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From: tim@isrnix.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: anti-nuke questions - (nf)
Message-ID: <1192@pur-ee.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 1-Dec-83 03:28:12 EST
Article-I.D.: pur-ee.1192
Posted: Thu Dec  1 03:28:12 1983
Date-Received: Sat, 3-Dec-83 00:00:08 EST
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Organization: Electrical Engineering Department , Purdue University
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#R:hou5a:-43700:isrnix:11700009:000:4076
isrnix!tim    Nov 30 23:42:00 1983

Once again when factual arguments are impotent in the face of the
evidence we find proponents of Nuclear armaments engaging in
red-baiting again.  It is no doubt true that the Soviet Union has
a propaganda budget, just as the U.S. has- in my town in Bloomington
just a month or so ago an Air Force colonel came as part of a
nationwide "information" campaign on the part of the Pentagon to
try to justify the latest escalation of the arms race. The issue of
the extinction of homo sapiens is not one which is only the concern
of the Soviet Union--people on BOTH sides are beginning to question
the actions of their governments in threatening the extinction of
the human race.  Are the supporters of the Peace Movement in
Eastern Europe also funded by the KGB? If the Peace Movement is solely
funded by the KGB then how does one explain the following article in the
New York Times?:
 
>MARCHERS IN RUMANIA ASSAIL ARMS PLANS OF EAST AND WEST
>
>Bucharest,Rumania, Nov. 12 (AP)-About 30,000 people joined a Government-
>sponsored march today against missile deployment in Europe by both
>East and West. The Soviet Union has reportedly been pressing Rumania
>to accept deployment of Soviet missiles if Soviet-American arms talks
>fail and new missiles are deployed in Western Europe.
 
or how about this article from the New York Times?:
>SOME CZECHS QUESTION NEED FOR SOVIET MISSILE RESPONSE
>
>Prague, Nov. 5(AP)-Some Czechoslovaks are questioning the wisdom
>of the deployment of Soviet medium-range missiles in their 
>country, the Communist Party newspaper Rude Pravo said today.
>Public airing of doubts about policy formulated in Moscow is rare
>in Czechoslovakia.  Rude Pravo said it had received letters since
>the Soviet Union said last month that it would respond to the
>deployment of United States Pershing 2 and cruise missiles in
>Western Europe by stationing missiles in Czechoslovakia and East
>Germany. Most letters "show a resolve to do all for the defense of
>peace," said Rude Pravo. "but there are also some from which one
>can sense doubts whether the recently announced steps for the
>strengthening of defense 'are necessary at this stage.'"
>Other letters ask "whether we should not have waited until the
>Pershings are stationed."
>"What will the defenders of peace in the West say to this?" and
>"Who really started all this?" said Rude Pravo.
 
Lest one thinks these reports (which are actually from the Associated
Press anyway) are merely products of the "liberal" New York Times,
recent issues of the conservative US News and World Report have
reported the same phenomenon- the growing peace sentiments in Eastern
Europe in East Germany and Czechoslovakia. In East Germany peace groups
have been meeting in Churches to question the present arms race and the
Soviet desire to station retaliatory missiles in East Germany in
response to US deployment of Pershings. And why not? If Europe is the
first target of a nuclear exchange BOTH East and West Europe will be
fried first. It is about time that the people on both sides of the
brink of armageddon forced their leaders to stop playing nuclear
blackmail with the life of the species and our whole planet for the
sake of their power politics games.  
  Of course one can be sure that Peace supporters in the East are also
accused of being "unpatriotic" or puppets of the West just as Peace
supporters are here.  But the facts are that everybody from East or
West has an interest in preserving our species.
 Another common tactic is to accuse Peace supporters of only opposing
"our" missiles, or advocating only our own disarmament. The fact that
the Peace marchers in Europe have called for the removal of Soviet
SS-20's as well as a halt to US cruise missiles is generally ignored.
When the Social Democrats in Germany approved a resolution opposing
the deployment of cruise missiles in Germany, they also called for
the halt of any more deployment of SS-20's.
 
  Avoiding nuclear war is as important for us as for them!
 
   tim sevener
   Indiana University, Bloomington
   pur-ee!iuvax!isrnix!tim