It was with great sadness that we learned last week of the untimely death of John Ainslie, coordinator of Scottish CND for over twenty years. His passing is an enormous loss to CND and to the wider peace movement. I was fortunate to work with John over many years and he had that rare capacity to be both intellectual and activist with equal distinction.
John’s scholarly rigour in his path-breaking and immensely valuable research on Trident was of great significance for our movement. His detailed writing on the Trident and employment question – where he worked with great effectiveness with the late Dr Alan Mackinnon and Professor John Foster – helped us enormously in challenging the misleading claims made about the jobs impact of getting rid of Trident.
When intense debate broke out about what would happen if Trident was kicked out of Scotland, John was first off the blocks with ‘Trident: nowhere to go’, an in-depth study of all the contending sites for relocating Trident elsewhere in Britain. His conclusion was evident from the title. John also worked to debunk the myth that Trident couldn’t be disarmed – that it would just take too long and be too difficult. A meticulous and authoritative briefing showed exactly how this could actually be done in a matter of weeks.
But John was far from confined to an ivory tower. His dynamic grass roots activism was central to his disarmament work, not only in public meetings and rallies, but in non-violent direct action at bases, and in tracking nuclear warhead convoys. One of my happiest memories of John was seeing him working Scottish CND’s huge Big Sandy puppet on demonstrations. Somehow it summed up his determination to make an impact, working hard, amongst the crowds, with humour, challenging conventional ideas of how to campaign.
Tributes have flowed in from far and wide. One of the first came from First Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, and it was no surprise to hear that Bill Kidd MSP, had put down a motion in Holyrood paying tribute to John’s work – huge testament to his standing in the Scottish political arena.
Wherever John was needed he was there, and he held a big place in the heart of the movement. We will miss John very much, for his dedication, his kindness and his wit, and our thoughts and prayers are with his family.