DU in Jonesborogh

This weekend Christian Peacemaker teams met just over the mountains in Johnson City, TN to discuss the global consequences of the depleted uranium production in nearby Jonesborogh. For ten days they plan to post reflections on their experience. Here’s a few of them:

CPT DU REFLECTION: WORKING TO TURN SWORDS INTO PLOWSHARES (May 20, 2007)

By Kirsten Romaine

Today our group stationed itself across the road from depleted uranium producer, AeroJet Ordnance, to protest its innocuous looking factory of death.
Determined to “turn swords into plowshares,” we sported a banner and held placards decrying the plant’s odious product and urging it to stop its production. Several cars honked their support of our action, while others sped by.

. . .

CPT DU REFLECTION: HOW CAN WE SPREAD THE WORD? (May 22, 2007)

By Wes Rehberg

With the case so clear and evident that weaponized uranium kills, deforms and sickens so profoundly, how can we who feel this way create a deeper public awareness of the dangers?

. . .

CPT DU Reflections: A Day of Contrasts (May 19, 2005)
By Jane MacKay Wright

On day one of the Christian Peacemaker Teams delegation, we attend a conference on depleted uranium in Johnson City, Tennessee . Spring green colors the eastern corner of Tennessee, while inside we watch photos of Afghan orphans and deformed babies. Leaves ripple in a warm breeze, while inside we learn of toxic dust blowing across the state. Weaponized uranium is of no harm to anyone says the Department of Defense, but Gulf War veterans sicken and die.

. . .

Patriotic Americans in Jonesborough, TN manufacture uranium core for their army, and are exposed to radiation. Farmers’ fields become contaminated battlefields. We think of Iraq. We see Tennessee. The sun shines as we walk in the warm light. A bird sings to us.