Hunger Strike for a Nuclear-Free UC

Embarking on a fast is a powerful act of self-sacrifice that can focus and center the spirit in times of distress. In situations of conflict, it can also help to rehumanize a committed actor to even the most insensitive opponent. In both of these senses, Mahatma Gandhi called fasting “the truest prayer”.
A group of students and activists at Berkeley, united in their desire for a peaceful future, are undertaking just such a prayer to protest and bring to light the University of California’s alarming involvement in the US government’s nuclear weapons program.
The following is an open letter from one of the fast participants explaining what they are doing and what you can do to help.

Dear friend,

On Wednesday, May 9th, students and alumni at three UC campuses will go on a hunger strike to demand that the University of California stop designing, engineering and manufacturing nuclear bombs. We are calling on the Regents to pass a resolution at their next meeting — scheduled for May 17th — severing all ties to the nuclear weapons complex. We will sustain our fast at least until that meeting, if not much longer. We are writing to ask for your support of this timely act of civil resistance, and of the just cause for which we sacrifice.

For over six decades, the UC has been the US government’s primary nuclear warhead contractor, having managed the Los Alamos (NM) and Livermore (CA) nuclear weapons compounds since their inceptions. Every nuclear warhead in the US arsenal was designed by a UC employee. These include the B61-11 “bunker busters” currently deployed in the Persian Gulf, with which the US government is threatening Iran . Now, the UC is even building a new hydrogen bomb: officially, the first new US nuclear weapon since the end of the Cold War and setting up one of its labs to actually manufacture nuclear warhead components.

As hunger strikers, our basic position is this: At this critical time in our world, with the survival of our planetary ecosystem hanging in the balance, it is imperative for the UC Regents to stop providing a fig leaf of academic respectability to the creation of the world’s most toxic and deadly weapons, and instead use their position of political leverage to spur the US toward genuine nuclear disarmament, democratization, and demilitarization.

The hunger strike action represents the culmination of over five years of organizing and struggle by UC student nuclear abolitionists, anti-war activists, and anti-imperialists. We have petitioned, written letters, marched, rallied, spoken out at UC Regents meetings, and even physically disrupted some of those same meetings to demand that the UC get out of bed with bombs. Now, we are escalating our tactics. We seek, above all, for our actions to be commensurate with the truly formidable challenges confronting our generation and the earth.

We’d like to highlight five ways that you can support us, in order of those we consider most important:

1. Join us for a short-term (one-day, for example) solidarity fast. Fasting is a remarkable way to cleanse your body, and doing so for a short amount of time entails virtually no physical risk. Even if you can’t fast, come visit us on campus! There will be six Berkeley students doing a 7-day solidarity fast with the hunger strike, and during the day they will be sitting near California Hall with signs and outreach materials. Please come show your support!

2. Attend our “No Nukes In Our Name!” rally at the UC Regents meeting on Thursday, May 17th at 10 a.m. at UC San Francisco ‘s Mission Bay building. Due to the level of local, statewide, and national attention we expect to gain through this action, we anticipate being able to bring a great deal of pressure to bear on the Regents. You can also sign up to speak during the public comment period of the meeting at 8 am – please call the regents secretary. A large mobilization at this action is crucially important! For driving directions, visit www.ucnuclearfree.org or contact youth@napf.org.

3. Call the UC Regents – ask that they vote on our resolution for nuclear weapons lab severance on May 17th. It is crucial for as many supporters as possible issue this demand, whether they be California tax-payers, UC students, or concerned citizens of the world! Please see Regents contact info below.

4. Write a letter to the UC Regents – ask that they vote on our resolution for nuclear weapons lab severance on May 17th. Please see the list of contacts below. An online form letter will be available at www.ucnuclearfree.org beginning on Wednesday, May 9th.

5. Write a letter of solidarity to the hunger strikers. You can send emails to youth@napf.org , and we will forward them on to the other hunger strikers. Your letters will go a long way toward boosting our morale as the hunger strike wears on. We will read many of them at the rallies and public events we hold to garner support throughout the action.

We wouldn’t be writing to you if we didn’t consider your support vitally important to the success of this initiative. We expect that the hunger strike will receive national attention and mark a significant step forward in the struggle for nuclear abolition. It may very well achieve its aim. If it is to do so, it needs to have broad-based support both at UC campuses and far beyond!

There has never been a more critical time for the UC Regents to take a principled stand against the US ‘ nuclear weapons programs. They are in a very powerful position to do so: They can withdraw their management of the Los Alamos and Livermore labs, which are the keystone institutions in the US nuclear weapons complex. They could cast the UC’s enormous political and intellectual weight on the side of international law and morality, and seize this opportunity to work toward nuclear disarmament. To do otherwise is to continue to provide a much-needed veneer of academic legitimacy to the creation and maintenance of weapons that poison communities and endanger the entire world.

We recognize that the world we live in is fundamentally unjust, that it is full of a spate of interconnected problems, and that all of these problems merit being addressed on their own terms and in their own ways. We realize our hunger strike will do little to address most of those problems. But we do believe we have part of the answer to making the world a much better place. We hope that, by performing this hunger strike, we can initiate new connections and relationships that will help us continue to work in solidarity with people engaged in multiple other fronts of political struggle.

Together, we can make the UC nuclear-free! Thank you so much for your time and attention! We look forward to connecting with you!

Yours in the struggle for a world free of war, nuclear weapons, and empire,
Chelsea Collonge
on behalf of
The UC “No More Nukes In Our Name!” Hunger Strikers