The fight in Anniston has been developing since 1992, when the U.S Army, not bothering to seek a permit, began ground–breaking for the incinerator at the army depot. Since then several protests against it have taken place. The facility was supposed to begin operating in October, but in August the Alabama Department of Environmental Management asked for more tests.

Several speakers at the rally pointed out that the incinerator was built in a working-class, largely Black community. Some 35,000 residents of Calhoun County live within a six-mile radius of the depot and would be vulnerable to a lethal dose if an accident occurred. To add insult to injury, some residents point out, Anniston is already severely contaminated with toxic PCBs from the local Monsanto plant.

The more than 2,250 tons of chemical weapons stored at Anniston Army Depot represents 9 percent of the Pentagon’s chemical weapons stockpile. Other U.S. chemical weapons sites are located in Kalama (Johnston) Atoll in the Pacific; Umatilla, Oregon; Tooele, Utah; Pueblo, Colorado; Pine Bluff, Arkansas; Newport, Indiana; Richmond, Kentucky; and Aberdeen, Maryland. Two other incinerators in Utah and Hawaii have been closed since July because of nerve gas releases.

Local government officials, the Chamber of Commerce, and the local media all support the incinerator. Several environmental and other groups, including Serving Alabama’s Future Environment (SAFE), Families Concerned About Nerve Gas Incineration, and Coosa River Basin Initiative are organizing opposition to it.

In 1986 Congress officially ordered all U.S. chemical weapons destroyed. The U.S. government signed the international Chemical Weapons Convention treaty, which went into effect in 1997. Under that treaty all U.S. chemical weapons are supposed to be destroyed by 2007.

At the rally Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, a longtime civil rights leader, said, "President Bush is worried about Saddam Hussein’s chemical weapons, but he isn’t bothered at all about chemicals that would destroy American people right here in Anniston," he said.

The method of disposal to be used at the Anniston incinerator involves chopping up the weapons and dropping them into the incinerator without separating out the nerve gas. Some of the nerve gas, stuck to the metal parts in gelatinized form, ends up in the incinerator. This poses a constant risk of dangerous chemical releases.

Terri Swearingen, an environmental activist from East Liverpool, Ohio, an Appalachian community that has one of the largest toxic waste incinerators, said that at the toxic waste incinerator in his area there have been 50 fires, two explosions and many chemical releases. He said the number of children with mercury in their urine has doubled and there have been more than 200 new cases of cancer since 1992.

Brenda Mugleston from Tooele, Utah, who worked at the incinerator there, described the lack of monitoring for chemical agents in the facility. She said the air lines workers used to breathe were contaminated, and that workers were sent into contaminated areas without proper protective equipment. Two workers have been exposed to sarin gas.

Several dozen young people came to the rally. Some came with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference activists, others from several different college campuses, especially from Rome, Georgia.  
 
 
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