August 6 - 9, 2007- Brandywine Peace Community's Hiroshima Day of
Remembrance & Resistance at Lockheed Martin, Valley Forge, PA and
Nagasaki Day Peace Dedication at SS Peter & Paul Roman Catholic
Cathedral in Philadelphia, PA.

On August 6, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb on
the city of Hiroshima, Japan, killing an estimated 150,000 people
in the immediate blast and fire. Three day later, on August 9, 1945,
more than 75,000 people died in the blast and fire resulting from the
U.S. atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan. More than 100,000
people died in the days and years ahead, and continue to die,
from the radioactive poisoning of the first atomic bombings.

In Valley Forge, Lockheed Martin, among other Pentagon
contracts, produces fire control systems for Tomahawk cruise
missiles as well as battlefield computers used in the U.S. war of
occupation in Iraq.

August 9, 2007 - Nagasaki Day Peace Dedication
Organized by: Brandywine Peace Community; Co-sponsored by:
Catholic Peace Fellowship & Northwest [Phila.] Greens

August 9, 1945, Atomic Bombing of Nagasaki, Japan;
Ground Zero: the Urakami Roman Catholic Cathedral

August 9, 2007, Nagasaki Day Dedication at SS Peter & Paul
Roman Catholic Cathedral in Philadelphia

As people stood on and before the steps of the SS Peter & Paul
Roman Catholic Cathedral in Phila., a siren blasted recalling the
sirens of that morning 62 years ago when the largest Catholic
Cathedral in all of Asia, in the city of the largest Catholic population
in all of Asia, was ground zero for the 2nd atomic bombing.

[Relative to the Hiroshima bomb (nicknamed "Little Boy) dropped
three days earlier, the bomb that exploded above the Urakami
suburb of Nagasaki was the more powerful plutonium bomb,
nicknamed "Fat Man" after British prime minister Winston Churchill.
The plane carrying "Fat Man" took off from Tinian Island with the
primary target of Kokura. Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Kokura had all
been "saved" (from earlier U.S. carpet and fire bombings) for the
planned atomic bombings.
On the morning of August 9, ground haze and smoke fully obscured
Kokura, so the plane's pilot, Major Charles W. Sweeney, decided to
"make a run down to Nagasaki [the mission's secondary target] as
there was no sense dragging the bomb home or dropping it in the
ocean". At 11:02AM, "Fat Man" dropped from the B-29 and
exploded 1,650 feet above the city.]

In front of Philadelphia's SS Peter & Paul Cathedral, a large bell
tolled 62 times as people stood in silent reflective memory of 62
years of war and nuclear weapons. Readings on "the Cost of War,
the Price of Peace" followed as did a Litany of Water, Healing, &
Peace (see below).

Incense burned in homage to all the victims of war and ceremonially
people were invited to a basin, on the base of which were river rocks
and stones, a piece of wood, and a dome shaped stone. Water (a
symbol of healing, cleansing, and re-juvenation) was poured over
the hands of participants and the basin-filled representation of the
Urakami Cathedral and the port city of Nagasaki.

The Nagasaki Day Peace Dedication ended with Tom Mullian
leading people his song "We Declare Peace".

Hiroshima Day ‘07 Litany

Reader: On July 16, 1945, the first atomic bomb test, code-named
“Trinity,” took place in an area of desert in New Mexico called
“Jornada del Muerto” – Journey of Death. J. Robert Oppenheimer,
the scientific director of the Manhattan Project which developed the
first atomic bombs, remembered the passage from the Hindu
Scripture, the Bhagavad Gita: “Now I am become death, the
destroyer of worlds.” Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 3 weeks later,
foretold the world that we know and the society that we’ve become.
The trail of nuclear weapons, militarism and war, invasions and
occupations, empire and the corporate domination of the economy
and our democracy, brings us to where war is made today:
Lockheed Martin.
All: Hiroshima/Nagasaki, Never Again; Stop Lockheed Martin;
We Declare Peace

Reader: On August 6, 1945, the first atomic bomb was dropped on
the city of Hiroshima. The thermal flash and blast started fires
which very quickly became a firestorm until the whole city was
ablaze. Birds ignited in midair. People ran to the rivers to escape
and soon the river became not a stream of flowing water but a
stream of drifting dead bodies. Despite every horrifying statistic of
violence and war we’ve ever heard, the account, statistics, and
memory of that day 62 years ago are still devastating. 60 percent of
the city is destroyed–hospitals, hotels, rail stations, temples,
factories, houses, and scores of other buildings reduced to flaming
rubble. The next morning the sun rose and revealed the dawning of
the nuclear age. Where the city once stood, was a wasteland of
ashes and ruin. Three days later, Nagasaki.
All: Hiroshima/Nagasaki, Never Again; Stop Lockheed Martin;
We Declare Peace

Reader: Sixty-two years of nuclear weapons and their threatened
use have emboldened and outlined every imperial move of the U.S.
from Vietnam to Central America to the Persian Gulf. The U.S.
continues to maintain an arsenal of 10,000 nuclear weapons
deployed on land, sea, and in the air, at a cost of $27 billion
annually and the Bush Administration is now pushing Complex
2030 for the streamlining and re-juvenation of future nuclear
weapons design and production. Called Complex 2030 because of
the nuclear weapons industry’s plan, with Lockheed Martin at the
core, be in place within the next 25 years. Whole populations and
lands have been contaminated with the toxic effects of nuclear
weapons production–plutonium, which fuels nuclear bombs, has a
toxic life of 240,000 years or 10,000 human generations. So too, the
very principle of democracy and commitment to civil liberties has
been contaminated by our society’s reliance on war and the
militarization of culture, economy, and law.
All: Hiroshima/Nagasaki, Never Again; Stop Lockheed Martin;
We Declare Peace

Reader: The U.S. military budget this year will exceed a half
trillion dollars. Many suffer, so very, very few may profit.
Lockheed Martin, the world’s largest weapons corporation, the
U.S.’s #1 worldwide arms supplier, the U.S.’s chief nuclear bomb
contractor, the Iraq war’s chief profiteer - is quite simply making a
killing in war. The fire control systems for Tomahawk cruise
missiles repeatedly launched from Lockheed Martin Aegis warships
throughout the Gulf Wars are produced by Lockheed Martin right
here as are the battlefield computer used daily in the Iraq war of
occupation, now in its 4th year In every war lies the threat of
another Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Lockheed Martin is built atop the
ashes of the nuclear age and the continuing wars and global nuclear
reach of the U.S. military empire. Lockheed Martin profits, at the
expense of human needs and the promise of justice. In memory of
all victims of the past 62 years of war and nuclear terror, we cry out
for peace and a future worthy of our hopes and our
children–education, homes, health care for all, justice, an honoring
of the earth, peace. All: Hiroshima/Nagasaki, Never Again;
Stop Lockheed Martin; We Declare Peace

Declaring Peace at Lockheed Martin

Ten years had passed since the day the Bomb was dropped on the city of
Hiroshima.  In 1955, a thirteen year old Japanese girl named Sadako
Sasaki died of radiation-induced leukemia.  She was one of thousands of
children in Hiroshima  to suffer the radioactive after-effects that have
kept
killing weeks, months, years, decades,  after August 6, 1945.  During her

illness Sadako folded paper cranes wishing for recovery from the fatal
disease.  She knew the story which says that cranes live a thousand years

and that the person who folds a thousand paper cranes will have their
wish granted.  Sadako folded 644 paper cranes before she died.  Her
classmates folded 356 more cranes so Sadako could be buried with a
thousand cranes.  A monument was built in the Hiroshima Peace Park to
honor the child’s memory and each year on  Hiroshima Day children
throughout Japan adorn it with  thousands of brightly colored paper
cranes.  The monument to Sadako Sasaki reads: “This is our cry, this is
our prayer, Peace in the world.”

The sunflower has become a worldwide symbol for peace, carrying the
hope of a world free of nuclear weapons and war. We claim for peace the
land on which Lockheed Martin sits. We seek to reclaim our country for
peace and the promise of justice and democracy. We seek to reclaim a
determined hope for a world free of nuclear weapons and war. Today, we
join hands and declare peace in front of Lockheed Martin. Today, we
recall the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and, with
sunflower seeds, we plant our hopes here at Lockheed Martin for peace
and for justice.
All: Hiroshima/Nagasaki, Never Again; Stop Lockheed Martin;
We Declare Peace

Litany of Water, Healing & Peace
Response: [all] May the healing waters of peace roll over us as
we toll the bell of peace

In Remembrance of the Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki, 62 years of war and nuclear weapons, and amidst the
seas of war, violence, disaster, and neglect that swirl around us
today; we yearn for the healing waters of peace...[all]
For vibrant lives suddenly and shamelessly taken from the
community of family and loved ones...[all]
For the lives that continue, haunted forever by the pain of absence,
and the nightmare images forever seared into our memories...[all]
For empire and all the deaths due to the arrogance of patriotism,
religious or ideological fanaticism, and indifference to the world
and human need...[all]
For reconciliation amongst all peoples... [all]
For the care of children and the earth... [all]
For the violence of poverty and the wounding of body and spirit
resulting from racial, religious, and sexual hatred...[all]
For our society’s addiction to oil, weapons, and war-making... [all]
That we may end war and the occupation of Iraq, abolish nuclear
weapons, resist the war economy and beat swords into plowshares,
care for the victims of violence, disaster, and hatred; That we may
see the possibilities of justice and peace, always clinging to the
Promise of Peace... [all] --Robert M. Smith