By Jason Sibert
With a world in turmoil, the state of Vermont has stepped up with solutions.
Part of the turmoil is the geo-political friction between China, the United States, Russia, Iran, and India. Several nuclear armed states are caught up in the push and pull between countries. President Donald Trump’s administration seems determined to put as little faith in arms control as possible in abandoning the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action arms control treaty with Iran and the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty with Russia.
However, Vermont’s legislators, citizens, and citizen groups are providing an alternative to events on the national stage. The state’s senate passed a resolution in May opposing the basing of nuclear weapons systems in the state, a move critics of the F-35 hope will force the federal government to take the planes, activists say they can carry nuclear arms, to another location. The resolution passed the Vermont Senate 22-7, largely on party lines with Democrats voting for it and Republicans voting against it, said reports.
Vermont State Senator Jeanette White (D-Windham) supported the resolution. Senator White has been involved in peace-related issues for years. She was involved in the movement to end the Vietnam War and her husband was a conscientious objector to that war. Both served as draft counselors in the era, said White. The state senator said the decision to place the F-35 in the state had already been made. However, she still hopes the state’s move can make an impact in terms of consciousness.
“I don’t know if we’ll have much of an impact at all,” White said. “It seems to me that states are the laboratory of democracy and if states get involved and start pushing for something than it’s more likely that it will happen on a national level. I would not have made the decision to put the F-35’s in Burlington (Vermont) but that was a decision that was way beyond my pay grade. It seems they’re going to be there.”
The presence of the F-35’s around Vermont’s largest municipality, Burlington, also presented noise pollution issues.
“The noise they will make in an urban area (Burlington) is more than should be tolerated,” she said. “We’ve learned in the past that there have been nuclear delivery systems out of Burlington. In the 1960’s, I think they were called F-89’s. They were actually carrying nuclear weapons. We don’t want them here, we don’t want them anywhere.”
White said Vermont is carrying out tradition, as the state has traditionally opposed nuclear weapons and the arms race. In addition, citizen groups mobilized around the issue. The organization Citizens Against Nuclear Bombers in Vermont visited State Senate Leader Tim Ashe to discuss the resolution. Retired Air Force Col. Rosanne Greco also supported the resolution. Saying it sent a strong message and provides the Air Force an out to put the planes in a different location.
Jason Sibert is the executive director of the Peace Economy Project
