N.Y. campaign seeks to ban nuclear ships from harbor

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NEW YORK-A campaign to put a referendum on the November ballot is under way in New York City. The initiative is aimed at blocking the Navy's plans to bring nuclear weapons into New York's harbor.

The Navy has decided to station a nuclear-capable Surface Action Group at Stapleton, Staten Island. Although Navy policy is neither to confirm nor deny the presence of nuclear weapons on its ships, the issue is not in doubt. A letter from 15 New York City Council members to Secretary of the Navy John Lehman made this clear:

"Statements by the Navy and the Secretary of Defense as well as information in military publications on the purpose of a Surface Action Group, suggest to us a de facto existence of nuclear missiles on board the ships to be stationed at Stapleton."

The letter urged that plans for the base be cancelled.

The opposition campaign is being organized by the Ad Hoc Committee for a Navyport Referendum, which was initiated by the New York Mobilization for Survival. The fact that the referendum, if successful, would be binding on New York City's government gives this petitioning drive a potentially powerful dynamic.

A majority vote in the referendum would not be binding on the Navy, but it would block the city government from cooperating with the Navyport plans in any way.

The city would be prohibited from providing land or funds to the project. If the Navy were to proceed anyway— "Damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead"-it would have to do so in the face of a popular vote to the contrary. In any case, this is not a petitioning effort that the warmakers will easily be able to ignore.

The campaign is expected to proceed in two stages. First is the drive to collect 30,000 valid signatures of New York City voters by the end of May. Then would come the effort to mobilize pub. lic support to actually pass the referendum in November.

Campaign's two stages

The kick-off for this latter phase will be a "human chain" demonstration on June 8 spanning the Verrazano Bridge, which connects Staten Island and Brooklyn. This action will be part of an aggression against Vietnam and Nicaragua.

SWP hall, forcing the socialists to evacuate.

and 46-1/2 Race St., San Jose, CA 95126. international series of protests during the first two weeks in June. A demonstration to span the Golden Gate Bridge has been called in San Francisco, where the Navy intends to base the presumably nuclear-armed battleship Missouri.

The Navy's plans for New York's harbor call for a fleet of seven ships, headed by the battleship Iowa, that can carry up to 360 Tomahawk cruise missiles. Each of these missiles carries a nuclear warhead 15 times more powerEthiopia, Laos shima.

The proposed Navyport would be a launching pad for military intervention in Central America and elsewhere. Last November, the Iowa led a flotilla of 25 ships in a traditional "gunboat diplomacy" display in Central American waters.

When New Zealand refused to allow U.S. nuclear ships to dock, the Reagan administration's response was "the squeal heard 'round the world! " This is a particularly sensitive issue for the nuclear warriors in the Pentagon-and a rebuff by New York City would inflict a wound far deeper than the New Zealand refusal.

But if New Zealand can do it, why can't New York?

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