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Article Review: International Maritime Bureau

 * the points that are made in this article are relevant, but are vague in describing what the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) actually does.
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Seeds of Hope

 * Seeds of hope was a group of four women (also called the Warton Four) formed in England 1996 who intentionally damaged a BAE Hawk fighter jet owned by the  British aerospace which was in the  Warton Aerodome in  Preston, England. A London newspaper released an article stating that Joanna Wilson, Lotta Kronlid, and Andrea Needham were arrested and charged with causing 1.7 million pounds worth of damage. Angie Zelter was also charged shortly after with conspiracy. All four were in prison for six months pending trial that ended up lasting seven days at Liverpool crown court in July 1996. The attacks were an attempt to promote hope and to discourage violence in the  British air force. To do this, the women did broke into a British Aerospace factory in Lancashire and used household hammers to disarm the Hawk warplane headed for Indonesia.

Women Involved
The group was composed of four women.
 * 1) Angie Zelter age 45
 * 2) Joanna Wilson age 33
 * 3) Lotta Kronlid age 28
 * 4) Andrea Needham age 30

Motives
The four women did 1.7 million pounds worth of damage to the fighter jets in attempt to promote a movement against violence and social greed. The four women felt that in damaging the British fighter jets that they were preventing a genocide and saving lives. Later, they claimed their actions were unpunishable because they were preventing a terrorist attack. The planes were bound for Indonesian that were going to be used by the Indonesian air force. Under british law, people are allowed to use reasonable force to prevent crime and that's what the women felt they were doing. They were later arrested and charged with criminal damage. The brutal Indonesian counterinsurgency campaign against the independence movement in East Timor had alredy attracted a great deal of controversy when their protest began. The Hawk Ploughshares group had attempted to campaign conventionally to get the government and British Aerospace to stop the export of the Hawk jets on carious occasions. BAe claimed that the planes were being exported as trainers, but there was plenteous evidence of their active military role; the Hawk Ploughshares group came to recognize that direct action would be the only successful option, though aware that as a consequence its members might face many years in prison.

Arrest and Trial
After the women were arrested, they were imprisoned for 6 months without bail. After six months time they were found not guilty. The defense case was that the women were preventing a greater crime - the use of the jet by the Indonesian military against people in East Timor, who had been engaged in a struggle against cruel occupation and for national independence since 1975. The outcome remarkable as they were found not guilty. The jury's verdict was that these ordinary people were simply trying their best to prevent the harmful use of the fighter jets and to save lives of people involved. This was the 56th plowshares action in the world and the women involved in seeds of hope were the first ones to be found note guilty.

Post Movement
After the attacks went public, it sparked huge movements which brought forth rallies, parades and protest. Some of the women even went on to write books about the event and it became a famous event. Decades later, an account had been published by Peace News of the series of events that led to the trial as well as of the women's week in the dock. One of the women, Andrew Needham wrote The Hammer Blow: How Ten Women Disarmed a Warplane. It is a lucid personal narrative of why they decided to do what they did. It maps the work by the four and their six close supporters, which developed over years of effort before culminating in the mid-winter action.

There were many different themes in Andrea Needham's book, but four these four themes are evident throughout the novel. The first theme revolved around the amount of work involved. The women spent months pursuing the usual routes before embarking on the action, and then many more being cautious and considering how to respond to what would inevitably follow, while maintaining their focus on possibility of success.

Second, the meticulous research and observation of the BAe plant at Warton in Lancashire, north-west England that provided the crucial information they needed to eventually commence the action. They had put so much detail into avoiding security. Without having done the damage, they couldn't attract the attention of BAe staff. After two hours in the hangar, they ended up phoning the Press Association to get the message out.

Third, the group's experience of months on remand in Risley prison, near Warrington. As one could imagine this was a difficult time for the women. The novel provides a revealing picture of how a women's prison operates in modern-day Britain. This period was taken up with preparation for the trial, in which aid from lawyers and support from many people proved invaluable.

Fourth, and one of the most important themes was the trial itself. This was presided over by a judge who was not sympathetic to their case. One high point was the appearance of witnesses from East Timor, who provided graphic descriptions of the force being used by Indonesia's government. Another was BAe's persistent attempt to maintain that the planes were trainers, even against evidence that they were to be deployed to a squadron with a known counterinsurgency role and at an airbase within combat-range of East Timor.