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The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) plans a summit, or at least a "celebration" in Washington, D.C., April 4, 2019, to mark 70 years since its creation on April 4, 1949.
We plan a peace festival to advocate the abolition of NATO, the promotion of peace, the redirection of resources to human and environmental needs, the demilitarization of our cultures, and the commemoration of Martin Luther King Jr.'s speech against war on April 4, 1967, as well as his assassination on April 4, 1968.
Plans are subject to change based on input from allies and updated information on what NATO plans to do. Tentatively, World BEYOND War plans to work with a coalition of other groups to organize events in downtown Washington, D.C., on April 3 to include nonviolence training, big art creation, a conference of speakers, and possibly a big demonstration; and on April 4 to be part of a major demonstration. One idea being considered is to form a procession to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial and from there to where NATO is meeting and/or to a rally in Freedom Plaza.
The important thing now is to put this on your calendar. NATO was heartily unwelcomed by big crowds in Chicago in 2012, and we should be even bigger and more effective this time, with nonviolent actions and media outreach that communicate our opposition to militarism and our support for peace.
In 2012 in Chicago, Amnesty International put up big ads thanking NATO for its warmaking. This time we should put up big ads calling for an end to NATO and to war. Fund pro-peace billboards and other big ads here.
World BEYOND War has also endorsed a rally at 1 p.m. on March 30 at the White House with UNAC, and an event planned by Black Alliance for Peace on the evening of April 4. We will be strongest with all groups, across divergent ideologies and issue areas, working together.
How You and Your Organization Can Be Part of Saying No to NATO, Yes to Peace:
We're lining up venues, which may include a venue where we can hold events and where people can choose to spend the night on April 3rd. We'll have those details and further information on rides and lodging. If you'd like to offer or request lodging or rides, please do that here.
Endorsing Organizations:
World BEYOND War, Popular Resistance, CODE PINK, UFPJ, DSA Metro DC, A-APRP (GC), No to War No to NATO, International Peace Bureau, National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance, Nuke Watch, Alliance for Global Justice, Coalition Against U.S. Foreign Military Bases, U.S. Peace Council, Backbone Campaign,
Sponsoring Organizations and Individuals:
World BEYOND War,
Volunteering to Help:
Outreach that Individuals and Organizations Can Help With
We want to reach out to organizations and individuals in and around Washington, D.C., and any willing to come to Washington, D.C. These events are an opportunity to build the coalition we need. War and militarism kill, teach violence, drive racism, create refugees, destroy the natural environment, erode civil liberties, and drain budgets. There are no groups working for good causes that shouldn't have an interest in opposing NATO and advocating for peace. All are welcome. Here's a sample message you can modify and use.
Spread the word on social media:
The Case Against NATO:
While Donald Trump once blurted out the obvious: that NATO is obsolete, he subsequently professed his commitment to NATO and began pressuring NATO members to buy more weapons. So, the notion that somehow NATO is anti-Trump and therefore good would not only be silly and practically amoral on its own terms, it is also at odds with the facts of Trump's behavior. We are planning an anti-NATO / pro-peace action at which opposition to the militarism of NATO's dominant member is welcome and necessary.
NATO has pushed the weaponry and the hostility and the massive so-called war games right up to the border of Russia. NATO has waged aggressive wars far from the North Atlantic. NATO has added Colombia, abandoning all pretense of its purpose being in the North Atlantic. NATO is used to free the U.S. Congress from the responsibility and the right to oversee the atrocities of U.S. wars. NATO is used as cover by NATO member governments to join U.S. wars under the pretense that they are somehow more legal or acceptable. NATO is used as cover to illegally and recklessly share nuclear weapons with supposedly non-nuclear nations. NATO is used to assign nations the responsibility to go to war if other nations go to war, and therefore to be prepared for war. NATO's militarism threatens the earth's environment. NATO's wars fuel racism and bigotry and erode our civil liberties while draining our wealth.
We must say: No to NATO, Yes to peace, Yes to prosperity, Yes to a sustainable environment, Yes to civil liberties, Yes to education, Yes to a culture of nonviolence and kindness and decency, Yes to remembering April 4th as a day associated with the work for peace of Martin Luther King Jr.
"As I have walked among the desperate, rejected, and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. But they asked, and rightly so, 'What about Vietnam?' They asked if our own nation wasn't using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today: my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent." —MLK Jr.
Send us your ideas, questions, proposals!
