Called by CND the protest brought together the widest selection of age groups, from pensioners to teens to children, with a range of local CND groups represented plus supporters of London Socialist Alliance, SWP, and Globalise Resistance as well as individual activists. Alongside the mass printed socialist placards there were an array of colourful self made signs and banners.

A giant Darth Vader puppet draped in the American flag mingled through the crowd and made visits to the gates of Downing Street, crossing over the road. At about 13.15 the police in front of Downing Street called for more officers to attend the demonstration - not because of anything the crowd was doing, but simply because of the numbers present -at that time the police had just seven officers policing the protest.

The usual crash barrier pens erected opposite Downing Street were just too small to even begin to provide space for people to stand in so the crowd spread out along the street and filled the pavements. While drums were being played and people chanting several delegations arrived at the gates of downing street for a spot of street theatre, while death, the grim reaper, lurked in the background, ever present.

A harassed Tony Blair was pulled this way and that by a spangled Uncle Sam and high ranking US military figures backed up by a number of evil corporate representatives, until the CND delegation managed to rescue (kidnap?) him and talk some sense into him. The troupe crossed over the road to where protestors were gathered and symbolically removed the American flag from the Yorkshire region of a huge map of the UK, replacing it with a CND banner and union jack together.

A range of speeches were made by CND veterans and a representative of Globalise Resistance. Speakers made the point that the missile system was clearly not about defence, but all about America being able to launch a first strike, being able to survive a Nuclear war. The system breaks the 1972 ABM treaty and its promotion is already leading to destabilisation and an increase in arms spending in countries around the world, including China which has recently increased its nuclear budget by 17%.

Messages of support were sent by celebrities including Ian Banks (sp?) and Emma Thompson, who urged people to demonstrate now before it was too late - for once we are ahead of the game - we have to send a clear signal to Blair that he cannot use British bases to implement this on behalf of the American administration and corporations - for they simply want to dominate not only land, air and sea, but space also. The American administration is also being pushed by the corporations who will profit out of this huge investment in technology (eg Boeing, TRW, Lockhead Martin and Raytheon).

Respect was paid to all of the CND and other peace groups who have been campaigning on this issue for years including those in Yorkshire, at Menwith Hill and the women's campaigns. Speakers also highlighted how these issues are all linked and that fair trade, globalisation and nuclear campaigns are all part of the same struggle. Recognising previous successes and older campaigns of civil disobedience there was a general call for an increase in campaigning against Star Wars including more direct action.


With that the crowd spontaneously surged into the street and blocked the entire road sending police into a series of confused urgent radio exchanges. As veteran peace campaigners jigged shoulder to shoulder with younger anti-capitalist protestors and socialists the crowd joined together chanting as traffic was turned back. With the street well and truly taken and smiles all around the protestors only paused chanting to briefly move aside, allowing an ambulance safe passage through the blockade.

After about 10-15 minutes the police were looking for someone to negotiate with, their message - that they were about to bring in TSG (riot police) and that people had to move to clear the road one way or another. While in discussions the crowd again spontaneously moved, this time to start marching up Whitehall towards Trafalgar Square. With loud chants and those at the front linking arms, the police again went into intense radio exchanges.

At 13.40 the colourful crowd reached the edge of Trafalgar Square as 3 police riot vans entered from the opposite side. With police trying to steer the front of the crowd the newly arrived officers ran through the streets trying to get to the front. About 2 minutes later and the marchers had moved up the road to the left of the square towards the National Gallery, where around 30 police struggled to form a line, aggressively pushing the front demonstrators back. With more riot vans arriving scuffles broke out at the front until the forces of darkness had regained control with the police now blocking the road backed up by 4 riot vans.

10 minutes after getting to the square the demonstrators turned and began marching in the other direction, but by now there were almost 70 police officers, 14 riot vans, 6 police motorbikes and a range rover in attendance, ready to steer the march into the square - after a brief attempt to retake the road through the traffic (forcefully prevented) the mass of people found themselves on the pavement of the square hemmed in by a pretty solid cordon of police.

Realising that this was now a stalemate, the day ended with speeches made from a megaphone congratulating people on a good turn out and a spirited demonstration. While two well known police surveillance photographers took more snaps of peaceful demonstrators for the state's files, people called for much larger demonstrations later this summer against the missile defence system, for more direct action, and for solidarity between different campaign groups. The recent press and police hysteria over the Mayday demonstrations was condemned and people were invited to take part in peaceful non violent direct action against the World Bank on Mayday. People were also urged to get involved in the demonstrations that will be occurring all over the world in July coinciding with large demonstrations against the G8 summit in Genoa Italy. The speeches ended in cheers and chants as people began to disperse at around 14.15

Pictures at:  http://uk.indymedia.org/display.php3?article_id=2949

More info:

CND briefing on Nat Missile Defence System:
 http://www.cnduk.org/briefing/nmd.htm

Yorks CND Space Missile links:
 http://www.gn.apc.org/cndyorks/ylinks.htm#space

A weakness has been found in the death star,stormtroopers who dont hear the 'voice'will soon face metalstorm.
The last empire is under attack as the planetary battle begins.Do whatever it takes -- just end the oppression of the Trade Federation.