By Brian Terrell
Twenty-three activists gathered at dawn May 19 outside the so-called Kansas City “National Security Campus” to protest its nuclear weapons production.
The group greeted workers arriving for the early shift at the KCNSC, a government facility operated by Honeywell which makes 80 percent of the electrical and mechanical parts for the U.S. military’s nuclear weapons arsenal.
At present, the KCNSC is participating in seven “modernization programs” for land-based, air-dropped, and sea-launched nuclear weapons, including the newly accelerated production of the B61-13 gravity bomb which is to be 25 times more powerful than the atomic bomb the U.S. Army Air Corps dropped on Hiroshima. It is said to be more “precise” than earlier versions of the B61 — as if a 300-kiloton thermonuclear bomb needs precision. The U.S. Hiroshima bomb incinerated 4.4 square miles immediately killing between 70,000 and 140,000 people with fire, blast, and radiation.* Twenty-five of these new H-bombs could incinerate 110 square miles.
Even with over 7,000 employees, the KCNSC is undergoing an expansion that will double its size. A banner on the gate of the vast construction site reads “Safe, efficient and timely delivery of KC next critical infrastructure,” celebrating several contractors’ contributions to the government’s mad rush to produce more powerful and easier to use nuclear bombs.
In anticipation of the protest, the “campus” security closed the main gate, directing workers to another entrance. After the morning rush, six activists — Ann Suellentrop of Kansas City, Kansas; Jane and Henry Stoever of Overland Park, Kansas; Mike Miles of Luck, Wisc.; Brother Louis Rodemann of Kansas City, Missouri; and myself — took the protest onto the KCNSC. We were placed under arrest by officers of the Federal Protection Force who turned us over to the Kansas City Police Department who cited us for alleged violations of local ordinances. We were released with orders to appear in court in late June.
— Brian Terrell is a long-time member of the Strangers and Guests Catholic Worker in Maloy, Iowa.
*Whole World on Fire, by Lynn Eden, Cornell Univ. Press 2004, p.20.
Leave a Reply