Playing the game and resisting British Aerospace

<*> The United Nations Day for Children -- 2 October--was the occasion of the most recent act of civil disobedience against British Aerospace's government-backed deal to supply Indonesia with 24 Hawk ground attack aircraft.

Twenty-five of us gathered at BAe's London headquarters and then carried a child's coffin, first to the cenotaph for a minute's silence for the victims of Indonesia's war in East Timor, and then to the Foreign Office where six of us staged a symbolic die-in for half an hour in the vehicle entrance. Police turned away vehicles and made no arrests. As an ending to the action a letter calling on the Foreign Office to revoke BAe's export licence was handed in along with wreath, and a final minute's silence was held.

Nonviolent direct action against the Hawk deal has been taking place regularly for the past two and a half years, initiated by Chris Cole's "BAe Ploughshares" action of January 1993, in which he broke into BAe's Stevenage factory and, with a household hammer, disarmed various military components, including a Hawk nosecone. Lower risk actions have since taken place at the main factories involved in Hawk production--Stevenage, Brough, and Warton--at BAe offices in London and Farnborough, and at various BAe events including shareholders' meetings and the Hawks' contribution to the VE-Day celebrations in Hyde Park. Actions have included painting, blood-pouring, flyposting, occupations, the dyeing red of ornamental fountains, die-ins, blockades, factory incursions and--at the recent peace camp at Warton, a short-lived football match within the factory perimeter, to which management, security, and workers were all invited.

There are several groups which campaign against the Hawk deal as part of their activity on arms trade, human rights, or peace issues: among them the British Coalition for East Timor, Campaign Against Arms Trade, TAPOL - the Indonesian Human Rights Campaign, and the London-based antimilitarist group ARROW. Separate from these groups, but overlapping with them in places, is a coalition which oversees a "Pledge of resistance" for individuals prepared to engage in civil disobedience to stop the Hawk deal.

>>> What's going wrong?

Unfortunately, the numbers--both organising and taking part in nonviolent resistance to the Hawk deal--have not been as hoped. With the first of the 24 Hawks due to be shipped from Warton early in 1996, and with a possible further 120 in the bloody pipeline, we have been faced with some searching questions about both our organisational abilities and about the theories and practices of civil disobedience. Much focus has been on the point of production, in terms of mild disruption and visual protest, with some attempt at communicating with workers. Although there has been some sympathy expressed by workers, no significant action has followed--without the offer of concerted and comprehensive union or peace and human rights movement support, this is hardly surprising. In resistance terms, the government has largely been let off the hook.

With the clock ticking away towards the days when the first Hawks are shipped out, there we could see either despair or frenzied activity among the nonviolent resisters.

However, given that other groups are engaged in parliamentary lobbying and some individuals are mounting a legal challenge to the deal, it is vital that nonviolent resisters create calmer spaces in which to work out how best to use their energies in support of the overall campaign. I think that two larger-scale actions in the first half of next year, one high-profile one at the Foreign Office in London and a mass rally and civil disobedience at Warton, could contribute significantly to creating political and public pressure to reverse the deal. Whatever we decide in the coming months, we need more people willing to organise, mobilise for, and enact the sort of protest and resistance the people of East Timor deserve.

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The next round of protest and NVDA around the Hawk deal will happen on 11 November, the day before the anniversary of the 1991 Santa Cruz massacre in East Timor. Actions are planned for BAe Warton, near Preston (0161 834 0295 for info); BAe Brough, near Hull (01482 470621); and BAe Farnborough, near Reading (01865 793820).

Pledge of Resistance, c/o Stop the Hawk Deal, One World Centre, 6

Mount St, Manchester M2 5NS