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  • The Iraq War: Ten Years, Five Poems of Remembrance

    David KriegerIt has been ten years since the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq spearheaded by the George W. Bush administration.  It is an occasion for remembrance, reflection and deep regret.  It was a war built on lies that harmed everything it touched.  Most of all, it has harmed the children of Iraq and their families, and it continues to harm them even though the United States and its allies have officially left Iraq.

    The war has also done deep and possibly irreparable damage to the credibility and decency of the United States, the country that led in choosing war over peace.  It is an ongoing disgrace to America that we do not hold those who initiated aggressive warfare to account for their individual crimes, as the Allies did at Nuremberg following World War II.  Short of public international criminal trials, the best we can do now is commit ourselves to never again allowing an aggressive war to be committed in our names, build a world at peace, and be a force for peace in our personal and communal lives.

    The five poems that follow were written over an eight-year period, nearly the length of the nine-year war.  The first poem, “The Children of Iraq Have Names,” was written in the lead-up to the war and was read at many hopeful peace marches in late 2002 and early 2003, when many people throughout the world took to the streets seeking to prevent the war from occurring.  The second poem, “Worse Than the War,” was written in June 2004, a little over a year into the war.  In it, I give my thoughts on what could be worse than the war.

    The third poem, “To an Iraqi Child,” was written nearly a year later, in April 2005.  It is about a 12-year-old boy, Ali Ismail Abbas, who lost his mother, father, brother and 11 other relatives when a US missile struck his home.  The boy lost both of his arms in the attack. He had wanted to be a doctor.

    The fourth poem, “Greeting Bush in Baghdad,” was written in December 2008, near the end of the war and is based upon an incident that occurred when George W. Bush visited Iraq and spoke to the press there.  The fifth and final poem, “Zaid’s Misfortune,” was written in July 2010, and is a poem about another Iraqi child.

    The children of Iraq paid the price for a war that should not have happened.  So did the people of Iraq.  So did the young Americans that the government sent to fight and die there.  So did those Americans who fought in Iraq and came home injured and traumatized.  So did America itself and its allies pay the price of military failure, the loss of credibility and the trillions of dollars wasted on the war.  So did we all pay the price of being implicated in an unnecessary and immeasurably futile war.  When will we ever learn?

     

     

    The Children of Iraq Have Names

    The children of Iraq have names.
    They are not the nameless ones.

    The children of Iraq have faces.
    They are not the faceless ones.

    The children of Iraq do not wear Saddam’s face.
    They each have their own face.

    The children of Iraq have names.
    They are not all called Saddam Hussein.

    The children of Iraq have hearts.
    They are not the heartless ones.

    The children of Iraq have dreams.
    They are not the dreamless ones.

    The children of Iraq have hearts that pound.
    They are not meant to be statistics of war.

    The children of Iraq have smiles.
    They are not the sullen ones.

    The children of Iraq have twinkling eyes.
    They are quick and lively with their laughter.

    The children of Iraq have hopes.
    They are not the hopeless ones.

    The children of Iraq have fears.
    They are not the fearless ones.

    The children of Iraq have names.
    Their names are not collateral damage.

    What do you call the children of Iraq?
    Call them Omar, Mohamed, Fahad.

    Call them Marwa and Tiba.
    Call them by their names.

     

     

    Worse Than the War

    Worse than the war, the endless, senseless war,
    Worse than the lies leading to the war,

    Worse than the countless deaths and injuries,
    Worse than hiding the coffins and not attending funerals,

    Worse than the flouting of international law,
    Worse than the torture at Abu Ghraib prison,

    Worse than the corruption of young soldiers,
    Worse than undermining our collective sense of decency,

    Worse than the arrogance, smugness and swagger,
    Worse than our loss of credibility in the world,
    Worse than the loss of our liberties,

    Worse than learning nothing from the past,
    Worse than destroying the future,
    Worse than the incredible stupidity of it all,

    Worse than all of these,
    As if they were not enough for one war or country or lifetime,
    Is the silence, the resounding silence of good Americans.

     

     

    To an Iraqi Child

    for Ali Ismail Abbas

    So you wanted to be a doctor?

    It was not likely that your dreams
    would have come true anyway.

    We didn’t intend for our bombs to find you.

    They are smart bombs, but they didn’t know
    that you wanted to be a doctor.

    They didn’t know anything about you
    and they know nothing of love.

    They cannot be trusted with dreams.

    They only know how to find their targets
    and explode in fulfillment.

    They are gray metal casings with violent hearts,
    doing only what they were created to do.

    It isn’t their fault that they found you.

    Perhaps you were not meant to be a doctor.

     

     

    Greeting Bush in Baghdad

    “This is a farewell kiss, you dog.”
    — Muntader al-Zaidi

    You are a guest in my country, unwanted
    surely, but still a guest.

    You stand before us waiting for praise,
    but how can we praise you?

    You come after your planes have rained
    death on our cities.

    Your soldiers broke down our doors,
    humiliated our men, disgraced our women.

    We are not a frontier town and you are not
    our marshal.

    You are a torturer.  We know you force water
    down the throats of our prisoners.

    We have seen the pictures of our naked prisoners
    threatened by your snarling dogs.

    You are a maker of widows and orphans,
    a most unwelcome guest.

    I have only this for you, my left shoe that I hurl
    at your lost and smirking face,

    and my right shoe that I throw at your face
    of no remorse.

     

    Zaid’s Misfortune

    Zaid had the misfortune
    of being born in Iraq, a country
    rich with oil.

    Iraq had the misfortune
    of being invaded by a country
    greedy for oil.

    The country greedy for oil
    had the misfortune of being led
    by a man too eager for war.

    Zaid’s misfortune multiplied
    when his parents were shot down
    in front of their medical clinic.

    Being eleven and haunted
    by the deaths of one’s parents
    is a great misfortune.

    In Zaid’s misfortune
    a distant silence engulfs
    the sounds of war.

    David Krieger is President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • Iraq 10 Years Later: What Lessons Have Been Learned?

    This article was originally published by the Ventura County Star.

    This week marks the 10th anniversary of the Iraq War. As the longest and most costly war in U.S. history, the true costs in dollars, lives, environmental contamination and opportunity costs may never be fully appreciated.

    This “preventive war” waged on our behalf has forever tainted the world view and standing of the U.S. Perhaps the most significant outcome of the war is the identification and clarification, a “how to” of what doesn’t work in resolving international conflict. Namely war itself.

    Dollar estimates of the combined war costs range from $1.4 trillion to $4 trillion spent and obligated or a bill of between $4,500 and $12,742 for every man, woman and child in the U.S.

    The human costs and death toll are immense. It is estimated that between 225,000 to more than 1 million have been killed when taking into account all the lives lost in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

    To this tragedy are added the tens of thousands injured. Significant brain and spinal injuries to coalition forces approach 20 percent and PTSD 30 percent. The costs of treating these problems will continue for decades to come.

    The respected international mediator John Paul Lederach suggests that going to war to defeat terrorism is like hitting a mature dandelion with a golf club — it only creates another generation of terrorists.

    That graphic image is very telling in a part of the world where the mean age ranges from 17.9 in Afghanistan to 21.1 in Iraq. How will these future generations who lack the meeting of basic human needs respond to our war?

    We have fallen victim to the idea that the “ends justify the means” when in reality the means are the ends in the making.

    In his book Dying to Win, Professor Robert Pape of the University of Chicago examines the phenomenon of suicide bombing. His research reveals that despite religious conviction or revenge, the vast majority (95 percent) of suicide bombings always include the primary motivation of trying to push out foreign occupiers.

    In a way to somehow sanitize or numb ourselves to the horrific effects of this war we have seen an entirely new lexicon added to our language. From drones to PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) to TBI (traumatic brain injury) to collateral damage to enhanced interrogation (torture) to rendition (torturing prisoners in outsourced countries) to suicide bombers.

    We have written legal treatises to soothe and justify our use of terrorism and assassination of even our own citizens. In the use of these methods, machines and practices, have we not become the embodiment of “the enemy”? What happens when the entire world has the same capabilities and beliefs? These are some of the realities after 10 years of war.

    We have fallen into financial disarray at home, with a significant contribution from these wars. The robbing of our own social fabric to cover these costs will play out for years to come. Yet, there are those who would continue to dismantle our social infrastructure to continue this war effort and that of future wars at any cost. How we address the facts at hand will determine our future and that of the world.

    Indeed conflict is inevitable. War is optional. We have the necessary means to address conflict without war. The means are the ends in the making.

    Robert Dodge is a family physician in Ventura, California, and is a member of the NAPF Board of Directors.

  • The Iraq War: 10 Years Later

    After a decade of combat, casualties, massive displacement, persisting violence, enhanced sectarian tension and violence between Shi’ias and Sunnis, periodic suicide bombings, and autocratic governance, a negative assessment of the Iraq War as a strategic move by the United States, United Kingdom, and a few of their secondary allies, including Japan, seems near universal. Not only the regionally destabilizing outcome, including the blowback effect of perversely adding weight to Iran’s overall diplomatic influence, but the reputational costs in the Middle East associated with an imprudent, destructive, and failed military intervention make the Iraq War the worst American foreign policy disaster since its defeat in Vietnam in the 1970s, and undertaken with an even less persuasive legal, moral, and political rationale.

    Most geopolitical accounting assessments do not bother to consider the damage to the United Nations and international law arising from an aggressive use of force in flagrant violation of the UN Charter, embarked upon in the face of a refusal by the Security Council to provide a legitimating authorization for the use of force despite great pressure mounted by the United States. The UN further harmed its own image when it failed to reinforce its refusal to grant authorization to the United States and its coalition, by offering some kind of support to Iraq as the target of this contemplated aggression. This failure was compounded by the post-attack role played by the UN in lending full support to the unlawful American-led occupation, including its state-building mission. In other words, not only was the Iraq War a disaster from the perspective of American and British foreign policy and the peace and stability of the Middle East region, but it was also a severe setback for the authority of international law, the independence of the UN, and the quality of world order.

    In the aftermath of the Vietnam War, the United States was supposedly burdened by what policymakers derisively called ‘the Vietnam Syndrome.’ This was a Washington shorthand for the psychological inhibitions to engage in military interventions in the non-Western world due to the negative attitudes towards such imperial undertakings that were supposed to exist among the American public and in the government, especially among the military who were widely blamed for the Vietnam disaster. Many American militarists at the time complained that the Vietnam Syndrome was a combined result of an anti-war plot engineered by the liberal media and a response to an unpopular conscription or ‘draft’ that required many middle class Americans to fight in a distant war that lacked both popular support, a convincing strategic or legal rationale, and seemed to be on the wrong side of history, which as the French found out in their own Indochina War favored anti-colonial wars of liberation. The flag-draped coffins of dead young Americans were shown on TV, leading defense hawks to contend somewhat ridiculously that ‘the war was lost in American living rooms.’ The government made adjustments that took these rationalizations serious: the draft was abolished, and reliance  henceforth was placed on an all-volunteer professional military complemented by large-scale private security firms; also, intensified efforts were made to assure media support for subsequent military operations by ‘embedding’ journalists in combat units and more carefully monitoring news reporting.

    President, George H.W. Bush told the world in 1991 immediately after the Gulf War that had been successfully undertaken to reverse the Iraqi annexation of Kuwait that “we have finally kicked the Vietnam Syndrome.” In effect, the senior President Bush was saying to the grand strategists in the White House and Pentagon that the role of American military power was again available for use to do the work of empire around the world. What the Gulf War showed was that on a conventional battlefield, in this setting of a desert war, American military superiority would be decisive, could produce a quick victory with minimal costs in American lives, and bring about a surge of political popularity at home. This new militarist enthusiasm created the political base for recourse to the NATO War in 1999 to wrest Kosovo from Serb control. To ensure the avoidance of casualties, reliance was placed on air attacks conducted from high altitudes. The war took more time than expected, but was interpreted as validating the claim of war planners that the United States could now fight and win ‘zero casualty wars.’ There were no NATO combat deaths in the Kosovo War, and the war produced a ‘victory’ by ending Serbian control over Kosovo as well as demonstrating that NATO could still be used and useful even after the Cold War and the disappearance of the Soviet threat that had explained the formation of the alliance in the first place.

    More sophisticated American war planners understood that not all challenges to United States interests around the world could be met with air power in the absence of ground combat. Increasingly, political violence involving geopolitical priorities took the form of transnational violence (as in the 9/11 attacks) or was situated within the boundaries of territorial states, and involved Western military intervention designed to crush societal forces of national resistance. The Bush presidency badly confused its new self-assurance about the conduct of battlefield international warfare where military superiority dictates the political outcome and its old nemesis from Vietnam War days of counter-insurgency warfare, also known as low-intensity or asymmetric warfare, where military superiority controls the battlefield but not the endgame of conflict which depends on winning the allegiance of the territorial population.

    David Petraeus rose through the ranks of the American military by repackaging counterinsurgency warfare in a post-Vietnam format relying upon an approach developed by noted guerrilla war expert David Galula, who contended that in the Vietnam War the fatal mistake was made of supposing that such a war would be determined 80% by combat battles in the jungles and paddy fields with the remaining 20% devoted to the capture of the ‘hearts and minds’ of the indigenous population. Galula argued that counterinsurgency wars could only be won if this formula was inverted.  This meant that 80% of future U.S. military interventions should be devoted to non-military aspects of societal wellbeing: restoring electricity, providing police protection for normal activity, building and staffing schools, improving sanitation and garbage removal, and providing health car and jobs.

    Afghanistan, and then Iraq, became the testing grounds for applying these nation-building lessons of Vietnam, only to reveal in the course of their lengthy, destructive and expensive failures that the wrong lessons had been learned by the militarists and their civilian counterparts. These conflicts were wars of national resistance, a continuation of the anti-colonial struggles against West-centric  domination, and regardless of whether the killing was complemented by sophisticated social and economic programs, it still involved a pronounced and deadly challenge by foreign interests to the national independence and rights of self-determination that entailed killing Iraqi women and children, and violating their most basic rights through the unavoidably harsh mechanics of foreign occupation. It also proved impossible to disentangle the planned 80% from the 20% as the hostility of the Iraqi people to their supposed American liberators demonstrated over and over again, especially as many Iraqis on the side of the occupiers proved to be corrupt and brutal, sparking popular suspicion and intensifying internal polarization. The truly ‘fatal mistake’ made by Petraeus, Galula, and all the counterinsurgency advocates that have followed this path, is the failure to recognize that when the American military and its allies attack and occupy a non-Western country, especially in the Islamic world, when they start dividing, killing and policing its inhabitants, popular resistance will be mobilized and hatred toward the foreign ‘liberators’ will spread. This is precisely what happened in Iraq, and the suicide bombings to this day suggest that the ugly patterns of violence have not stopped even with the ending of America’s direct combat role.

    The United States was guilty of a fundamental misunderstanding of the Iraq War displayed to the world when George W. Bush theatrically declared on May 1, 2003 a wildly premature victory from the deck of an American aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, with the notorious banner proclaiming ‘mission accomplished’ plainly visible behind the podium as the sun sank over the Pacific Ocean. Bush reveled in this misunderstanding by assuming that the attack phase of the war was the whole war, forgetting about the more difficult and protracted occupation phase. The real Iraq War, rather than ending, was about to begin, that is, the violent internal struggle for the political future of the country, one made more difficult and protracted by the military presence of the US and its allies. This counterinsurgency sequel to occupation would not be decided on the kind of battlefield where arrayed military capabilities confront one another, but rather through a war of attrition waged by hit and run domestic Iraqi forces, abetted by foreign volunteers, opposed to the tactics of Washington and to the overall aura of illegitimacy attached to American military operations in a Third World setting. Such a war has a shadowy beginning and a still uncertain ending, and is often, as in Iraq, as it proved to be earlier in Vietnam and Afghanistan, a quagmire for intervening powers. There are increasing reasons to believe that the current Iraqi leader, Nouri al-Maliki, resembles the authoritarian style of Saddam Hussein more than the supposed constitutional liberal regime that the United States pretends to leave behind, and that the country is headed for continuing struggle, possibly even a disastrous civil war fought along sectarian line. In many respects, including the deepening of the Sunni/Shi’a divide the country and its people are worse off that before the Iraq War without in any way questioning allegations about the cruelty and criminality of the regime headed by Saddam Hussein.

    The Iraq War was a war of aggression from its inception, being an unprovoked use of armed force against a sovereign state in a situation other than self-defense. The Nuremberg and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunals convened after World War II had declared such aggressive warfare to be a ‘crime against peace’ and prosecuted and punished surviving political and military leaders of Germany and Japan as war criminals. We can ask why have George W. Bush and Tony Blair not been investigated, indicted, and prosecuted for their roles in planning and prosecuting the Iraq War. As folk singer Bob Dylan instructed us long ago, the answer is ‘blowin’ in the wind,’ or in more straightforward language, the reasons for such impunity conferred upon the American and British leaders is one more crude display of geopolitics—their countries were not defeated and occupied, their governments never surrendered and discredited, and such strategic failures (or successes) are exempted from legal scrutiny. These are the double standards that make international criminal justice a reflection of power politics more than of evenhanded global justice.

    There is also the question of complicity of countries that supported the war with troop deployments, such as Japan, which dispatched 1000 members of its self-defense units to Iraq in July 2003 to help with non-combat dimensions of the occupation. Such a role is a clear breach of international law and morality. It is also inconsistent with Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution. It was coupled with Tokyo’s diplomatic support for the U.S./UK-led Iraq War from start to finish. Should such a record of involvement have any adverse consequences? It would seem that Japan might at least review the appropriateness of its complicit participation in a war of aggression, and how that diminishes the credibility of any Japanese claim to uphold the responsibilities of membership in the United Nations. At least, it provides the people of Japan with a moment for national soul-searching to think about what kind of world order will in the future best achieve peace, stability, and human dignity.

    Are there lessons to be drawn from the Iraq War? I believe there are. The overwhelming lesson is that in this historical period interventions by the West in the non-West, especially when not authorized by the UN Security Council, can rarely succeed in attaining their stated goals. More broadly, counterinsurgency warfare involving a core encounter between Western invading and occupying forces and a national resistance movement will not be decided on the basis of hard power military superiority, but rather by the dynamics of self-determination associated with the party that has the more credible nationalist credentials, which include the will to persist in the struggle for as long as it takes, and the capacity to capture the high moral ground in the ongoing legitimacy struggle for domestic and international public support. It is only when we witness the dismantling of many of America’s 700+ acknowledged foreign military bases spread around the world, and see the end of repeated US military intervention globally, that we can have some hope that the correct lessons of the Iraq War are finally being learned. Until then there will be further attempts by the U.S. Government to correct the tactical mistakes that it claims caused past failures in Iraq (and Afghanistan), and new interventions will undoubtedly be proposed in coming years, most probably leading to costly new failures, and further controversies as to ‘why?’ we fought and why we lost. American leaders will remain unlikely to acknowledge that the most basic mistake is itself militarism and the accompanying arrogance of occupation, at least until this establishment consensus is challenged by a robust anti-militarist grassroots political movement not currently visible.

    Richard Falk is Professor Emeritus at Princeton University and NAPF Senior Vice President.

  • Reflections on Omnicide, Nuclear Deterrence and a Maginot Line in the Mind

    This article was originally published by Truthout.

    David KriegerI offer a few reflections in an effort to separate fact from fiction with regard to nuclear weapons, their capacity for devastation and our ability to assure global security by preventing their use.

    First, today’s nuclear arsenals are capable of omnicide, the death of all. In that sense, nuclear weapons are not really weapons but instruments of annihilation. They place all complex life at risk of extinction.

    Omnicide is possible because of the unique capacity of nuclear weapons to cause a “nuclear winter” and to trigger “nuclear famine.” In addition to the ordinary ways that nuclear weapons destroy – blast, fire and radiation – they have the capacity to block sunlight from reaching the earth, shorten growing seasons, and lead to the destruction of crops, resulting in global nuclear famine.

    Second, nuclear weapons are justified by their possessors by their belief in the effectiveness of nuclear deterrence.

    We must always keep in mind that nuclear deterrence is not a fact; it is a hypothesis about human behavior. It is a hypothesis that posits rational leaders; and it is, in fact, highly irrational to believe that humans will behave rationally at all times under all conditions. How many national leaders are you aware of who always act rationally, regardless of the circumstances?

    It is also true that humans are fallible and prone to error, even when they construct elaborate safeguards. Examples of human fallibility are found in the nuclear power plant accidents at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, and in numerous accidents with nuclear weapons in transport, such as the refueling accident over Palomares, Spain.

    As Ban Ki-moon said earlier this year in a speech at the Monterey Institute of International Studies: “Nuclear deterrence is not a solution to international peace and stability. It is an obstacle.”

    Third, I urge you to remember the Maginot Line. It was a high-tech wall that French leaders believed would prevent another invasion of their country, as had occurred in World War I. The Maginot Line was highly regarded right up to the time that it failed, catastrophically for France, when the German attackers simply marched around it.

    I view nuclear deterrence theory as a Maginot Line in the mind. It is likely to be relied upon right up until the moment it fails, and when it fails it will be catastrophic, far more so than in the French case. Like the original Maginot Line, it will seem clear after the fact that it was destined to fail.

    What is missing from the discourse on nuclear armaments among national leaders is political will for nuclear weapons abolition, a sense of urgency and the courage to lead. Mr. Obama spoke in his 2013 State of the Union Address about the US “leading the global effort to secure nuclear materials that could fall into the wrong hands.” The problem with the president’s perspective is that all hands are the wrong hands.

    Who will make this clear to Mr. Obama and to the leaders of the other nuclear weapons states? This is a role for the citizens of the nuclear weapon states and for the leaders of middle-power countries. It is necessary if we are to preserve our world and pass it on intact to new generations.

    Mr. Obama also said that “our ability to influence others depends on our willingness to lead.” Who will step up and lead on this mostcritical of all issues for humanity’s future?

    Strategies for nuclear weapons, based on nuclear deterrence, have been MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). MAD has given way to SAD (Self-Assured Destruction), as today’s arsenals of thermonuclear weapons have the capacity to trigger Ice Age conditions (leading to nuclear famine) that would assure the destruction of the attacking nation, even without retaliation.

    We must have the courage to move past MAD and SAD to PASS (Planetary Assured Security and Survival). This will require moving rapidly but surely to the total abolition of nuclear weapons, as required by the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

    I urge national leaders and security specialists, as well as the public, to base their strategic thinking, leadership and action regarding nuclear weapons on three basic understandings that separate fact from fiction, truth from hypothesis. First, nuclear weapons are capable of omnicide. Second, nuclear deterrence is only a hypothesis about human behavior, not a fact that can be relied upon for the indefinite future. Third, the Maginot Line was fancy and high-tech and was thought to be foolproof by most security experts, but it failed to provide a defense when it mattered, and its failure was devastating for France.

    Nuclear deterrence is a Maginot Line in the mind, and its failure would be devastating, not only to nuclear armed countries, but to people everywhere, as well as to the future of complex life on the planet.

    David Krieger is President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • Nuclear Weapons Must Be Eradicated for All Our Sakes

    This article was originally published by The Guardian.

    We cannot intimidate others into behaving well when we ourselves are misbehaving. Yet that is precisely what nations armed with nuclear weapons hope to do by censuring North Korea for its nuclear tests and sounding alarm bells over Iran’s pursuit of enriched uranium. According to their logic, a select few nations can ensure the security of all by having the capacity to destroy all.

    Until we overcome this double standard – until we accept that nuclear weapons are abhorrent and a grave danger no matter who possesses them, that threatening a city with radioactive incineration is intolerable no matter the nationality or religion of its inhabitants – we are unlikely to make meaningful progress in halting the spread of these monstrous devices, let alone banishing them from national arsenals.

    Why, for instance, would a proliferating state pay heed to the exhortations of the US and Russia, which retain thousands of their nuclear warheads on high alert? How can Britain, France and China expect a hearing on non-proliferation while they squander billions modernising their nuclear forces? What standing has Israel to urge Iran not to acquire the bomb when it harbours its own atomic arsenal?

    Nuclear weapons do not discriminate; nor should our leaders. The nuclear powers must apply the same standard to themselves as to others: zero nuclear weapons. Whereas the international community has imposed blanket bans on other weapons with horrendous effects – from biological and chemical agents to landmines and cluster munitions – it has not yet done so for the very worst weapons of all. Nuclear weapons are still seen as legitimate in the hands of some. This must change.

    Around 130 governments, various UN agencies, the Red Cross and the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons are gathering in Oslo this week to examine the catastrophic consequences of nuclear weapons and the inability of relief agencies to provide an effective response in the event of a nuclear attack. For too long, debates about nuclear arms have been divorced from such realities, focusing instead on geopolitics and narrow concepts of national security.

    With enough public pressure, I believe that governments can move beyond the hypocrisy that has stymied multilateral disarmament discussions for decades, and be inspired and persuaded to embark on negotiations for a treaty to outlaw and eradicate these ultimate weapons of terror. Achieving such a ban would require somewhat of a revolution in our thinking, but it is not out of the question. Entrenched systems can be turned on their head almost overnight if there’s the will.

    Let us not forget that it was only a few years ago when those who spoke about green energy and climate change were considered peculiar. Now it is widely accepted that an environmental disaster is upon us. There was once a time when people bought and sold other human beings as if they were mere chattels, things. But people eventually came to their senses. So it will be the case for nuclear arms, sooner or later.

    Indeed, 184 nations have already made a legal undertaking never to obtain nuclear weapons, and three in four support a universal ban. In the early 1990s, with the collapse of apartheid nigh, South Africa voluntarily dismantled its nuclear stockpile, becoming the first nation to do so. This was an essential part of its transition from a pariah state to an accepted member of the family of nations. Around the same time, Kazakhstan, Belarus and Ukraine also relinquished their Soviet-era atomic arsenals.

    But today nine nations still consider it their prerogative to possess these ghastly bombs, each capable of obliterating many thousands of innocent civilians, including children, in a flash. They appear to think that nuclear weapons afford them prestige in the international arena. But nothing could be further from the truth. Any nuclear-armed state, big or small, whatever its stripes, ought to be condemned in the strongest terms for possessing these indiscriminate, immoral weapons.

    Desmond Tutu is Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town and a member of the NAPF Advisory Council.

  • Who Will Assist the Victims of Nuclear Weapons?

    On 30 August 1945 Dr Marcel Junod, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross delegation in Japan, received a chilling cable from an ICRC representative in Hiroshima. The cable read as follows: “Conditions appalling. City wiped out. Eighty percent of all hospitals destroyed or seriously damaged. Inspected two emergency hospitals, conditions beyond description. Effect of bomb mysteriously serious. Many victims apparently recovering suddenly suffer fatal relapse due to decomposition of white blood cells and other internal injuries, now dying in great numbers. Estimated still over one hundred thousand wounded in emergency hospitals located surroundings. Sadly lacking bandaging materials, medicines.”

    On his arrival in Hiroshima, Marcel Junod came face-to-face with the grim reality of medical care after an atomic bombing of a city and its medical infrastructure. In addition to the destruction and damage to hospitals mentioned in the cable, the impact on those meant to care for the sick and wounded was equally severe: 90% of Hiroshima’s doctors were killed or injured by the explosion, as were 92% of the city’s nurses and 80% of its pharmacists. There was a desperate need for blood but no possibility of blood transfusions as most potential donors were either dead or injured. To put it bluntly, the city’s capacity to treat victims had been wiped out. As a result, there was little or no health-care provision in the immediate aftermath of the explosion.

    This same catastrophic scenario – and more – awaits us if nuclear weapons are ever used again. While the destructive capacity of nuclear weapons increased dramatically during the Cold War, the capacity of States and international agencies to assist the victims did not. As you will hear tomorrow, the ICRC has over the past six years made an in-depth assessment of its own capacity, and that of other agencies, to help the victims of nuclear, radiological, biological and chemical weapons. We have concluded that an effective means of assisting a substantial portion of survivors of a nuclear detonation, while adequately protecting those delivering assistance, is not currently available at national level and not feasible at international level. It is highly unlikely that the immense investment required to develop such capacity will ever be made. If made, it would likely remain insufficient.

    In April 2010, my predecessor, Jakob Kellenberger, spoke of this state of affairs in a statement to Geneva’s diplomatic community. In this statement the ICRC made four key points:

    • Nuclear weapons are unique in their destructive power, in the unspeakable human suffering they cause, in the impossibility of controlling their effects in space and time, in the risks of escalation they create, and in the threat they pose to the environment, to future generations, and indeed to the survival of humanity.
    • It is difficult to envisage how any use of nuclear weapons could be compatible with the rules of international humanitarian law.
    • Regardless of their views on the legality of nuclear weapons, States must ensure that they are never again used.
    • Preventing the use of nuclear weapons requires fulfilment of existing obligations to pursue negotiations aimed at prohibiting and completely eliminating such weapons through a legally binding international treaty.

    We are encouraged by the response to the ICRC’s appeal in 2010. Since then, the 190 States party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons have recognized the “catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons” and the relevance of international humanitarian law in this regard. Those States have also reaffirmed the call made by the United Nations Security Council at its summit in 2009, and by Presidents Obama and Medvedev earlier that year, to move towards a world free of nuclear weapons. In 2011 the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement made a historic appeal on nuclear weapons, in the same vein as that of the ICRC. In it, the Movement undertook to raise awareness among the public, scientists, health professionals and decision-makers of its ongoing concerns and to promote the norm of non-use and the elimination of nuclear weapons among governments and the public. In October 2012 the Movement’s concerns were reflected in a statement made by 34 States to the UN General Assembly’s First Committee.

    The ICRC warmly welcomes the Norwegian Government’s initiative to convene this conference on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons. Although nuclear weapons have been debated in military, technical and geopolitical terms for decades, it is astounding that States have never before come together to address their humanitarian consequences.

    In our view, no informed political or legal position on these weapons can be adopted without a detailed grasp of the immediate consequences of these weapons on human beings and on medical and other infrastructure. It is also essential to understand the long-term effects on human health and on the genetics of survivors; consequences that have been confirmed by research and have been witnessed and treated for nearly seven decades by the Japanese Red Cross hospitals in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In addition, one cannot ignore the insight offered by modern climate science into the implications of nuclear weapon use for the world’s climate and food production. And last, but by no means least, States must answer the question: Who will assist the victims of these weapons and how? The next two days provide a unique and historic opportunity to begin addressing these fundamental issues.

    In closing, I am confident that, as you broach these issues, you will share the ICRC’s commitment to prevent any future use of nuclear weapons. I also hope that you will be driven by the sense of opportunity generated by this conference and by the belief that the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons must be at the centre of the debate. This is an important moment to recognize and understand these consequences, thus ensuring that they are central to future discussions.

    And yet, an awareness of the consequences of nuclear weapons will not be enough to definitively prevent the use of and bring about the elimination of nuclear weapons. Public awareness, media interest and the sustained commitment of responsible State authorities are crucial. The international community has not always seized upon opportunities to prevent human suffering. In the case of nuclear weapons, prevention – including the development of a legally binding treaty to prohibit and eliminate such weapons – is the only way forward.

    Peter Maurer is President of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

  • Against the Institution of War

    As we start the 21st century and the new millennium, our scientific and technological civilization seems to be entering a period of crisis. Today, for the first time in history, science has given to humans the possibility of a life of comfort, free from hunger and cold, and free from the constant threat of infectious disease. At the same time, science has given us the power to destroy civilization through thermonuclear war, as well as the power to make our planet uninhabitable through pollution and overpopulation. The question of which of these alternatives we choose is a matter of life or death to ourselves and our children.

    Science and technology have shown themselves to be double-edged, capable of doing great good or of producing great harm, depending on the way in which we use the enormous power over nature, which science has given to us. For this reason, ethical thought is needed now more than ever before. The wisdom of the world’s religions, the traditional wisdom of humankind, can help us as we try to insure that our overwhelming material progress will be beneficial rather than disastrous.

    The crisis of civilization, which we face today, has been produced by the rapidity with which science and technology have developed. Our institutions and ideas adjust too slowly to the change. The great challenge which history has given to our generation is the task of building new international political structures, which will be in harmony with modern technology. At the same time, we must develop a new global ethic, which will replace our narrow loyalties by loyalty to humanity as a whole.

    In the long run, because of the enormously destructive weapons, which have been produced through the misuse of science, the survival of civilization can only be insured if we are able to abolish the institution of war.

    While in earlier epochs it may have been possible to confine the effects of war mainly to combatants, in our own century the victims of war have increasingly been civilians, and especially children. For example, according to Quincy Wright’s statistics, the First and Second World Wars together cost the lives of 26 million soldiers, but the toll in civilian lives was much larger: 64 million.

    Since the Second World War, despite the best efforts of the U. N., there have been over 150 armed conflicts; and, if civil wars are included, there are on any given day an average of 12 wars somewhere in the world. In the conflicts in Indo-China, the proportion of civilian victims was between 80 % and  90 % , while in the Lebanese civil war some sources state that the proportion of civilian casualties was as high as 97%.

    Civilian casualties often occur through malnutrition and through diseases, which would be preventable in normal circumstances. Because of the social disruption caused by war, normal supplies of food, safe water and medicine are interrupted, so that populations become vulnerable to famine and epidemics. In the event of a catastrophic nuclear war, starvation and disease would add greatly to the loss of life caused by the direct effects of nuclear weapons.

    The indirect effects of war are also enormous. Globally, preparations for war interfere seriously with the use of tax money for constructive and peaceful purposes. Today, despite the end of the Cold War, the world spends roughly $1.7 trillion (i.e. a million million) US dollars each year on armaments. This enormous flood of money, which is almost too large to imagine, could have been used instead for urgently needed public health measures.

    The World Health Organization lacks funds to carry through an anti-malarial program on as large a scale as would be desirable, but the entire program could be financed for less than the world spends on armaments in a single day. Five hours of world arms spending is equivalent to the total cost of the 20-year WHO campaign, which resulted in the eradication of smallpox. For every 100,000 people in the world, there are 556 soldiers, but only 85 doctors. Every soldier costs an average of 20,000 US dollars per year, while the average spent per year on education is only 380 US dollars per school-aged child. With a diversion of funds consumed by three weeks of military spending, the world could create a sanitary water supply for all its people, thus eliminating the cause of almost half of all human illness.

    A new and drug-resistant form of tuberculosis has recently become widespread, and is increasing rapidly in the former Soviet Union. In order to combat this new form of tuberculosis, and in order to prevent its spread to Western Europe, WHO needs 450 million US dollars, an amount equivalent to 4 hours of world arms spending. By using this money to combat tuberculosis in the former Soviet Union, WHO would be making a far greater contribution to global peace and stability than is made by spending the money on armaments.

    Today’s world is one in which roughly ten million children die each year from diseases related to poverty. Besides this enormous waste of young lives through malnutrition and preventable disease, there is a huge waste of opportunities through inadequate education. The rate of illiteracy in the 25 least developed countries is 80 percent, and the total number of illiterates in the world is estimated to be 800 million. Meanwhile every 60 seconds the world spends roughly 2 million U. S. dollars on armaments.

    It is plain that if the almost unbelievable sums now wasted on armaments were used constructively, most of the pressing problems now facing humanity could be solved, but today the world spends more than 20 times as much per year on weapons as it does on development.

    Because the world spends a thousand billion dollars each year on armaments, it follows that very many people make their living from war. This is the reason why it is correct to speak of war as a social institution, and also the reason why war persists, although everyone realizes that it is the cause of much of the suffering that inflicts humanity. We know that war is madness, but it persists. We know that it threatens the future survival of our species, but it persists, entrenched in the attitudes of historians, newspaper editors and television producers, entrenched in the methods by which politicians finance their campaigns, and entrenched in the financial power of arms manufacturers, entrenched also in the ponderous and costly hardware of war, the fleets of warships, bombers, tanks, nuclear missiles and so on.

    Science cannot claim to be guiltless: In Eisenhower’s farewell address, he warned of the increasing power of the industrial-military complex, a threat to democratic society. If he were making the same speech today, he might speak of the industrial-military-scientific complex. Since Hiroshima, we have known that new knowledge is not always good. There is a grave danger that nuclear weapons will soon proliferate to such an extent that they will be available to terrorists and even to the mafia. Chemical and biological weapons also constitute a grave threat. The eradication of smallpox in 1979 was a triumph of medical science combined with international cooperation. How sad it is to think that military laboratories cultivate smallpox and that the disease may soon be reintroduced as a biological weapon!

    The institution of war seems to be linked to a fault in human nature, to our tendency to exhibit altruism towards members of our own group but aggression towards other groups if we perceive them to be threatening our own community. This tendency, which might be called “tribalism”, was perhaps built into human nature by evolution during the long prehistory of our species, when we lived as hunter-gatherers in small genetically homogeneous tribes, competing for territory on the grasslands of Africa. However, in an era of nerve gas and nuclear weapons, the anachronistic behavior pattern of tribal altruism and intertribal aggression now threatens our survival.

    Fortunately, our behavior is only partly determined by inherited human nature. It is also, and perhaps to a larger extent, determined by education and environment; and in spite of all the difficulties just mentioned, war has been eliminated locally in several large regions of the world. Taking these regions as models, we can attempt to use the same methods to abolish war globally.

    For example, war between the Scandinavian nations would be unthinkable today, although the region once was famous for its violence. Scandinavia is especially interesting as a model for what we would like to achieve globally, because it is a region in which it has been possible not only to eradicate war, but also poverty; and at the same time, death from infectious disease has become a rarity in this region.

    If we consider the problem of simultaneously eliminating poverty, war and frequent death from infectious disease, we are lead inevitably to the problem of population stabilization. At the time when poverty, disease and war characterized Scandinavia, the average fertility in the region was at least 6 children per woman-life. Equilibrium was maintained at this high rate of fertility, because some of the children died from disease without leaving progeny, and because others died in war. Today, poverty and war are gone from the Nordic countries, and the rate of premature death from infectious disease is very low. The simultaneous elimination of poverty, disease and war would have been impossible in Scandinavia if the rate of fertility had not fallen to the replacement level. There would then have been no alternative except for the population to grow, which it could not have continued to do over many centuries without environmental degradation, bringing with it the recurrence of poverty, disease and war.

    In Scandinavia today, democratic government, a high level of education, economic prosperity, public health, high social status for women, legal, economic and educational equality for women, a low birth rate, and friendly cooperation between the nations of the region are mutually linked in loops of cause and effect. By contrast, we can find other regions of the world where low status of women, high birth rates, rapidly increasing population, urban slums, low educational levels, high unemployment levels, poverty, ethnic conflicts and the resurgence of infectious disease are equally linked, but in a vicious circle. The three age-old causes of human suffering, poverty, infectious disease and war are bound together by complex causal relationships involving also the issues of population stabilization and woman’s rights. The example of Scandinavia shows us that it is possible to cure all these diseases of society; but to do so we must address all of the problems simultaneously.

    Abolition of the institution of war will require the construction of structures of international government and law to replace our present anarchy at the global level. Today’s technology has shrunken the distances, which once separated nations; and our present system of absolutely sovereign nation-states has become both obsolete and dangerous.

    Professor Elie Kedourie of the University of London has given the following definition of nationalism: “A doctrine invented in Europe at the beginning of the 19th century. It pretends to supply a criterion for the determination of the unit of population proper to enjoy a government exclusively its own, for the legitimate exercise of power in the state, and for the right organization of a society of states. Briefly, the doctrine holds that humanity is naturally divided into nations, that nations are known by certain characteristics which can be ascertained, and that the only legitimate type of government is national self-government.”

    A basic problem with this doctrine is that throughout most of the world, successive waves of migration, conquest and intermarriage have left such a complicated ethnic mosaic that attempts to base political divisions on ethnic homogeneity often meet with trouble. In Eastern Europe, for example, German-speaking and Slavic-speaking peoples are mixed together so closely that the Pan-German and Pan-Slavic movements inevitably clashed over the question of who should control the regions where the two populations lived side by side. This clash was one of the main causes of the First World War.

    Similarly, when India achieved independence from England, a great problem arose in the regions where Hindus and Moslems lived side by side; and even Gandhi was unable to prevent terrible violence from taking place between the two communities. This problem is still present, and it has been made extremely dangerous by the acquisition of nuclear weapons by India and Pakistan.

    More recently, nationalist movements in Asia and Africa have derived their force and popularity from a reaction against the years of European political and economic domination. Thus, at first sight, they seem to deserve our sympathy and support. However, in building states, the new nationalists have often used hate for outsiders as mortar. For example, Israel is held together by hostility towards its Arab neighbors, while the Pan-Arab movement is held together by hostility towards Israel; and in this inflamed political climate of mutual fear and hatred, even clandestine nuclear weapons appear to either side to be justified.

    A basic problem rooted in nationalist mythology exists in the concept of sanctions, which treat nations as if they were individuals. We punish nations as a whole by sanctions, even when only the leaders are guilty, even though the burdens of the sanctions often fall most heavily on the weakest and least guilty of the citizens, and even though sanctions often have the effect of uniting the citizens of a country behind the guilty leaders.

    It is becoming increasingly clear that the concept of the absolutely sovereign nation-state is an anachronism in a world of thermonuclear weapons, instantaneous communication, and economic interdependence. Probably our best hope for the future lies in developing the United Nations into a World Federation. The strengthened United Nations should have a legislature with the power to make laws which are binding on individuals, and the ability to arrest and try individual political leaders for violations of these laws. The World Federation should also have the military and legal powers necessary to guarantee the human rights of ethnic minorities within nations.

    A strengthened UN would need a reliable source of income to make the organization less dependent on wealthy countries, which tend to give support only to those interventions of which they approve. A promising solution to this problem is the so-called “Tobin tax”, named after the Nobel-laureate economist James Tobin of Yale University. Tobin proposed that international currency exchanges should be taxed at a rate between 0.1 and 0.25 percent. He believed that even this extremely low rate of taxation would have the effect of damping speculative transactions, thus stabilizing the rates of exchange between currencies. When asked what should be done with the proceeds of the tax, Tobin said, almost as an afterthought, “Let the United Nations have it”. The volume of money involved in international currency transactions is so enormous that even the tiny tax proposed by Tobin would provide the World Federation with between 100 billion and 300 billion dollars annually. By strengthening the activities of various UN agencies, such as WHO, UNESCO and FAO, the additional income would add to the prestige of the United Nations and thus make the organization more effective when it is called upon to resolve international political conflicts.

    A federation is, by definition, a limited union of states, where the federal government has the power to make laws which are binding on individuals, but where the laws are confined to interstate matters, and where all powers not expressly delegated to the federal government are reserved for the several states. In other words, in a federation, each of the member states runs its own internal affairs according to its own laws and customs; but in certain agreed-on matters, where the interests of the states overlap, authority is specifically delegated to the federal government.

    For example, if the nations of the world considered the control of narcotics to be a matter of mutual concern; if they agreed to set up a commission with the power to make laws preventing the growing, refinement and distribution of harmful drugs, and with the power to arrest individuals for violating those laws, then we would have a world federation in the area of narcotics control.

    If, in addition, the world community considered terrorism to be a matter of mutual concern; if an international commission were also set up with the power to make global anti-terrorist laws, and to arrest individuals violating those laws, then we would have a world federation with somewhat broader powers.

    If the community of nations decided to give the federal authority the additional power to make laws defining the rights and obligations of multinational corporations, and the power to arrest individuals violating those laws, then we would have a world federation with still broader powers; but these powers would still be carefully defined and limited.

    In 1998, in Rome, representatives of 120 countries signed a statute establishing a International Criminal Court, with jurisdiction over war crimes and genocide. Four years were to pass before the necessary ratifications were gathered, but by Thursday, April 11, 2002, 66 nations had ratified the Rome agreement, 6 more than the 60 needed to make the court permanent. The jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court is at present limited to a very narrow class crimes. The global community will have a chance to see how the court works in practice, and in the future, the community may decide to broaden its jurisdiction.

    In setting up a federation, the member states can decide which powers they wish to delegate to it; and all powers not expressly delegated are retained by the individual states. We are faced with the problem of constructing a new world order which will preserve the advantages of local self-government while granting certain carefully-chosen powers to larger regional or global authorities. Which things should be decided locally, or regionally, and which globally?

    In the future, overpopulation and famine are likely to become increasingly difficult and painful problems in several parts of the world. Since various cultures take widely different attitudes towards birth control and family size, the problem of population stabilization seems to be one which should be solved locally. At the same time, aid for local family planning programs, as well as famine relief, might appropriately come from global agencies, such as WHO and FAO. With respect to large-scale migration, it would be unfair for a country which has successfully stabilized its own population, and which has eliminated poverty within its own borders, to be forced to accept a flood of migrants from regions of high fertility. Therefore the extent of immigration should be among the issues to be decided locally.

    Security, and controls on the manufacture and export of armaments will require an effective authority at the global level. It should also be the responsibility of the international community to intervene to prevent gross violations of human rights. Since the end of the Cold War, the United Nations has more and more frequently been called upon to send armed forces to troubled parts of the world. In many instances, these calls for U. N. intervention have been prompted by clear and atrocious violations of human rights, for example by “ethnic cleansing” in Bosnia and by genocide in Rwanda. In the examples just named, the response of the United Nations would have been much more effective, and many lives would have been saved, if the action which was finally taken had come sooner. Long and complex diplomatic negotiations were required to muster the necessary political and physical forces needed for intervention, by which time the original problems had become much more severe. For this reason, it has been suggested that the U. N. Secretary General, the Security Council and the General Assembly ought to have at their disposal a permanent, highly trained and highly mobile emergency force, composed of volunteers from all nations. Such an international police force would be able to act rapidly to prevent gross violations of human rights or other severe breaches of international law.

    In evaluating the concept of an international police force directly responsible to the United Nations, it is helpful to examine the way in which police act to enforce laws and to prevent violence and crime at local and national levels.

    Within a community which is characterized by good government, police are not highly armed, nor are they very numerous. Law and order are not maintained primarily by the threat of force, but by the opinion of the vast majority of the citizens that the system of laws is both just and necessary. Traffic stops when the signal light is red and moves when it is green whether or not a policeman is present, because everyone understands why such a system is necessary.

    Nevertheless, although the vast majority of the citizens in a well-governed community support the system of laws and would never wish to break the law, we all know that the real world is not heaven. The total spectrum of human nature includes evil as well as a good. If there were no police at all, and if the criminal minority were completely unchecked, every citizen would be obliged to be armed. No one’s life or property would be safe. Robbery, murder and rape would flourish.

    Within a society with a democratic and just government, whose powers are derived from the consent of the governed, a small and lightly armed force of police is able to maintain the system of laws. One reason why this is possible has just been mentioned – the force of public opinion. A second reason is that the law acts on individuals. Since obstruction of justice and the murder of policemen both rank as serious crimes, an individual criminal is usually not able to organize massive resistance against police action.

    Edith Wynner, one of the pioneers of the World Federalist movement, lists the following characteristics of police power in a well-governed society:

    1. “A policeman operates within a framework of organized government having legislative, executive and judicial authority operating on individuals. His actions are guided by a clearly stated criminal code that has the legislative sanction of the community. Should he abuse the authority vested in him, he is subject to discipline and court restraint.”
    2. “A policeman seeing a fight between two men does not attempt to determine which of them is in the right and then help him beat up the one he considers wrong. His function is to restrain violence by both, to bring them before a judge who has authority to determine the rights of the dispute, and to see that the court’s decision is carried out.”
    3. “In carrying out his duties, the policeman must apprehend the suspected individual without jeopardizing either the property or the lives of the community where the suspect is to be arrested. And not only is the community safeguarded against destruction of property and loss of life but the rights of the suspect are also carefully protected by an elaborate network of judicial safeguards.”

    Edith Wynner also discusses the original union of the thirteen American colonies, which was a confederation, analogous to the present United Nations. This confederation was found to be too weak, and after eleven years it was replaced by a federation, one of whose key powers was the power to make and enforce laws which acted on individuals. George Mason, one of the architects of the federal constitution of the United States, believed that “such a government was necessary as could directly operate on individuals, and would punish those only whose guilt required it”, while James Madison (another drafter of the U. S. federal constitution) remarked that the more he reflected on the use of force, the more he doubted “the practicability, the justice and the efficacy of it when applied to people collectively, and not individually”. Finally, Alexander Hamilton, in his “Federalist Papers”, discussed the confederation with the following words: “To coerce the states is one of the maddest projects that was ever devised… Can any reasonable man be well disposed towards a government, which makes war and carnage the only means of supporting itself – a government that can exist only by the sword? Every such war must involve the innocent with the guilty. This single consideration should be enough to dispose every peaceable citizen against such a government… What is the cure for this great evil? Nothing, but to enable the… laws to operate on individuals, in the same manner as those of states do.”

    The United Nations is at present a confederation rather than a federation, and thus it acts by attempting to coerce states, a procedure which Alexander Hamilton characterized as “one of the maddest projects that was ever devised”. Whether this coercion takes the form of economic sanctions, or whether it takes the form of military intervention, the practicability, the justice and the efficacy of the UN’s efforts are hampered because they are applied to people collectively and not individually. It is obvious that the United Nations actions to stop aggression of one state against another in the Korean War and in the Gulf War fail to match the three criteria for police action listed above. What is the cure for this great evil? “Nothing”, Hamilton tells us, “but to enable the laws to act on individuals, in the same manner as those of states do.”

    Historically, confederations have always proved to be too weak; but federations have on the whole been very successful, mainly because a federation has the power to make laws which act on individuals. At the same time, a federation aims at leaving as many powers as possible in the hands of local authorities. Recent examples of federations include the United States of America, the United States of Brazil, the United States of Mexico, the United States of Venezuela, the Argentine Nation, the Commonwealth of Australia, the Dominion of Canada, the Union of South Africa, Switzerland, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the European Federation. Thus we are rich in historical data on the strengths and weaknesses of federations, and we can make use of this data as we attempt to construct good government at the global level.

    Looking towards the future, we can perhaps foresee a time when the United Nations will have been converted to a federation and given the power to make international laws which are binding on individuals. Under such circumstances, true international law enforcement will be possible, incorporating all of the needed safeguards for lives and property of the innocent. One can hope for a future world where the institution of war will be abolished, and where public opinion will support international law to such an extent that a new Hitler or a future Milosevic will not be able to organize large-scale resistance to arrest, a world where international law will be seen by all to be just, impartial and necessary, a well-governed global community within which each person will owe his or her ultimate loyalty to humanity as a whole.

    Besides a humane, democratic and just framework of international law and governance, we urgently need a new global ethic, – an ethic where loyalty to family, community and nation will be supplemented by a strong sense of the brotherhood of all humans, regardless of race, religion or nationality. Schiller expressed this feeling in his “Ode to Joy”, the text of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Hearing Beethoven’s music and Schiller’s words, most of us experience an emotion of resonance and unity with its message: All humans are brothers and sisters – not just some – all! It is almost a national anthem of humanity. The feelings which the music and words provoke are similar to patriotism, but broader. It is this sense of a universal human family, which we need to cultivate in education, in the mass media, and in religion.

    Educational reforms are urgently needed, particularly in the teaching of history. As it is taught today, history is a chronicle of power struggles and war, told from a biased national standpoint. Our own race or religion is superior; our own country is always heroic and in the right.

    We urgently need to replace this indoctrination in chauvinism by a reformed view of history, where the slow development of human culture is described, giving adequate credit to all those who have contributed. Our modern civilization is built on the achievements of ancient cultures. China, India, Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt, Greece, the Islamic world, Christian Europe, and Jewish intellectual traditions all have contributed. Potatoes, corn and squash are gifts from the American Indians. Human culture, gradually built up over thousands of years by the patient work of millions of hands and minds, should be presented to students of history as a precious heritage – far too precious to be risked in a thermonuclear war.

    In the teaching of science too, reforms are needed. Graduates in science and technology should be conscious of their responsibilities. They must resolve never to use their education in the service of war, or in any way which might be harmful to society or to the environment.

    In modern societies, mass media play an extremely important role in determining behavior and attitudes. This role can be a negative one when the media show violence and enemy images, but if used constructively, the mass media can offer a powerful means for creating international understanding. If it is indeed true that tribalism is part of human nature, it is extremely important that the mass media be used to the utmost to overcome the barriers between nations and cultures. Through increased communication, the world’s peoples can learn to accept each other as members of a single family.

    Finally, let us turn to religion, with its enormous influence on human thought and behavior. Christianity, for example, offers a strongly stated ethic, which, if practiced, would make war impossible. In Mathew, the following passage occurs:

    “Ye have heard it said: Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thy enemy. But I say unto you: Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that spitefully use you and persecute you.”

    This seemingly impractical advice, that we should love our enemies, is in fact of the greatest practicality, since acts of unilateral kindness and generosity can stop escalatory cycles of revenge and counter-revenge such as those which characterize the present conflict in the Middle East and the recent troubles of Northern Ireland. However, Christian nations, while claiming to adhere to the ethic of love and forgiveness, have adopted a policy of “massive retaliation”, involving systems of thermonuclear missiles whose purpose is to destroy as much as possible of the country at which the retaliation is aimed. It is planned that entire populations shall be killed in a “massive retaliation”, innocent children along with the guilty politicians. The startling contradiction between what the Christian nations profess and what they do was obvious even before the advent of nuclear weapons, at the time when Leo Tolstoy, during his last years, was exchanging letters with a young Indian lawyer in South Africa. In one of his letters to Gandhi, Tolstoy wrote:

    “The whole life of the Christian peoples is a continuous contradiction between that which they profess and the principles on which they order their lives, a contradiction between love accepted as the law of life, and violence, which is recognized and praised, acknowledged even as a necessity.”

    “This year, in the spring, at a Scripture examination at a girls’ high school in Moscow, the teacher and the bishop present asked the girls questions on the Commandments, and especially on the sixth. After a correct answer, the bishop generally put another question, whether murder was always in all cases forbidden by God’s law; and the unhappy young ladies were forced by previous instruction to answer ‘Not always’ – that murder was permitted in war and in the execution of criminals. Still, when one of these unfortunate young ladies (what I am telling is not an invention but a fact told to me by an eye witness) after her first answer, was asked the usual question, if killing was always sinful, she, agitated and blushing, decisively answered ‘Always’, and to the usual sophisms of the bishop, she answered with decided conviction that killing was always forbidden in the Old Testament and forbidden by Christ, not only killing but every wrong against a brother. Notwithstanding all his grandeur and arts of speech, the bishop became silent and the girl remained victorious.”

    As everyone knows, Gandhi successfully applied the principle of non-violence to the civil rights struggle in South Africa, and later to the political movement, which gave India its freedom and independence. The principle of non-violence was also successfully applied by Martin Luther King, and by Nelson Mandela. It is perhaps worthwhile to consider Gandhi’s comment on the question of whether the end justifies the means: “The means may be likened to a seed”, Gandhi wrote, “and the end to a tree; and there is the same inviolable connection between the means and the end as there is between the seed and the tree.” In other words, a dirty method produces a dirty result; killing produces more killing; hate leads to more hate. Everyone who reads the newspapers knows that this is true. But there are positive feedback loops as well as negative ones. A kind act produces a kind response; a generous gesture is returned; hospitality results in reflected hospitality. Buddhists call this principle of reciprocity “the law of karma”.

    The religious leaders of the world have the opportunity to contribute importantly to the solution of the problem of war. They have the opportunity to powerfully support the concept of universal human brotherhood, to build bridges between religious groups, to make intermarriage across ethnic boundaries easier, and to soften the distinctions between communities. If they fail to do this, they will have failed humankind at a time of crisis.

    It is useful to consider the analogy between the institution of war and the institution of slavery. We might be tempted to say, “There has always been war, throughout human history; and war will always continue to exist.” As an antidote for this kind of pessimism, we can think of slavery, which, like war, has existed throughout most of recorded history. The cultures of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome were all based on slavery, and, in more recent times, 13 million Africans were captured and forced into a life of slavery in the New World. Slavery was as much an accepted and established institution as war is today. Many people made large profits from slavery, just as arms manufacturers today make enormous profits. Nevertheless, in spite of the weight of vested interests, slavery has now been abolished throughout most of the world.

    Today we look with horror at drawings of slave ships, where human beings were packed together like cord-wood; and we are amazed that such cruelty could have been possible. Can we not hope for a time when our descendants, reading descriptions of the wars of the twentieth century, will be equally amazed that such cruelty could have been possible? If we use them constructively, the vast resources now wasted on war can initiate a new era of happiness and prosperity for the family of man. It is within our power to let this happen. The example of the men and women who worked to rid the world of slavery can give us courage as we strive for a time when war will exist only as a dark memory fading into the past.

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    7. H. Mahler, “World Health is Indivisible”, World Health Organization, Geneva, (1978).
    8. E. Kamenka, editor, “Nationalism”, Edward Arnold, London, (1976).
    9. Elie Kedourie, “Nationalism in Asia and Africa”, Frank Cass and Company Ltd., London, (1970).
    10. S. Freud, “Warum Krieg? Das Bild vom Feind”, Arbeitsgem. Friedenspedagogik, (1983).
    11. R.A. Levine and D.T. Campbell, “Ethnocentrism: Theories of Conflict, Ethnic Attitudes and Group Behavior”, Wiley, New York, (1972).
    12. R.A. Hinde, “Biological Basis of Human Social Behavior”, McGraw-Hill, (1977).
    13. R.A. Hinde, “Towards Understanding Human Relationships”, Academic Press, London, (1979).
    14. C. Zahn-Waxler, “Altruism and Aggression: Biological and Social Origins”, Cambridge University Press, (1986).
    15. R. Axelrod, “The Evolution of Cooperation”, Basic Books, New York, (1984).
    16. Arthur Koestler, “The Urge to Self-Destruction”, in “The Place of Values in a World of Facts”, A. Tiselius and S. Nielsson editors, Wiley, New York, (1970).
    17. Edith Wynner,”World Federal Government in Maximum Terms: Proposals for United Nations Charter Revision”, Fedonat Press, Afton New York, (1954).

    John Avery is a leader in the Pugwash movement in Denmark.

  • What Is Ethical?

    This article was originally published by Pressenza.

    During the lunch hour on the final day of the ICAN Civil Society Forum in Oslo, around 150 people attended a panel discussion on “Ethics in International Politics.”

    At the end of the panel discussion, Fr. John Dear briefly brought up an important example that shocked many in the audience. He said that many of the employees of Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), near where he lives in New Mexico, believe that they are engaged in an ethical – perhaps the most ethical – line of work.

    The definition of “ethics” through which I view the issue of nuclear weapons is this:

    That branch of philosophy dealing with values relating to human conduct, with respect to the rightness and wrongness of certain actions and to the goodness and badness of the motives and ends of such actions.

    How can LANL employees possibly believe their work is ethical? Each nuclear weapon that LANL employees have created, monitored and modernized from the dawn of the Nuclear Age until today have the capacity to destroy hundreds of thousands – or more – lives in a flash. The resulting nuclear famine from even a relatively small regional exchange of nuclear weapons would kill hundreds of millions more people around the world.

    The answer to this question lies in their belief in nuclear deterrence – that the threat of massive retaliation by Country B prevents Country A from initiating hostilities. Therefore, nuclear weapons keep the peace and will never be used.

    As a signatory to the Santa Barbara Declaration against nuclear deterrence, I do not believe that this idea about human behavior holds in all cases or can be relied on to keep us safe. A conscious effort must be made by nuclear weapons proponents to ignore the well-documented catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons in order to consider nuclear weapons “ethical.”

    At the 2010 Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, NAPF President David Krieger asked U.S. Undersecretary of State Ellen Tauscher whether the U.S. would be willing to conduct a “human impact statement” on the use of nuclear weapons. Ms. Tauscher’s answer was simple: “We have no intention of doing this.”

    This willful ignorance continues today: the P5 (U.S., Russia, U.K., France and China) made a collective decision to avoid the Norwegian Foreign Ministry’s conference on the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons, which begins on March 4. To participate in it would shatter their carefully-crafted illusion that the “motive” and the “end” of maintaining even one nuclear weapon is ethical.

    At least 132 countries will come together in Oslo on March 4-5 to examine the humanitarian impacts of nuclear weapons. The scientific evidence is beyond doubt. No one could hide from the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons should a nuclear exchange take place.

    The P5 cannot hide forever from the fact that humanity demands the abolition of nuclear weapons. A Nuclear Weapons Convention for the phased, verifiable, transparent and irreversible elimination of all nuclear weapons worldwide is the only ethical option.

    Rick Wayman is Director of Programs & Operations at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • Entrevista con David Krieger

    Click here for the English version.

    El Doctor en Derecho, David Krieger, es uno de los más apasionados y conocidos defensores de la no proliferación, destrucción y prohibición de las armas nucleares en los EE.UU. En 1970 fue reclutado por el ejército durante la guerra de Vietnam, pero se negó a servir, declarando ante las autoridades militares que la guerra es inmoral y participar en ella era contrario a sus convicciones. Pero las autoridades no aceptaron su posición. Él no se dio por vencido y recurrió a la corte federal. Ahí ganó. Desde 1982 hasta este día, David Krieger es presidente de la ONG Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, ofreciendo conferencias en universidades de los EE.UU., Europa y Japón. Fue uno de los líderes de las audiencias civiles de 2007 sobre la legalidad de las acciones de Estados Unidos en Irak, y fue miembro del jurado del tribunal público internacional sobre Iraq, celebrado en Estambul en 2005. Es autor y co-autor de decenas de libros sobre los peligros de las armas nucleares, su no proliferación y la eliminación de la mismas.   Esta es la visión de los problemas que David Krieger compartió con los lectores de “Rosbalt”.

    Yaroshinskaya: No hay información en los medios de comunicación rusos, pero sé que en febrero de 2012 usted fue arrestado – junto con su esposa, Carolee, Daniel Ellsberg, Cindy Sheehan, el padre Louis Vitale, y diez otros activistas – cerca de la Base Aérea Vandenberg en California. Cuente, por favor, en forma breve a nuestros lectores lo que hacían ahí y cómo las autoridades los castigaron.

    Krieger: Varias veces al año, la Fuerza Aérea de Estados Unidos lleva a cabo vuelos de prueba de misiles balísticos intercontinentales (ICBM), sin sus ojivas nucleares, desde su Base Vandenberg. La base – la única de EE.UU. que pone a prueba misiles balísticos intercontinentales – está a unos 100 km de Santa Barbara, donde yo vivo. Para tratar de minimizar las protestas, la Fuerza Aérea por lo general lanza los misiles a altas horas de la noche. Mi esposa y yo nos unimos con Daniel Ellsberg y cerca de otras setenta personas en una protesta que tuvo lugar justo antes de la medianoche del 24 de febrero en Vandenberg. No puedo hablar por todos, pero yo estaba protestando porque los misiles nucleares base-tierra ICBM son armas de ataque directo. En un momento de fuertes tensiones, son las armas que un país debe utilizar o enfrentarse a la posibilidad de perderlo todo por el ataque de otro país. Creo que los ciudadanos no deben permitir que las pruebas de los sistemas de tales armas sigan como una cuestión de rutina. Estas pruebas no deben ser rutinarias. Son advertencias de las amenazas de destrucción de civilizaciones que los arsenales nucleares plantean a la humanidad entera, y deben terminar mientras se llegan a acuerdos para desmantelar las armas y sus sistemas de lanzamiento.

    Después de la medianoche, quince de nosotros nos dimos la mano y caminamos hacia la puerta principal de la base de la Fuerza Aérea. Queríamos entregar un mensaje al comandante de la base. El mensaje era que esta pesadilla nuclear debe terminar, y que las pruebas rutinarias de misiles balísticos intercontinentales es una forma de locura colectiva. Antes de que pudiéramos acercarnos a la caseta en la puerta principal, jóvenes militares del personal de seguridad formaron una fila delante de nosotros y luego nos arrestaron, nos esposaron a la espalda, nos subieron en varias camionetas y nos llevaron a un lugar solitario en el bosque, donde nos tomaron las huellas dactilares y fotografías y nos dieron una citación por violación de la propiedad militar. Más tarde, la Fuerza Aérea nos dejó alrededor de las 4:00 am, en un centro comercial a muchos kilómetros de nuestros automóviles.  Cuando comparecimos ante el tribunal federal, nos declararamos “no culpables” a los cargos que nos habían hecho.

    El juicio estaba programado para el mes de octubre pasado, pero en la fecha indicada, el fiscal del gobierno retiró los cargos contra nosotros y el caso quedó concluído. Yo creo que no querían la publicidad de un juicio y tal vez temían de que perderían el caso. Fue un honor haber sido detenido junto a Daniel Ellsberg, mi esposa y los demás para protestar por la locura absoluta de continuar amenazando a otros países con armas nucleares y sistemas de lanzamientos intercontinentales. Con nuestra protesta, hemos dado voz a las generaciones futuras, que merecen la oportunidad de vivir en un mundo sin que se cierna sobre ellos, la amenaza de la aniquilación nuclear.

    Yaroshinskaya: A pesar del hecho de que desde la firma del Tratado sobre la No Proliferación de las Armas Nucleares (TNP) han pasado más de 40 años, estas no han disminuido en el mundo. Algunos expertos subrayan que en este Tratado se indican también las obligaciones del club nuclear para la destrucción de las armas nucleares. ¿Cómo se aplican?

    Krieger: El Tratado de No Proliferación (TNP) es el único tratado de armas existente que contiene obligaciones para el desarme nuclear.  Este obliga a los cinco estados con armas nucleares que son partes en el documento (EE.UU., Rusia, Reino Unido, Francia y China) a negociar de buena fe para el cese de la carrera armamentista nuclear en una fecha próxima, por el desarme nuclear y para un tratado sobre el desarme general y completo. Estas negociaciones no han tenido lugar y, después de 43 años, “una fecha próxima” ha sido rebasada sin duda. Los cinco Estados poseedores de armas nucleares del TNP están en incumplimiento de sus obligaciones en virtud del tratado. Su falta de acción para cumplir con sus obligaciones pone el tratado, así como el futuro de la civilización, en peligro. Estos estados están demostrando que ellos creen que las armas nucleares son útiles para su seguridad. Además de estar equivocados acerca de que las armas nucleares proporcionan seguridad, están siendo extremadamente miopes. La disuasión nuclear no es “defensa”. Es una hipótesis sobre el comportamiento humano y está sujeto al fracaso. Por su dependencia en la disuasión nuclear, los Estados poseedores de estas armas no sólo corren el riesgo de que una guerra nuclear ocurra por accidente o causada, sino que también están en realidad alentando la proliferación nuclear.

    Yaroshinskaya: Rusia y Estados Unidos son los principales actores en el escenario mundial nuclear.¿Cómo evalúa usted el pasado tratado ruso-estadounidense sobre la reducción de la capacidad nuclear – START-3, firmado por Dmitriy Medvedev y Barack Obama en abril de 2010? ¿Cuál es su opinión – EE.UU. está dispuesto a reducir aún más las armas nucleares y, finalmente, a eliminarlas todas como Barak Obama prometió antes de su primera elección presidencial?

    Krieger: El nuevo acuerdo START especifica la reducción de armas nucleares estratégicas desplegadas en cada lado a mil quinientas cincuenta y de vehículos de lanzamiento a setecientos para 2018. Estos números son todavía demasiado altos.   Creo que el presidente Obama vio el nuevo acuerdo START como el establecimiento de una nueva plataforma para hacer reducciones en el tamaño de los arsenales nucleares. Sin embargo, parece claro que el despliegue de EE.UU. de instalaciones de defensa antimisiles cerca de la frontera rusa pueden hacer esto difícil de lograr. En 2009, en un discurso en Praga, República Checa, el presidente Obama habló del “compromiso de Estados Unidos para buscar la paz y la seguridad de un mundo sin armas nucleares”. Pero, continuó, “yo no soy ingenuo. Este objetivo no se puede alcanzar rápidamente – quizás no en mi vida. Requerirá de paciencia y persistencia.” A mi juicio, es necesario que haya un mayor sentido de la urgencia de convertir este compromiso en acciones dentro de un plazo razonable, si queremos alcanzar la meta de un mundo libre de armas nucleares.

    Yaroshinskaya: El ex secretario del Departamento de Estado, Henry Kissinger declaró hace algún tiempo que Estados Unidos podría liderar el desarme nuclear mundial. ¿Qué tan realistas son estas afirmaciones o no es nada más que un juego de la política?

    Krieger: Henry Kissinger ya no tiene poder político. Él sólo tiene el poder de persuasión. Se ha unido a otros líderes estadounidenes de la Guerra Fría, – George Shultz, William Perry y Sam Nunn – para pedir la abolición de armas nucleares. Pero, como el presidente Obama, ven esto como una meta a largo plazo. Pero creo que es correcto decir que EE.UU. podría liderar al mundo para lograr el desarme nuclear. El presidente Obama ha pedido también este tipo de liderazgo. Si EE.UU. falla en esto, es poco probable que suceda. Por supuesto, Rusia también podría dar un paso adelante y demostrar ese liderazgo.

    Yaroshinskaya: Uno de los temas más sensibles de las relaciones ruso-estadounidenses es el sistema norteamericano de defensa antimisiles en Europa. ¿Usted personalmente cree que este sistema está dirigido sólo contra países como Irán y Corea del Norte, pero no en contra de Rusia, como lo declaran los generales estadounidenses?

    Krieger: Mi creencia personal es que el sistema de defensa de misiles de EE.UU. es principalmente un medio de canalizar fondos públicos para los contratistas de esa “defensa”. Dudo que las defensas de misiles puedan tener realmente éxito en la detención de armas nucleares, y desde luego nunca tendrán éxito contra un país como Rusia, con sofisticadas fuerzas nucleares. Por lo tanto, creo que las defensas de misiles de Estados Unidos se dirigen a los países menos sofisticados, como Irán y Corea del Norte, en lugar de Rusia. Es fácil de entender, sin embargo, la preocupación que tiene Rusia. Sin duda, EE.UU. también estaría preocupado si Rusia intenta poner instalaciones de defensa de misiles cerca de la frontera de EE.UU..

    Yaroshinskaya: ¿Cuál es su opinión con respecto a la amenaza nuclear iraní hacia Estados Unidos y el mundo? ¿Realmente existe?  Recordamos el error norteamericano. sobre el programa nuclear de Irak y podemos ver ahora el resultado de dicho error para la gente de ese país.

    Krieger: En este momento, Irán no representa una amenaza nuclear para EE.UU. y el resto del mundo. Hasta donde yo sé, no hay servicio de inteligencia nacional que llegue a la conclusión de que Irán tiene un programa de armas nucleares.   Lo que sabemos es que Irán tiene un programa para enriquecer uranio, lo que podría ser convertido en un programa de armas nucleares.   Creo que es importante disuadir a Irán de desarrollar armas nucleares, pero esto se hace más difícil por el hecho de que los Estados nucleares no avanzan seriamente hacia el cumplimiento de sus obligaciones de desarme nuclear en el marco del TNP.

    Yaroshinskaya: Y esta es la última pregunta. Sé que hace tiempo intercambia correspondencia con Vladimir Putin. Si me permite la pregunta, ¿qué se han escrito el uno al otro?

    Krieger: En febrero de 2012, enviamos una “Carta Abierta sobre los planes de la OTAN de defensa de misiles y un mayor riesgo de la guerra nuclear” al presidente Obama, al presidente Medvedev y otros funcionarios rusos y estadounidenses. Usted puede encontrar esta carta enhttps://wagingpeace.davidmolinaojeda.com/articles/db_article.php?article_id=313 . He recibido una carta de respuesta del Secretario de Relaciones Exteriores, Sergueyi Lavrov. Él me dijo en su carta de marzo de 2012: “Compartimos plenamente la opinión de que el hecho de que la Alianza del Atlántico Norte se negó a incluir a Rusia en una defensa antimisiles conjunta es la evidencia de su falta de visión para tratar a nuestro país como un socio equitativo. Esto parece ser especialmente alarmante en el contexto de la ampliación de la OTAN y la búsqueda de consolidar concesiones globales en las funciones militares de la coalición. Uno no puede dejar de llegar a la conclusión de que el despliegue del sistema de defensa de misiles en las fronteras mismas de Rusia, aumenta la posibilidad de que una confrontación militar convencional pueda convertirse en una guerra nuclear. Hemos sido muy francos en el sentido de que esas medidas adoptadas por EE.UU. y la OTAN socavan la estabilidad estratégica y el avance en la reducción y limitación de las armas nucleares”.   Asimismo, expresó su “esperanza de continuar este diálogo positivo e imparcial.” El texto completo de la carta del Sr. Lavrov se puede encontrar enhttps://wagingpeace.davidmolinaojeda.com/articles/pdfs/2012_03_27_lavrov_reply.pdf  Espero que este diálogo continuará en efecto a nivel oficial y conduzca a las negociaciones para un nuevo tratado, una Convención sobre Armas Nucleares, para la eliminación total de las armas nucleares en etapas, de manera verificable, irreversible y transparente.

    Alla Yaroshinskaya publicó este artículo en Rosbalt, un servicio noticioso ruso. Ruben Arvizu es Director para América Latina de Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • Dismay at P5 Boycott of Oslo Conference

    This article was originally published by Pressenza.

    It appears that Norway’s deliberate plan to limit the focus of its conference to the “catastrophic consequences of nuclear war” in an attempt to secure the attendance of the nuclear weapons states, has failed with the five nuclear weapons states who signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty (known as the P5, as they are the very same nations that have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council and wield the veto power in that damaged institution) boycotting the event.

    The P5 have ganged up on the rest of the world, consulting with each other and refusing as a group to attend, according to Rose Goettemoeler, the US Acting Undersecretary for Arms Control and National Security, who briefed a group of US NGOs, starting out the conversation by saying:

    “I want to talk to you about the US decision not to attend the conference, want you to know what the rationale is, we didn’t take this decision lightly.  It was made in consultation with the P5.  They all agreed not to attend.”

    Contending that a focus on the humanitarian consequences of nuclear war was a good strategy for NGOs, Goettemoeller insisted that it would be a “distraction” from the “step-by-step” approach preferred by the P5.  But the beloved “step-by-step” approach, leading to a nuclear weapons free world in an infinite number of lifetimes, has brought us the latest abomination, the modest START treaty where Obama made a deal with the weapons labs and arms merchants for $180 billion worth of three new bomb factories, at Los Alamos, Oak Ridge and Kansas City, as well as new planes, submarines and missiles, over the next ten years, to deliver their lethal nuclear payloads.

    One of the first ugly steps was the deal Clinton made in 1992 with the weapons labs when he was trying to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, where he promised $6 billion a year for new high-tech, computer-simulated nuclear bomb laboratory tests coupled with “sub-critical” tests at the Nevada test site, where plutonium is blown up with high explosives, but doesn’t have a chain reaction.

    Despite the pledge made in the Non-Proliferation Treaty “to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament”, the rogue P5, are modernizing their arsenals and taking tiny baby steps leading to nowhere.  All the while the US points to the “greatest threat”, a nuclear terrorist getting a bomb or North Korea or Iran.

    Further, they appear to be tone-deaf or blind to the effect that NATO expansion and ballistic missile “offense” is having on the possibility for true nuclear disarmament where major agreements are needed between the US and Russia who have 19,000 of the 20,000 bombs on the planet.  While Goettemoeller said she is looking forward to further progress in nuclear arms cuts with Russia, she discounted Putin’s recent call to beef up its military because of NATO expansion and US missiles planted on its border, characterizing it as a grandstanding speech by Putin made at a meeting of his generals.  We need only recall what happened when the Soviet Union planted missiles in Cuba—we almost started a world war.

    The good news about Oslo is that 130 nations have agreed to attend, including India and Pakistan, two nuclear weapons states outside the NPT regime. Perhaps Asia will lead the way to a negotiated treaty to finally ban the bomb.

    Alice Slater is the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s New York Representative.