Articles by: Brian Terrell

 Home of the “Hellhounds,” Whiteman AFB drone squadron ‘most lethal’ in US

 Home of the “Hellhounds,” Whiteman AFB drone squadron ‘most lethal’ in US

Note: Brian Terrell delivered this talk at the Oct. 1 peace witness sponsored by PeaceWorksKC, at Whiteman AFB, near Knob Noster, MO. Leading up to this protest there was discussion among organizers about the nature of drone operations here at Whiteman Air Force Base. Is this a training facility, or are Reaper drones engaged in lethal activities, are actual murders[Read More…]

by 03/10/2022 Comments are Disabled World
“An unspeakable crime”

“An unspeakable crime”

On the occasion of the Prohibit Nukes, Promote HOPE—Memorial Day walk, rally at the Kansas City National Security Campus, Kansas City, Missouri, on May 30, 2022 Four months ago, two days before the civilized world celebrated one year since the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons came into force on January 22, officials here at the Kansas City National[Read More…]

by 31/05/2022 Comments are Disabled World
“Let Them Kill as Many as Possible”- United States Policy Toward Russia and its Neighbors

“Let Them Kill as Many as Possible”- United States Policy Toward Russia and its Neighbors

In April 1941, four years before he was to become President and eight months before the United States entered World War II, Senator Harry Truman of Missouri reacted to the news that Germany had invaded the Soviet Union: “If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia; and if that Russia is winning, we ought[Read More…]

by 03/03/2022 Comments are Disabled World
Volkel, Netherlands, photo by BNNVARA

Digging for Peace- Resisting Nuclear Weapons

On Wednesday, October 20, I joined “Vrede Scheppen,” “Create Peace,” about 25 peace activists from the Netherlands, Germany and Austria at the airbase at Volkel, Netherlands, making a plea for an end to nuclear weapons. This base is home to two Dutch F16 fighter wings and the United States Air Force 703rd Munitions Support Squadron. In violation of international and[Read More…]

by 18/11/2021 Comments are Disabled World
A man grieves during a mass funeral for members of a family was killed in a U.S. drone airstrike, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, Aug. 30, 2021. (Photo: Marcus Yam/Los Angeles Times)

The “Longest War” is not over

Speaking from the White House on August 31, President Joe Biden lied to the people of the U.S. and to the world: “Last night in Kabul, the United States ended 20 years of war in Afghanistan — the longest war in American history.” The U.S. war on Afghanistan did not end— it has only adapted to technological advances and morphed[Read More…]

by 07/09/2021 Comments are Disabled World
Author filing an appeal to his criminal conviction at the court in Cochem, Germany. Photo by Christiane Danowski

Resisting Nuclear Weapons in a Climate Crisis

On July 21, I was walking in the forests surrounding the German Air Force Base at Büchel in the Eifel Mountains with three Catholic Worker friends, Susan van der Hijden of Amsterdam, Netherlands, Susan Crane of Redwood City, California, and Christiane Danowski of Dortmund, Germany. We were there at the end of an “International Week” of protests against the approximately[Read More…]

by 02/08/2021 Comments are Disabled World
The Al Jalaa Tower housing Al Jazeera and The Associated Press offices collapses after being hit by Israeli missile in Gaza City [Mohammed Salem/Reuters]

“Roof Knocking” in Gaza and the Myth of the Benevolent Drone

In its deadly attacks in densely populated Gaza, the Israeli Defense Force is employing a technique they call “roof knocking.” First drones fire small missiles without warheads on a residential building, intended only to shake the building before armed missiles destroy it minutes later. The IDF calls these “warning shots” and they are often preceded by telephone calls to some[Read More…]

by 20/05/2021 Comments are Disabled Palestine
Activists Brian Terrell and Ghulam Hussein Ahmadi at the Border Free Center in Kabul, Afghanistan. Graffiti by Kabul Knight, photo by Hakim

Biden’s Drone Wars

On Thursday, April 15, the New York Times posted an article headed, “How the U.S. Plans to Fight From Afar After Troops Exit Afghanistan,” just in case anyone misunderstood the previous day’s headline, “Biden, Setting Afghanistan Withdrawal, Says ‘It Is Time to End the Forever War’” as indicating the U.S. war in Afghanistan might actually come to an end on[Read More…]

by 19/04/2021 Comments are Disabled Imperialism
Brian Terrell at left, with Joan Pleune, Felton Davis and Bud Courtney, blocking the US Mission to the UN, December, 2017, by Joanne Kennedy

Ending the Other War in Yemen

On February 4, in his first major foreign policy address, President Joe Biden announced “we are ending all American support for offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arms sales.” Speaking of the Saudi-led coalition that has been at war in Yemen since 2015, creating what he called “a humanitarian and strategic catastrophe,” Biden declared “This war has[Read More…]

by 11/02/2021 Comments are Disabled World
Daniel Berrigan, inoculated against normalcy

COVID-19 and the Wasting Disease of Normalcy

“But what of the price of peace?” asked Jesuit priest and war resister Daniel Berrigan, writing from federal prison in 1969, doing time for his part in the destruction of draft records. “I think of the good, decent, peace-loving people I have known by the thousands, and I wonder. How many of them are so afflicted with the wasting disease[Read More…]

by 18/04/2020 1 comment World
Remembering Martin Luther King, Jr. on the Anniversary of his Murder in a Pandemic Year

Remembering Martin Luther King, Jr. on the Anniversary of his Murder in a Pandemic Year

  The United States Strategic National Stockpile of essential medical supplies maintained by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, seems unable to respond to the present COVID-19 crisis.  There is much discussion in today’s news about who is responsible for the shortcomings. Did Trump find the shelves empty or full when he took office after President Obama? Is[Read More…]

by 05/04/2020 1 comment World
A reflection on the trial of the Kings Bay Plowshares 7

A reflection on the trial of the Kings Bay Plowshares 7

“Whether nuclear weapons are actually illegal under international or domestic law (a doubtful proposition) is not relevant or an appropriate issue to litigate in this case,” so ruled Judge Lisa Godbey Wood of the US District Court for the Southern District of Georgia, late on Friday October 18. This last-minute order, restricting the defense of seven antinuclear activists at a[Read More…]

by 12/11/2019 Comments are Disabled World
U.S. F-16s at Incirlik    Photo credit: U.S. government

The United States Air Force at Incirlik, Our National “Black Eye”

Current events concerning Turkey and the Kurds in Syria remind me of a conversation I had with a US Air Force colonel almost 17 years ago in a courtroom in Des Moines. To refresh my memory, I dug deep into my closet and dusted off the transcript of the case, “STATE OF IOWA, plaintiff vs. CHRISTINE GAUNT et al.,” in[Read More…]

by 19/10/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Ending the War in Yemen- Congressional Resolution is Not Enough!

Ending the War in Yemen- Congressional Resolution is Not Enough!

On November 14, the Republican majority in the U.S. House of Representatives blocked a resolution that its supporters say would end U.S. participation in the war and famine in Yemen. It is unclear, however, what effect this resolution would have on the ground even if it were passed into law. It imposes no limits on arms sales to Saudi Arabia[Read More…]

by 16/11/2018 2 comments World
A young survivor of August 9 Saudi-led attack on his school bus, with fragment of U.S. made missile - Photo/Ahmad Algohbarya

 Catholic Support for War- Another Child Abuse Scandal

On August 14, a report from a grand jury investigation in Pennsylvania identified 300 Catholic priests across the state who had sexually abused more than 1,000 children. “Priests were raping little boys and girls, and the men of God who were responsible for them not only did nothing; they hid it all. For decades,” the grand jury wrote in one[Read More…]

by 31/08/2018 1 comment Human Rights
Two Interrogations, Gina Haspel and Adolf Eichmann

Two Interrogations, Gina Haspel and Adolf Eichmann

“the evasions and obfuscations of these two willing technicians of state terror are chillingly similar” On May 9, Gina Haspel, Donald Trump’s choice for head of the Central Intelligence Agency, testified at her Senate confirmation hearing in Washington, DC. Some senators questioned her about her tenure, in 2002, as CIA station chief in Thailand. There, the agency ran one of[Read More…]

by 12/05/2018 1 comment World
 Solidarity From Central Cellblock To Guantanamo

 Solidarity From Central Cellblock To Guantanamo

On Thursday, January 11, the sixteenth anniversary of the opening of the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba was marked by a coalition of 15 human rights organizations gathered in Lafayette Park, across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House in Washington, DC. An interfaith prayer service was followed by a rally featuring song and poetry and addresses by[Read More…]

by 15/01/2018 Comments are Disabled World
A Story of Two Blockades: New York City And Yemen

A Story of Two Blockades: New York City And Yemen

On December 11, in response to the growing humanitarian crisis in Yemen, more than 50 concerned people including representatives of various peace, justice and human rights organizations and communities, gathered in New York City’s Ralph Bunche Park, across First Avenue from the United Nations. Our message, which was communicated on signs and banners and by speakers addressing the rally, was[Read More…]

by 16/12/2017 1 comment World
“We are Killing Terrorists” And “Attack We Will”- Trump’s Most Vicious Racist Rant

“We are Killing Terrorists” And “Attack We Will”- Trump’s Most Vicious Racist Rant

  On Monday, August 21, President Donald Trump delivered a prime-time speech almost shocking in its ordinariness. It was such an address as either of his immediate predecessors, George W. Bush or Barack Obama, could easily have given over the previous decade and a half. While hinting at nebulous new strategies and ill-defined new metrics to measure success, President Trump[Read More…]

by 29/08/2017 Comments are Disabled Imperialism
Pope Francis And The Style Of Politics For Peace

Pope Francis And The Style Of Politics For Peace

Brian Terrell, December 25, 2016: Since Pope Paul VI proclaimed January 1 a “World Day of Peace” in 1967, popes have issued statements for peace for that day. On December 8, in this most perilous of times, Pope Francis published the fiftieth World Day of Peace declaration for 2017, catching the church and the world by surprise with its call[Read More…]

by 27/12/2016 1 comment World
A Visit To Russia For “Life Extension” Of The Planet

A Visit To Russia For “Life Extension” Of The Planet

  On October 9, I was in the Nevada desert with Catholic Workers from around the world for an action of prayer and nonviolent resistance at what is now called the Nevada National Security Site, the test site where between 1951 and 1992, nine hundred and twenty-eight documented atmospheric and underground nuclear tests occurred. Since the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and[Read More…]

by 17/11/2016 2 comments World
What Makes A Hate Group?

What Makes A Hate Group?

“As a matter of fact, you have had a person attend your protests in Camp Douglas who has threatened to kill our Deputies.”This piece of startling news was revealed to me in a letter from Juneau County, Wisconsin, Undersheriff Craig Stuchlik dated July 25. I had written to the sheriff’s department requesting documents under the Open Records Law and for[Read More…]

by 26/08/2016 1 comment World