Press Releases & Updates 1999

As HMS Vengeance prepared to leave Barrow for its lair in Faslane on the Clyde, activists from Trident Ploughshares 2000 promised that it would just be one more disarmament target in the campaign of direct action against the UK’s Trident nuclear weapons system.

As the fourth nuclear weapons boat sets sail at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, protesters will be on the spit at the Rhu narrows at the entrance to the Gareloch to show their anger. They will return when it arrives, on either Thursday or Friday morning.

TP2000 pledger Ellen Moxley said:

"If the people of Scotland want to see what makes this government’s talk of ethics and humanitarian concern a cynical mockery let them come to the Clyde and watch this unspeakable thing slink into its berth. It’s not welcome here or anywhere. Its arrival will stiffen our resolve to continue disarming."

Meanwhile Simon Gillespie, an MOD spokesman, writing to TP activist Angie Zelter, has said that the government would take legal advice about Trident only if and when its use was being considered.

TP2000 pledger David Mackenzie said:

"It’s obviously time for Dr. Strangelove 2. They seem to be saying that when the blips of hostile nuclear missiles appear on the screen they will send out for a lawyer. It just shows what the possession of these weapons does to the rationality of those committed to the system. The fact is they will not test the legality of Trident for real because they know it is indefensible under international humanitarian law."

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