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BRITISH COLUMBIA

‘People can block
the drift to war,’
scientists affirm

A decision to refuse to test the cruise
missile in Canada would provide an invalu-
able boon to the worldwide movement for
nuclear disarmament, a leading British
peace activist and scientist told an overflow
crowd at the University of British Columbia
last weekend.

Michael Pentz, dean of science at Bri-
tain’s Open University and a leader of the
gigantic Campaign for Nuclear Disarma-
ment praised the referendum on cruise mis-
sile testing which goes before the voters in
the Vancouver city election this fall.

He was joined by
retired U.S. Navy
admiral Eugene
Carroll, who with
dozens of other ex-
perts on the nuclear
arms race, including

two Soviet scientists
addressed delegates
at the conference

“Nuclear war: the MARAT
search for solutions” VARTANIAN
Oct. 19-21. we

The conference,
sponsored by the
Physicians for Social
Responsibility, the
B.C. and Canadian
teachers’ federations,
Science for Peace
and UBC’s Centre
for Continuing
Education drew 650 MICHAEL
registered delegates PENTZ
and countless others to the three-day delib-
erations.

The audience of mainly professional
people was told repeatedly throughout the
plenaries and workshops that the actions of
citizens banded together in peace move-
ments can change the doomsday scenario
posed by the spiralling arms race.

Pentz said the burgeoning peace move-
ment comes as a result of people “‘no longer
leaving it up to them” — governments
— and engaging in what he called ‘‘massive
interventionist democracy.”

And from Carroll, who speaks for the |
authoritative Centre for Defence Informa-
tion, came similar sentiments.

Noting Reagan’s recent “conciliatory”
approach to the USSR, he remarked: “It is
encouraging, but it is a change only in style,
not substance. It’s up to us to add this
substance, through our political activities
and at the polls.”

The presence of Carroll, who once served
in NATO under Alexander Haig, and that
of retired Canadian admiral and NATO
military man Robert Falls, provided an
authoritative rebuttal to the rhetoric of the
Reagan administration.

During workshop sessions both Falls
and Carrolll dismissed the myth of the
“Soviet threat,” stressing the USSR’s view
of its nuclear weaponry as defensive, and

Not attack oriented.

Following the example of the meeting
sponsored by PSR at UBC in March last
year, the weekend parley placed emphasis .
on fact, presented by the scientists and pro-
fessionals who had flown in from several
countries.

From Soviet psychologist Marat Vartan-
ian came the view, often stated by PSR
members and the International Physicians
for the Prevention of Nuclear War, that
there is no effective medical response to a
nuclear holocaust.

Vartanian utilized studies of the acute
psychosis, despair and apathy that sets in

after disasters — including the chilling and
relevant examples of the aftermath of the
Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings — to
show that facilities for desperately needed
psychiatric treatment for the survivors
would be hopelessly inadequate.

Estimating that some 20-25 per cent of
Europe’s population would survive follow-
ing a nuclear exchange, he said “a patient
load of such dimensions would exceed the
capabilities of the entire psychiatric staff of
the U.S. and the USSR. It follows that the
only alternative is to prevent such a war.”

In related matters, Vartanian said a joint
study between U.S. and Soviet psycholo-
gists found that while American children
were optimistic about the consequences of a
nuclear war, they were pessimistic about the
world’s ability to prevent such a war. With

Soviet children the result was the opposite,
leading to the scientists’ conclusions that
children in the USSR were more informed
of the consequences of a nuclear exchange,
he related.

Vartanian noted the Soviet doctors’
stance received the endorsement of the
Supreme Soviet, which adopted the sugges-
tion that the Hippocratic Oath contain
Sentences stating the doctor’s intention to
work towards the prevention of nuclear
war.

The conference also featured Richard
Turco, one of the key scientists involved in
the research leading to the “nuclear winter”
theory. Using several slides to demonstrate

his points, Turco said the smoke from the
fires of even a relatively modest nuclear
exchange would shut out all sunlight and
literally freeze the earth for several months
to several years afterward, warning that
“the global ecological damage could be far-
reaching and permanent.”

The Progressive Conservative govern-

ment was roundly criticized by the audience
for failing to senda representative to debate
wich NDP MP Pauline Jewett and Liberal
ex-cabinet minister Lloyd Axworthy on
Canada’s nuclear arms policies.
_ With Axworthy defending a continued
involvement in NATO on the claims that
Canada’s membership allowed it ‘input’
into decisions taken by the U.S.-dominated
military alliance, the most telling points
— and the loudest applause — fell to
Jewett, the NDP’s external affairs critic.

Inresponse to a question, Jewett said she
failed to see “any benefits” from Canada’s
continued involvement in NATO, while
noting that the cruise decision, taken by the
previous Liberal government, had nothing
to do with Canada’s NATO commitments.

She said, however; that her party wel-

comed the Liberals’ decision to seek a free
vote in the House of Commons for a
nuclear-weapons freeze, And, she said to
applause, “the direct impact of our becom-
ing a nuclear-weapons free zone would be
enormous,”
_ The freeze on testing, production and
deployment of nuclear weaons was endorsed
by the annual general meeting of the PSR,
which took place Sunday.

The PSR motion, distributed at the con-
ference, also called on Prime Minister Brian
Mulroney “to add his name to the public
declaration for such a freeze signed on May
22, 1984, by the heads of state of Argentina,
Greece, India, Mexico, Sweden and Tanza-
nia.”

The motion urged Ottawa to “adhere
scrupulously” to the freeze by banning the
testing of nuclear devices and weapons sys-
tems in Canada and by urging the U.S. and

USSR and their respective allies to adhere to
the freeze.

t
pas

VICTORIA — Led by Indian
drummers and dancers, more than 1,000
people, the majority of them native Indi-
ans, marched from city hall to the pro-
vincial legislature Oct. 20 where, in a
totem-raising ceremony, they demanded
that the government halt planned log-
ging by MacMillan Bloedel of Meares
Island, near Tofino.

Demonstrators, wearing signs reading
“Respect Native Land Claims”, “End
Clear Cut Logging” and “MacBlo Can’t
See the Forest for Dollars”, watched as
members of the Songhee band from Vic-
toria raised an eight-metre carved pole,
representing the traditional “welcome”
figure.

The huge carving was later taken to

The United Fishermen and Allied
Workers Union has called on the federal
government to upgrade the coast guard
and to reinstate the previously eliminated
weathership to prevent a recurrence: of
the tragedy in which four fishermen died’
even after a helicopter had spotted them.

“This fishing season has been one of
the worst on record,” UFA WU secretary
George Hewison told the Vancouver
and District Labor Council Oct. 16, cit-
ing the recent drownings at sea.

“We had people waiting in survival
suits waving at a passing helicopter for 24
hours before they perished,” he said. The
four, who had taken to their lifeboat
after an unexpected storm sank their
boat, were spotted by helicopter but
rescue could not be made.

Hewison said the blame for the
tragedy “can be laid squarely on the fact
that there are no longer any weather-
ships” and on “the total inadequacy of

‘Stop Meares logging’

Better coast guard urged

\ Provincial Notes

Meares Island to mark the site as a Clay-
oquot tribal park and to symbolize the
Opposition to the logging.

Addressing the rally, the eloquent
young chief of the Clayoquots, declared:
“Today one part of me is filled with joy
and pride, the other with anger. Our
people have strong ties with nature and

_the land and we demand respect for the
first law of our tribal council — the
preservation of our resources.

“There are only 16,000 acres left to we
West Coast Indians on our reservations
compared to MacMillan Bloedel’s mil-
lions,” he said. “This is not an Indian
problem, it is a Canadian people’s issue
and we must stand together.”

coast guard search and rescue facilities.”

The two weatherships were sold three
years ago when the federal department
claimed that new electronic equipment
could provide better weather forecasting.
“But all the new technology can’t pro-
vide the site specific forecasting that
fishermen need,” said Hewison.

Despite B.C.’s rugged, extended coast-
line, the federal government has less than
one-fifth of coast guard vessels here that
the U.S. has for the smaller Washington-
Oregon coastline. Defence Minister
Robert Coates has been pressed on
upgraded equipment but has refused to
give it priority. However, new uniforms

for Canadian Forces do have high prior-

ity, he said.

“We've got to take action to make
sure that the weathership is restored and
the air sea rescue is upgraded so that this
tragedy doesn’t happen again,” Hewison
said.

— ~
(ener pene ETERS FES at a AEA ERIE AON ESRC ISR ATU 2 AER I IN

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PACIFIC TRIBUNE, OCTOBER 24, 1984 e 3