L to R: Frits Ter Kuile, Mark Colville, Dennis DuVall, Susan Crane, Brian Terrell. Photo by Theo Kayser

On Monday 14 August, eleven activists (two from the Netherlands, three from Germany, one from Italy, five from the U.S.) blocked an entrance to Büchel Air Force Base in Germany being is used for construction work underway in preparation for the arrival of new U.S. B61-12 hydrogen bombs, and new U.S. F-35 jet fighters which are set to replace the base’s German Tornado fighter jets.

U.S. Air Force veteran Dennis Duvall, 81, wrote in paint on the driveway “Tatort” (crime scene) and “Atombomben” (atom bombs), reminding German speakers that nuclear “deterrence” is a conspiracy to commit war crimes under the Germany’s Basic Law (its constitution) and international treaty law.

The group also pasted Articles 1 and 2 of the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons to the access road. Articles I and II of the treaty forbid any transfer of nuclear weapons to other countries.

Local police detained the eleven briefly, and recorded their personal identification. After about two hours, the police gave the activists a one-day “ban-&-bar letter” prior to their release.

The five U.S. citizens who were detained are a part of a delegation of ten anti-nuclear activists who earlier protested the stationing of U.S. nuclear weapons at Volkel Air Force Base in The Netherlands.

Acknowledging the anniversaries of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the group conducted similar protests at the NATO base Volkel in the Netherlands which also hosts U.S. nuclear weapons. The abolitionists blocked the base’s main gate August 7, blocked the run way August 9, and attempted to dig a tunnel under the base’s fence August 10. Twenty-six arrests were made during series the actions at Volkel, and four U.S. citizens were ordered not to visit the European Union for one year.

The group is calling on German society to abolish nuclear weapons and reduce the CO₂ emissions by the armed forces to zero, saying “We have to learn to solve our conflicts in such a way that other people and fellow creatures, large and small, plant and animal, do not suffer.”

The following blocked the construction gate at Büchel:  Susan Crane, Brian Terrell, Ellen Grady, Dennis Duvall, and Mark Colville, all from the United States; Judith Samson, Christiane Danowski, and Beate Körsgen, from  Germany; Salvatore Vaccaro from Italy; and Sjaak Tensen and Frits ter Kuile from The Netherlands.

— Videotaped statements from some activists here: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLetmOQd9kKvCOF5uqkDQxi1z_UrMK148b

— Additional background information at:  https://noelhuis.nl/peace-camp-volkel-2023/

Germany̓s nationwide campaign Büchel is everywhere!Nuclear Weapons-Free Now! — of the parent network Abolish Nuclear Weapons – Start with Us! — invites you to a protest action during the International Week for the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons.

Protest action on Friday, September 22, 2023, in Karlsruhe.

A “Justitia” performance rally is planned in front of the Constitutional Court and in the city center.

Time: Noon to 2:30 p.m.: rally in front of the Federal Constitutional Court and from there walk at 3 p.m. to Stephansplatz, among other places, for flyer distribution until 4 p.m.

Climate-neutral: After the rally, a part of the protesters will ride about 100 km in a bicycle delegation over the weekend to Strasbourg, France. On Monday, September 25, the cyclers will join a rally there at the European Court of Human Rights.

Background:
NATO̓s “nuclear sharing” is practiced at the ari base Büchel. German pilots train to fly and drop U.S. nuclear bombs onto target areas in an “emergency”. NATO operational doctrine also includes a possible first use!

 

For 30 years, the peace movement has been organizing diverse protests at the gates of the Büchel base. It demands that the approx. 20 U.S. nuclear bombs be withdrawn and that our government accede to the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. We demand a Europe without nuclear sharing and the observance of international law!

Because of the catastrophic dangers that any use of nuclear weapons entail, and the criminality of nuclear deterrence, peace activists have repeatedly been compelled to resort to civil resistance. There were blockades and also go-in actions. The latter have been prosecuted and the people charged have been convicted and sentenced. Nineteen people have filed Constitutional Court complaints (appeals) over the last 26 years, directly related to civil resistance to the U.S. nuclear weapons at “Fliegerhorst Büchel” in the Eifel. None of the 19 complaints have been accepted for review by the Constitutional Court, Germany’s highest.

All defendants complain that they were denied their “right to a fair trial” under Article 6 of charter of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) because the hearing of exculpatory witnesses was refused by the courts. They were thus denied their “right to a fair hearing” under Article 103 of Germany’s Basic Law. International law stands above national law. Therefore, the designated (international law) experts should have been admitted as witnesses in the court proceedings.

 

Germany’s Constitutional Court has so far shirked its responsibility to deal with the concerns of the peace movement‘s appeals, without presenting any reasons. Lower court written decisions were merely upheld.

(For 1.5 years we have been waiting for a reply to the first application! In addition, on March 15, 2010, a civil lawsuit for the withdrawal of nuclear weapons from Germany by a resident who lives in the immediate vicinity of the nuclear weapons site was rejected.) This is despite the fact that under Articles I and II of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Germany is obliged, among other things, not to accept the transfer opf nuclear weapons either directly or indirectly. The unlawful transfer of U.S. nuclear weapons practiced by our government threatens our right to life and physical integrity (See Art. 2 and 3, ECHR). That is why currently four (soon six) nuclear resisters who were rejected by the Constitutional Court have filed complaints with the ECHR.

 

With our protest we demand a review of the nuclear weapons deployment by the Supreme Courts!

Please register:
for Karlsruhe, also for overnight stays, and separately for the “Peace bike tour nuclear weapons free 2023” and/or the “Protest in Strasbourg”.

Contact:
Do you have questions about the action? Then write an email to our campaign spokesperson Marion Küpker: aktionen@atomwaffenfrei.jetzt.

Do you have questions about the campaign? Then send us an email to: info@atomwaffenfrei.jetzt.

 www.atomwaffenfrei.de
 www.buechel-atombombenfrei.de
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 @atomwaffenfrei

We ask you: Support us with a donation!

By direct bank transfer:
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A delegation of U.S. peace activists will travel to The Netherlands and Germany this August to join international nuclear weapons protests focused on removing the U.S. nuclear weapons still stationed at the Netherlands’ Volkel Air Base, 85 miles south of Amsterdam, and at Germany’s Büchel Air Force Base, southeast of Cologne. The group of 11 anti-nuclear activists hail from Arizona, California, Connecticut, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, and New York.

 

Both the Volkel and Büchel Air Bases each maintain approximately 15-to-20 U.S. hydrogen bombs known as B61s* as part of NATO’s so-called “nuclear sharing” program in which foreign fighter jets and their pilots routinely rehearse attacks on Russia using the U.S. H-bombs. Alarmingly, in the midst of the ongoing war in Ukraine, operation “Air Defender 2023,” NATO’s largest-ever nuclear attack exercise, ran from June 14 to 23 in the skies over Germany. War planes involved in the practice included U.S. F-35s, F-15s and F-16s from the U.S., Turkey and Greece; Eurofighters from Spain and the U.K.; German Tornadoes; U.S. and Finnish F/A-18s; Hungarian Gripens; and U.S. A-10 ground-attack jets, according to CNN. The A-10 jets fire the controversially toxic and radioactive shells known as depleted uranium munitions.

 

Coordinated by the Amsterdam Catholic Worker community, Peace Camp Volkel runs from August 4 to 10 and is focused on “climate and a future without nuclear weapons.” Participants from around Europe and the United States will conduct nonviolence trainings, and blockades, “go-in” actions, and other protests. On 10 August, the U.S. activists will travel from Volkel to Kail, Germany for four days of protest actions directed at the Büchel Air Force Base, which like Volkel is now undergoing major construction in preparation for the delivery of replacement weapons, the new B61-12 gravity bomb, now in production in the United States.

 

Most of the U.S. delegates to the two peace camps have worked for years in anti-war and disarmament campaigns, and several have been imprisoned in the United States for nonviolent actions taken against the war system. Ellen Grady, from Ithaca, New York and a member of the delegation said, “We have to take some responsibility for these U.S. nuclear weapons stationed in Europe, because they threaten genocidal violence and they destabilize the reckless and expanding war in Ukraine.”

 

The eleven U.S. participants are: JACKIE ALLEN, of Hartford, Conn.; VERA ANDERSON, 35, from New York, NY; MARK COLVILLE from New Haven, Conn.; SUSAN CRANE, 75, from Redwood City, Calif.; DENNIS DuVALL, 81, from Radeberg, Germany (formerly of Prescott, Ariz.); JENN GALLER, 27, of Baltimore, MD; ELLEN GRADY, 60, from Ithaca, New York; THEO KAYSER, 33, of St Louis, Missouri; ERIC MARTIN 38, of Los Angeles, Calif.; SUSAN SCHALLER, 69, of Boston, Mass.; and BRIAN TERRELL, 67, of Maloy, Iowa.

 

Previous international camps involving “go-in” actions at the Büchel base have resulted in trespass charges and series of court trials and appeals in which resisters have attempted to put “nuclear sharing” on trial. The opponents argue that the defense of “crime prevention” excuses their actions in view of the 1970 Nonproliferation Treaty which forbids any transfer of nuclear weapons between treaty signers including the U.S., The Netherlands and Germany. Among this year’s delegates, Ms. Crane will in September be the 5^th nuclear resister to appeal from Germany to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasberg regarding alleged errors by German courts which have refused to consider defense arguments offered by the resisters. The European Court has yet to decide on any of the previous appeals.  [Biographies of the U.S. participants are available upon request.]

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* De Morgen (Antwerp), July 16, 2019, https://www.demorgen.be/nieuws/eindelijk-zwart-op-wit-er-liggen-amerikaanse-kernwapens-in-belgie~b051dc18/ (De Morgen obtained and published a leaked official NATO report detailing the locations and numbers of U.S. nuclear weapons currently stationed in five NATO states.)