Aug 25 2007
Cyrano’s Journal Online and its semi-autonomous subsections (Thomas Paine’s Corner, The Greanville Journal, CJO Avenger, and VoxPop) would be delighted to periodically email you links to the most recent material and timeless classics available on our diverse and comprehensive site. If you would like to subscribe, type “CJO subscription” in the subject line and send your email to
By Sandeep Pandey, Aruna Roy & Medha Patkar
8/25/07
Much has been said and written about the India-US Nuclear Deal, beginning with the statement issued by many eminent nuclear scientists soon after the talks on the deal began between the India and US governments. Public fora and people’s organisations such as Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and Peace called it anti-sovereignty. Today when it is seen as an issue of conflict between the UPA and its Left front allies, we as representatives of people’s movements must re-iterate our stand, which is that the deal is not just anti-democratic but against peace, and against environmentally sustainable energy generation and self-reliant economic development.
The Left front is questioning the fact that such an international deal with significant implications is imposed on the Indian people and Parliament with no public debate and consultation. While the US Congress took a year and a half to discuss the proposed change in US laws to permit nuclear commerce with India, the process in India has been totally undemocratic.
The deal is part of a successful attempt by the United States to build a strategic relationship with India. In confronting the rising capitalist challenge from China, India will be used as its client in the region. Directly or indirectly, the US will also enter the Indian sub-continent to manage intra-regional, inter-country relations. This whole process is likely to escalate the arms race between Pakistan and India, sabotaging the India-Pakistan peace process. How can we ignore the fact the US sells arms to both India and Pakistan?
Continue Reading »
Aug 10 2007
Cyrano’s Journal Online and its semi-autonomous subsections (Thomas Paine’s Corner, The Greanville Journal, CJO Avenger, and VoxPop) would be delighted to periodically email you links to the most recent material and timeless classics available on our diverse and comprehensive site. If you would like to subscribe, type “CJO subscription” in the subject line and send your email to
By Emily Spence
8/10/07
It is easy to be discouraged with the peace movement. It is easy to want to walk or run away, especially so when progress seems so slow to stop war activities anywhere in the world.
Ironically, the first day that I joined the peace moment was the same one that I most desperately wanted to run away. I, literally, wanted to flee with every part of my being, but somehow managed to sit still instead.
At the time, I was five years old. I was sitting on a bench at a Quaker Meeting. I remember the drop dead silence surrounding the deeply inward-dwelling people all around me. I remember the contrast that the occasional trilling bird in the shrubbery outside the window made and the merry splash of intermittent sunshine on the floor opposed to the overall dimness of the room. Then I heard the room’s door open followed by a muted shuffle of feet.
Continue Reading »
Aug 09 2007
Cyrano’s Journal Online and its semi-autonomous subsections (Thomas Paine’s Corner, The Greanville Journal, CJO Avenger, and VoxPop) would be delighted to periodically email you links to the most recent material and timeless classics available on our diverse and comprehensive site. If you would like to subscribe, type “CJO subscription” in the subject line and send your email to
By Jerry Mazza
Online Journal Associate Editor
Originally published at Online Journal
Aug 9, 2007
I was a little boy on August 6, 1945, when President Harry Truman decided to drop the first nuclear weapon ever on the ill-fated Hiroshima.
The weapon in fact was nicknamed “Little Boy,” a cruel irony. More so was the dropping three days later of the “Fat Man” nuclear bomb over Nagasaki, which unlike Hiroshima had no military installations. To make matters worse, on my seventh birthday, September 17, 1945, Hiroshima was hit by the Makurazaki Typhoon (Ida), which added 3,000 deaths and injuries to the first two disasters, the dark magic of three’s.
Continue Reading »