Three anti-nuclear weapons activists who sneaked into the Y-12 National Security Complex on July 28 splashed human blood and spray-painted slogans on the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility. The protesters also hammered the building, chipping it, and strung up crime scene tape. (Submitted photo)
The three anti-nuclear weapons activists who allegedly cut through fences at the Y-12 National Security Complex on July 28, evaded guards, and vandalized a high-security building where bomb-grade uranium is stored have released photographs showing the blood they splashed and slogans they spray-painted on the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility.
The five photos also show holes cut in fences near the HEUMF, including one photo taken after the three protesters—Greg Boertje-Obed, Megan Rice, and Michael R. Walli—had been arrested. In addition, they show red crime scene tape that was strung up by the three activists and a building corner that was chipped by the protesters, who hammered on the $549 million building to send a symbolic and literal message, “a rejection of nuclear weapons as a cornerstone of our national policy.”
The pictures were obtained by the protesters as part of the discovery stage in advance of a Feb. 26 trial in U.S. District Court in Knoxville. They were released to the media on Monday.
The trio face federal charges of property destruction, property depredation, and trespassing. They have pleaded not guilty and face potential penalties of up to 16 years in prison.
“These photographs carry with them our message,†said the three activists, who called their unprecedented intrusion Tranform Now Plowshares. “We came to Y-12 in a spirit of hope, not fear. We were authorized—even required—to act by the responsibilities placed on us as citizens. The Nuremberg principles, codified by the United Nations after World War II, require citizens to refuse cooperation with unlawful government acts insofar as it is morally possible. We also felt called, as children of God, to act on behalf of all God’s children, including and especially those who are threatened daily by the machines of war and the power of empire.â€
The three protesters painted slogans and poured blood on a concrete wall at the edge of an area designed to detect intruders near the Highly Enriched Uranium Materials Facility at the Y-12 National Security Complex.
They called the production of nuclear weapons a crime against humanity. They said were protesting the continued production of nuclear weapons at Y-12, as well as plans to build a new Uranium Processing Facility, which they estimate could cost $7.5 billion. (Government officials generally say the building could cost up to $6.5 billion.)
The protesters said that spreading the blood of Plowshares members across the HEUMF was a reminder that the use of nuclear weapons will “result in bloodshed beyond calculation and deaths beyond counting.”
They said the pictures released Monday, which include slogans quoting biblical passages, speak for themselves but don’t tell the whole story. They said their story is more than a stunning tale of making it through an high-security zone at Y-12, a place where deadly force is authorized, although that’s where most of the public attention has been focused since July.
“The whole story includes why we went there and the message we took,” Boertje-Obed, Rice, and Walli said in a statement released Monday. “We carried with us a Bible, hammers, candles, bread, white roses, and blood. We attempted to embody the prophecy God gave to Isaiah, to beat swords into plowshares. We tried to be faithful followers of Jesus Christ, who calls us to find our true security in love and compassion.”
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