilateral nuclear disarmament, but have turned our back on this multilateral disarmament.
Scotland is in a unique position internationally. It is a real chink in the armour of the nuclear beast. An independent Scotland with a written constitution banning nuclear weapons from its land and waters means an end to Trident, as there is nowhere else in the UK it can operate from other than the Faslane/Coulport complex.
While I sit here writing a young man sits at a control panel deep under the surface of the ocean. When the order comes (and Theresa May has already said she would give it) he will press the button, bringing hell on earth.
Preparing to commit a crime is already a crime. It follows that Trident is an actual, real and present war crime in progress. Which is why we attempted to thwart it, and why I am languishing in jail.
We were attempting to uphold international humanitarian law and the Common Law of Scotland which undoubtedly forbids the mass incineration of the civilian population as a strategy of war.
It is also why I beg all people of good will to voice their opposition to this, the world's most powerful machine for the mass killing of human behind and demand its destruction. Until we have settled this, the ultimate evil, we have no future.
Please support us.
Brian M Quail,
c/o HM Prison Low Moss, 190 Crosshill Road, Glasgow.
I AGREE with Russell Vallance (Letters, July 17) that exaggeration and misleading information by (anti-nuclear weapon) campaigners only serves to damage credibility and alienate. There’s certainly no need to exaggerate the very real dangers – which is why I’ve tried to be careful to stick to the facts, or at least to those that are publicly available.
Mr Vallance refers to the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice that “There is in neither customary nor conventional international law any comprehensive and universal prohibition of the threat or use of nuclear weapons as such.” As he also correctly states, the justices were evenly divided as to the circumstances (if any) in which the use of nuclear weapons might be lawful.
That was in 1996. I would welcome another opinion once the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has been ratified by a sufficient number of United Nations member states.
As to the number of warheads currently stockpiled worldwide and the yield of those carried on the nuclear submarines based at Faslane: as Mr Vallance says, much of that information is classified so (unless he has inside information) neither of us can know the precise figures. I am going by those that are published by the BBC and other usually reliable sources.
As Mr Vallance says, the destructive power of one 100 kiloton bomb is awful. The ones dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had yields of about 15 and 20 kilotons respectively. There’s no need to exaggerate to imagine what the effect would be if a device five times more powerful was detonated anywhere near a city the size of Glasgow.
Michael Rigg,
21 Southbrae Drive, Glasgow.
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