Cruise Threatens Peace and Breaks The Law

Date1983

Dimensions23 1/2 x 16 3/4 in. (59.7 x 42.5 cm)

ClassificationsPoster

Credit LinePoster House Permanent Collection

Terms

Object numberPH.7494

DescriptionThe Greenham Common protests started in September 1981 when a group of women staged a march against the plan to place American nuclear cruise missiles at this Royal Air Force base. Realizing that this approach was not going to be effective, and insisting on a women-only initiative, the activists began an encampment in 1982. That December, thirty thousand women formed a human chain around the base, occasionally breaking into the site to cause chaos or to vandalize U.S. warplanes with graffiti. This poster encourages other women to form similar encampments on each of the 102 American military bases within the United Kingdom (both those with and without nuclear weapons). On November 9, 1983 (the same day as the protest promoted in this poster), the group filed a lawsuit in the United States against the U.S. government, arguing against its right to place nuclear missiles on foreign soil. These efforts drew the attention of the American public to the outrage that many European citizens felt about the surrender of their sovereignty to the United States in the name of international security. In 1991, four years after the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was signed by Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan, nuclear missiles were removed from the Greenham Common base. The camp remained in operation as a monument until 2000.

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