PROTEST AT VANDENBERG

Vandenberg from Regis Tremblay on Vimeo.

This just in from Regis Tremblay.....a short video from the Global Network protest at Vandenberg AFB, California on the first day of our 22nd annual meeting.

During the video Global Network board member Dennis Apel is arrested.  Apel, a Catholic Worker activist, lives near the base and has been banned from the location because of many arrests there for non-violent civil disobedience.  Not pictured was the arrest of MacGregor Eddy (WILPF) who has also been banned from the base. 

Apel took the base ban case to the US Supreme Court which voted 9-0 saying that the base has the right to decide their boundaries.  The other part of the case, the right of people to repeatedly protest at the base, was sent back to Federal District Court for further review.

Vandenberg AFB plays a key role in Pentagon military satellite launching, testing nuclear missiles, and most recently as a deployment site for so-called “missile defense” interceptors.  

Each year the Global Network holds its space organizing conference in a different part of the world.  Last year the group met in the ‘high north’ of Sweden, where the US and NATO are creating a space surveillance and drone testing center.