PeaceWorks Kansas City and other groups are cosponsoring a walk and rally this Memorial Day, May 30, closing with civil resistance to nuclear weapons. The public is invited.
10:45 am Park on Prospect just north of Mo. Hwy. 150. Hear introductory remarks.
11 am Begin a 1-mile walk to the entry road to the Kansas City National Security Campus (KCNSC), 14510 Botts Rd., where some 85% of the mechanical and electronic parts for US nuclear weapons are made or procured. Carry flags of 60 countries that have adopted the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
11:45 am Begin the annual rally for a nuclear-weapon-free world. Conduct a die-in for lives lost to wars around the world, and for lives lost from toxins at Bannister Federal Complex, where workers made parts for nuclear weapons from 1949 to 2014. Listen to speakers, many representing event cosponsors (listed below).
12:15 pm Stand in support as a few civil resisters cross the KCNSC property line and are most likely arrested, processed, and released with a court date.
PeaceWorks Cochair Cris Mann says the event will use the “conversion concept—Honeywell, operator of the facility, can convert to make peacetime products. We are on the brink of nuclear annihilation. Our focus should be on what people need, not what is most deadly and most profitable.” The federal budget gives Honeywell $1.2 billion this fiscal year, and the Biden administration has proposed $1.3 billion for next year.
PeaceWorks Cochair Henry Stoever informed the KC police and the Honeywell guards on May 10 about this annual event. Stoever said the protesters object to “weapons of mass destruction, which we dare not use for fear of irreparable harm to the peoples and all life on Earth.” He continued, “Some say deterrence, but I say terrorism, and the entire planet is held hostage. Our nuclear weapons are on continuous launch status, ready to be used at any moment. I call this living on death row.” He concluded, “The destructive forces of weapons of war have trespassed too far upon our future and the future of all life on this planet.”
Event cosponsors: PeaceWorks Kansas City, Cherith Brook Catholic Worker House, Green Party (KC area), Mid-MO Fellowship of Reconciliation, Peace and Social Justice Center of South Central Kansas, Veterans for Peace.
