THE SATURDAY PROFILE/Rainbow Warrior: The Greenpeace ship 'Rainbow Warrior' is steaming into trouble once again this weekend, this time on the Irish Sea, writes Paul Cullen.
It is, arguably, the world's best-known boat, run by the world's best-known environmental organisation. After all, what multinational corporation would not give its right arm to have the brand recognition and saintly aura enjoyed by the Rainbow Warrior and its owners, Greenpeace?
Once again this weekend, the Rainbow Warrior is steaming into trouble and a confrontation of sorts, this time with two vessels bringing spent nuclear fuel back from Japan to the British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) plant at Sellafield.
Within days, the Greenpeace ship and a small flotilla of boats will sail close to the path of the two BNFL vessels as they pass up the Irish Sea. Banners will be unfurled, fists waved and the nuclear ships, highly powered and heavily armed, will go on their way.
For some, it's a stunt, conducted with all the usual accompaniments of such acts - celebs, politicians and television cameras.
But Greenpeace activists see such symbolic acts differently. The organisation's founders were strongly influenced by the Quaker form of non-violent protest known as "bearing witness". Indeed, in the 1950s, a group of Quakers forged the path for modern forms of passive resistance by trying to sail a boat into an area of the Pacific Ocean where hydrogen bombs were being tested.
In any case, it hardly matters what you think of the protest because, in our media-conscious age, stunts count. They get on TV, raise consciousness and encourage people to join up and contribute. Greenpeace has thrived for decades on being a thorn in the side of governments and multinationals and it sees no reason to change now.
The organisation has other boats, and even a balloon, but the Rainbow Warrior is central to its activities. The boat bearing the name has enjoyed a near-mythical status since its predecessor was blown up and sunk in New Zealand in 1985 by a French secret agent who had planted two bombs.
At the time, Greenpeace was engaged in peaceful protest against French nuclear testing at Moruroa in Polynesia. The blast claimed the life of a Dutch photographer, Fernando Pereira, and conferred martyr status on the boat.
The first Rainbow Warrior began life as a trawler, the Sir William Hardy, built in 1955. When Greenpeace found it in 1978, the boat was battered and rusty but within three months it had been converted into the organisation's flagship, complete with the dove of peace on its sails and a rainbow on its hull. According to Greenpeace, the boat was named for an ancient Native American prophecy, which predicted that the Earth would one day become terribly polluted. When this happened, people from all over the world would join together as Warriors of the Rainbow, returning the earth to its natural beauty and harmony.
The Rainbow Warrior's first outing saw it negotiating the freezing waters off Iceland, where Icelandic and Norwegian whalers plied their trade. By positioning the boat between the harpoons of the whaling boats and the whales, the activists succeeded in obstructing the whaling. After a month of this jousting, it sailed south, confident that the world was now aware of the issue.
Thus was set the pattern for future confrontations around the world. In the 1980s, Greenpeace expanded massively as the western world was swept by a wave of environmental activism. Support from rock stars such as Bono and Sting confirmed the organisation's "cool" status.
The current Rainbow Warrior was launched in July 1989, on the fourth anniversary of the sinking of the original ship.Ironically, it is a former sealing vessel and Greenpeace had to disguise its interest in the ship at the time of purchase. Since then, it has seen service in many far-flung parts: in the Russian Far East, where forests are under threat; campaigning against whaling and driftnets in the North Sea; and tracking plutonium fuel shipments between France, Britain and Japan.
Life on the ocean wave can be tough for the ship's complement of staff and volunteers. There are long periods where nothing happens, and then brief bursts of confrontation. The ship has been rammed and stormed, again by French commandos, and its staff has been attacked. The boat's 30 berths are occupied by a wide variety of environmental activists; trained scientists and short-term volunteers, skilled technicians and visitors. Staff who came to Dublin on the boat's recent sojourn here came from the US, New Zealand, Australia, Uruguay, Argentina, Mexico, Germany, the UK, Japan and Russia.
"It's comfortable but not luxurious. The accommodation is somewhat cramped but people leave you your space. There's a terrific feeling of belonging to the one family and having a common purpose," says John Bowler, who sailed on the Rainbow Warrior's maiden voyage.
In the 1990s, as an era of environmental concern gave way to more selfish times, Greenpeace was forced to retrench. The organisation's funding dried up and for a while it appeared that it might go under. The Irish branch was wound up against the wishes of local staff. Yet the organisation has recovered since those dark days. It is longer in the tooth but vastly more experienced. The Earth's environmental problems are growing and Greenpeace is there to sound the alarm bell. It now claims 2.8 million supporters in 41 countries.
The Sellafield issue has been its saviour in Britain and Ireland. Greenpeace is pushing an open door when it campaigns in Ireland against BNFL's accident-ridden plant, so it was novel but relatively unsurprising to see a series of Government Ministers posing for photographs aboard the Rainbow Warrior over the past few weeks.
Yet you'd wonder if the politicians would keep coming if Greenpeace were to turn its attentions to other matters - for example, the depletion of fish stocks in Irish waters or the pollution of our lakes.