‘en

FEATURE

‘Peace movement on the as

_ The outspoken voices of scien-

sts and doctors across North
erica speaking for arms control

and disarmament is evidence that

the peace movement is once again

onthe ascendancy, says B.C. Peace

Council president Carmela
evato.

Allevato was one of a small
&Oup of people from B.C. who at-
tended a conference of 1,800
academics and physicians last
Weekend in Seattle to discuss ‘“‘the
Medical consequences of nuclear
Weapons and nuclear war” and
WSsue an appeal for pressure on
80vernment at every level to sup-
Port arms control.

The organizers of the Seattle
Conference, Physicians for Social
Responsibility, have grown from
Just a handful to over 4,000 in only
One year. Together with the
academic group, Council for a
Liveable World Education Fund,

€y have organized five major
Conferences, including the Seattle
€vent, of a scheduled 25 con-
ferences in major U.S. cities. And
€ach conference has been an over-
Whelming success. Conference
Organizers told Allevato that 3,000
People were turned away after
€very seat at the University of
Washington conference centre was
filled.

“The idea behind the con-
ferences is to raise the awareness of
People about nuclear weapons and
the consequences of their use to the
level where they will react in the
same manner as they do to the idea
of biological warfare. The idea of a
limited nuclear war, or any use at
all of. nuclear weapons must. be
made so unthinkable that no
government would dare consider
it,’’ said Allevato.

radiologist Herbert Adams, retired
U.S. navy admiral John Lee and
Massachusetts Institute of
Technology physics professor Ber-
nard Feld, participated in the con-
ference, each focusing on a dif-
ferent aspect of the dangers of
nuclear war.

Feld particularly impressed
Allevato with his discussion on the
“environmental impact of nuclear

_ war’? which, like most speakers,
underscored the futility of surviv-
ing a nuclear attack, even if it were
possible.

The MIT physics PhD was
among those who pioneered the use
of nuclear power, and he now edits
the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.
He pointed out that the U.S. and
the Soviet Union now have bet-
ween 30,000 and 50,000 nuclear
weapons. If these weapons were to
be used within the next decade,
each side could drop five megatons
on the other side. A so-called “‘first
strike’ or “‘counter-force’’ would
not prevent the other side from
releasing its weapons. Feld
calculated that five million square
miles in both the U.S. and USSR
would be affected by fall out.

The nuclear blasts would fun-
damentally alter weather patterns
causing a un-ending downpour of
rain, continuing for a month, and
bringing the fallout down with it.

The ozone layer in the earth’s at-
mosphere — world wide — would
be depleted by 30to 50percent, and
it would take six months to three
years for recovery. The ozone layer
blocks the ultra-violet rays of the
sun, and with it depleted it would

( only be possible to remain out-
doors for minutes at a time. It is
highly unlikely that any animal

- would survive.

To press the point, 14 leading For those who might have sur-
U.S. physicians and academics, in- vived a nuclear attack, and after 17
cluding the founder and president days were able to emerge from a
of Physicians for Social Respon- fallout shelter, food sources would
sibility Dr. Helen Caldicott, Har- have been destroyed and water
vard economist John Kenneth sources contaminated. —
Galbraith, Harvard medical school Those in need of medical care,

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Map produced by Physicians for Social Responsibility shows range

Of devastation which a blast of

one, one megaton bomb over the

Boeing Air Field would create. All buildings and people in inner cir-
_ | Sle would be destroyed. In middle circle, all frame houses would be

®8troyed, and in second circle there would
irestorms and windstorms would cover ev

be heavy damage.
erything inside the outer

Circle, Radiation levels will cause death or fatal disease like cancer
°Ver entire Seattle area and beyond.

— rf
B.C. PEACE
Apr. 25 march. Anyone can join

public meeting second Tuesday o

Peace Council offices at 207 W. Hastings, 685-9958.

about 50 percent of the survivors,
would find hospitals and medical
facilities destroyed, and. medical
personnel dead.

According to the estimate of
Herbert Adams, there would be
134 million dead in the U.S. alone,
32 million injured who likely die,
and 92 million left with a chance of
life.

“Who could deal with 100
million corpses? And physicians
stressed that diseases like typhoid,
meningitis and dysentery would be
rampant. Radiation reduces
resistance to disease and there
would be no vaccines available.

‘‘Should there be war in the hext
decade, there would be no escape.
And survival wouldn’t be worth
it,” said Allevato.

The folly of the arms race, she
added, is that each decade there is a
20 fold increase in nuclear capabili-
ty. That will be the case when in the
1990’s the U.S. has its MX missile
system in place and by the year
2010 both the U.S. and the Soviets
could conceivably drop on each
other ‘‘one beach’’ — a term taken
from the novel ‘‘On the Beach”’
which represents one million
megatons.

The pointlessness of ever moun-
ting stockpiles of nuclear weapons
was addressed as well by Galbraith,
the eminent economist who has ad-
vised consecutive U.S. presidents.

Galbraith spoke of a ‘‘con-
spiracy of silence’ in the U.S.
which has attempted to deny the
role of military spending in the
economic decline of the country.
In 1977, Japan spent $47 per capita
on arms while the U.S. spent $440
per capita on arms. That year the
Japanese economy far outper-
formed the U.S. economy.

The appeal to action that emerg-
ed from the conference, presented
by Calidott and Jerome Grossman,
president of the Council for a
Liveable World Education Fund,
was a simple one. Work at every
level from the federal level to the
local level, and work in every situa-
tion to build hostility to nuclear
weapons and to force governments
to implement arms control.

The Seattle conference was a
vivid demonstration of the upsurge
in the peace movement, especially

since the election of Reagan, said
Allevato, which the B.C. Peace
Council found itself at its provin-
cial peace conference last month in
Vancouver. That conference drew
200 delegates from a diverse list of
organizations who agreed on a pro-
gram of peace action for B.C. and
elected a new leadership for the
Peace Council, headed by
Allevato, a family law lawyer.

“Things are happening in the
peace movement, and it is
exciting,’’ she said. “‘But it is the
real danger of war since the U.S.
endorsed a first strike policy and
since Reagan came to power that
has compelled people to wake up
and get active.”

One example of the new concern
for peace issues in this province is
this weekend’s anti-nuclear
demonstrations in Vancouver,

PHILIPPE HALSMAN

COUNCIL PRESIDENT CARMELA ALLEVATO .. . with work crew making placards for

in Peace Council activities, says Allevato. The Peace Council holds a
f each month at the Vancouver Public Library main branch, or contact |

_ environmentalists. ‘“We recognize

The Pacific Tribune presents...

THE DAY
AFTER
TRINITY

J.Robert Oppenheimer

A film by Jon Else
Written by David Peoples,

Sunday, May 17
Vancouver East Cinema (7th and Commercial).
All tickets $3.25

Advance tickets available at Tribune office,
People’s Co-op Books, 353 W. Pender

Kamloops and on Vancouver
Island.

The Vancouver march, which
last year drew 4,000 people, is
organized by a broad coalition of |
arti-nuclear groups, community |
groups and the Peace Council. This _,
year, for the first time, the coalition
has recognized the threat of nuclear
war as the most direct and real
danger facing the world.

Allevato sees the change as an
important development for many.

the problems associated with
nuclear wastes, although the great
majority of these wastes are the
result of arms production. We have
said, lets keep our focus on the !
main issue: nuclear weapons and |
disarmament. April 25is asign that ;
more and more people are agreeing '
with us.”

t

2 eR OR ntti UENO

& the Atomic Bomb q

Janet Peoples & Jon Else

Original Music by Marlin Bresnick
Y Y

A Ginema Ventures Release

as 2 p.m.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—APRIL 24, 1981—Page 3