Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

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  • War is a Racket

    War is a racket. It always has been.

    It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

    A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small “inside” group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

    In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

    How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

    Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few – the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.

    And what is this bill?

    This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.

    For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.

    Full text available at http://lexrex.com/enlightened/articles/warisaracket.htm.

    Smedley Butler was a Major General in the US Marine Corps. At the time of his death, he was the most decorated Marine in US history.

  • Preventable Genocide: Who Speaks for Humanity

    It’s wonderful to be in Santa Barbara and to see such a good crowd – especially given the fact that it is beautiful Saturday morning in sunny California and genocide is the subject of our discussion. It is clear that I have strayed from my California roots and been on the East Coast too long, as I am reminded of a cartoon that appeared in the New Yorker magazine, with the text, “Would you like to grab a drink after the Genocide panel?” How indeed, do we incorporate something like genocide into our “normal” lives?

    In the aftermath of the Second World War, Raphael Lemkin coined the word ‘genocide’. Lemkin, a lawyer and Holocaust survivor wanted to find a way to describe the policies that were intended to exterminate Jews throughout Europe in order to prevent such a thing from happening again. Based on his efforts, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was adopted by the United Nations in 1948 and went into force three years later. The Convention defined genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group,” and it made genocide a punishable crime under international law.

    Institutionalization of Hope

    The United Nations was itself created from the ashes of World War II and the atrocities of the Holocaust in order to prevent the extraordinary human suffering witnessed at that time. From the beginning, the United Nations has spoken to the ideals of people around the world for a better and more secure future – it was what former President Clinton recently called the “institutionalization of hope,” based on three ideals: the maintenance of international peace and security, the promotion of economic development, and the protection of human rights. As envisioned from the beginning of the Organization, governments could take action under the United Nations Charter to prevent genocide. The United Nations second Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold said the United Nations’spare job was not to take us to Heaven but to keep us from Hell. Genocide is the ultimate Hell.

    But we have not always lived up to the promise, sometimes succumbing to divisive international politics; the lack of collective political will to confront evil; and a callous tendency to preference sovereign rights of nations over the rights of vulnerable individuals in those nations. While the United Nations helped ultimately bring peace to Cambodia in the 1990s, it did so only after more than a million people died at the hands of the pathological Khmer Rouge regime. Alongside all countries of the world and all other international institutions, the United Nations failed to stop the mass murder of 800,000 in Rwanda in 1994. And again it failed, we all failed, to protect civilians from ethnic cleansing in Bosnia in the mid-90s.

    In short, history demonstrates that the United Nations faces a fundamental dilemma: on the one hand it represents both the highest ideals of humanity and the “institutionalization of hope,” but at the same time, its high ambitions have often contrasted sharply with the realities of what national governments have been able to agree on and deliver.

    While the United Nations may be imperfect, it is also indispensable. As the only universal body representing and bringing together every country and region of the world, the United Nations enjoys a unique legitimacy.

    So the United Nations is being asked to do more and more things: a quadrupling of United Nations peacekeeping forces in the last decade, so that at this moment, with over 93,000 sets of “boots on the ground” in 18 hot-spots in every corner of the globe, the United Nations is second only to the US in terms of the number of troops deployed around the world. The United Nations has also been relied on for providing humanitarian assistance in complex emergencies, such as in Southeast Asia after the tsunami and in Darfur, so that now there are more humanitarian missions run by the United Nations than ever before, serving the needs of over 40 million people around the world each year in almost 40 countries. The United Nations has also become the pre-eminent provider of organizing and monitoring national elections. The United Nations Millennium Development Goals are a blueprint that have been agreed to by all the world’s countries to meet the needs of the poor, including halving extreme poverty and curbing the spread of HIV/AIDS.

    Responsibility to Protect

    But what about preventing genocide?

    Is the United Nations’role limited to providing the normative and legal framework for combating genocide embodied in the Convention? Or can the United Nations become the pre-eminent service provider in this area, as it has in peackekeeping, humanitarian, elections, and providing a framework for development? The United Nations is not a world government, and it does not have its own military to send in to prevent or stop genocide. Ultimately, the decision to intervene and deliver troops and equipment is up to the governments of the countries that make up the United Nations, and more specifically, the Security Council.
    But the United Nations’s role is extremely important in getting governments to make that calculation. The Secretary-General has a moral voice to draw attention to humanitarian crises and he has done that tirelessly on Darfur.

    And in September 2005 at the United Nations, the largest gathering of heads of state ever assembled took another huge step. They approved, by consensus, the principle of the “Responsibility to Protect” – the idea that every government has a responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity, but when they are unable or unwilling to do so, the community of nations is be prepared to take collective action. In terms of international norms and law, this was a fundamental shift. Governments have always been able to hide behind sovereignty, by saying that they have a right to determine what goes on behind their own borders. Now, governments as large as China and as small as Burundi have acknowledged that they have a responsibility to their civilians and that failure to do so means that the international community has the responsibility and can take action, either through diplomatic, humanitarian, or other means, including military means (under Chapter VII) of the United Nations Charter.

    Such a historic agreement is possible only through the United Nations. Those who criticize the United Nations, arguing instead for coalitions of the willing or alliances of democracies to replace it, have failed to realize that an agreement on how to address genocide by angels alone, leaves most of humanity at the mercy of those less angelically inclined. But through the United Nations we now have an agreed principle for protecting all of the world’s people.

    However, despite its adoption last year, the Responsibility to Protect has not yet been operationalized. Turning it from a principle into an actionable norm is essential. Civil society and NGOs can help by influencing policy makers in governments and insisting that they put into action the Responsibility to Protect.
    Three different types of United Nations institutions can play on enhanced role in the fight against genocide:

    First, the Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide

    In 2004, the Secretary-General appointed Mr. Juan Méndez, Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide based on the lessons learned from past instances of collective failure to address gross human rights violations. The Special Advisor acts as an early warning mechanism to bring attention to situations that could result in genocide and advises the Secretary-General and the Security Council. This is the first time the United Nations has had a position that is devoted exclusively to preventing genocide and mass abuses of human rights, and he has been active on Darfur, traveling to the region and reporting back on how to prevent the situation from deteriorating further.

    Second, the new Human Rights Council

    Another recent development that can significantly bolster human rights at the United Nations is the establishment of the Human Rights Council to replace the Commission on Human Rights. The world needs an intergovernmental body which effectively deals with human rights. The Human Rights Council is a crucial opportunity and holds great promise despite some early stumbles that make it appear to be replicating some of the failures of the Commission. It meets year around and has a new feature – the universal peer review that ensures that all members, including the most powerful countries, who sit in judgment of human rights situations around the world, have their own human rights records scrutinized. The Council is an important development but it has to be supported and made to work.
    Third, the International Criminal Court , war crimes tribunals, and “hybrid” courts

    Within the last 10 years, we have seen ICC investigations on Sudan and Uganda have dramatically changed the political equation there. remarkable progress in international justice – the establishment of the International Criminal Court, the tribunals for Rwanda and Yugoslavia, which have tried the first genocide cases against top officials, and the hybrid national/international courts in Sierra Leone and Cambodia. But questions have been raised about whether pursuing justice may undermine peace. In cases like Uganda, where the suffering has gone on for two decades, some say that we should not disrupt such hard won peace talks by trying the perpetrators. But peace without justice for the victims is not sustainable or wise.

    Darfur as a test case

    So we have witnessed progress in key areas. But can we prevent genocide?

    The singular biggest test we face is that in Darfur, Sudan.

    The situation on the ground is stark. Since the conflict began in 2003, more than 200,000 people have been killed from fighting, famine, or disease, and over 2.5 million people have been displaced from their homes. As a reminder, just 6 days ago large scale militia attacks in West Darfur on 8 settlements caused scores of civilian deaths, including 27 children under the age of 12.

    With the signing of the Darfur Peace Agreement in May we had a framework for ending the violence and a road map for moving to stability, but not all parties have accepted the Agreement. The Security Council adopted a resolution to send in United Nations peacekeeping troops. This has been rejected by the Sudanese government. We therefore need smart pressure and a global diplomatic campaign. In the meantime, the African Union has done a tremendous job, but it needs to be strengthened. The UN has committed to providing support for the AU mission in Sudan, and we are looking at bolstering that support, but again, contributions depend on Member States.

    Now we have to alter the calculation of potential perpetrators of abuses, and equally importantly, make it much more difficult for governments which decide not to act to prevent genocide.

    The Responsibility to Protect must be put into practice. The role of the Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide could be strengthened. The Human Rights Council, should adopt a country-specific resolution on Darfur as recommended by the Secretary-General that urges the government of Sudan to allow United Nations peacekeepers into Darfur.

    Achieving a lasting peace in Darfur also means bringing those responsible to justice. The Security Council has referred Darfur to the International Criminal Court. The case against the perpetrators is being built as we speak. Action by the International Criminal Court must be supported and seen through.

    Conclusion

    In order to prevent genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity, we still face tremendous challenges. But nothing is inevitable. Genocide is indeed preventable. 60 years ago, we didn’t even have a name for this evil. Now, we not only can name it, we have legal mechanisms obligating all to act to stop it, and increasing experience at trying to stop it. We now have the knowledge, we have the United Nations institution to help organize our response, and the political, economic, and military tools to prevent it. The question is, “Will we use them?”

    Let us work together to do so. Santa Barbara may feel as far from Darfur as a place can be – indeed it is. And yet, you all turned up today to engage on this most difficult of subjects. A crucial first step. Now organize, let your representatives know how you feel. The United States as a country must show leadership. Support United Nations efforts. Place pressure on all national governments to fulfill their obligations. Support the NGOs whose dedicated staff are risking their lives on the front lines.

    Today’s topic was “Who speaks for humanity?” One of my favorite saying is by Pastor Martin Niemöller, a German citizen of conscience who reflected on his experience with genocide in his own country 60 years ago:

    First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.

    So to the question posed today, “Who speaks for Humanity?”, the answer is clear – we do. We must.

    Robert Orr is Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Planning in the Executive Office of the Secretary-General of the United Nations. The speech was given at a United Nations Day event held in Santa Barbara, California on November 4, 2006.
  • 2006 Annual Dinner Speech: World Citizenship Award to Bianca Jagger

    2006 Annual Dinner Speech: World Citizenship Award to Bianca Jagger

    Let me state the obvious: We are living in deeply troubling times. Having learned little from our mistakes in Vietnam, we repeat them in Iraq. Having learned little from the Cuban Missile Crisis, we have moved again to the nuclear precipice. Our cities, our country and civilization itself remain at risk of catastrophic nuclear devastation.

    The North Korean nuclear test did not happen in a vacuum. It happened after continued failures to negotiate in good faith with the North Koreans and after failures of our country to lead in fulfilling our obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It also happened after our government performed 1,054 nuclear tests, and has continued to the present to conduct sub-critical nuclear tests. Current US nuclear policies are leading us in the same direction with Iran, and other countries will follow if we do not change these policies.

    At the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, we are convinced that we cannot trust the future of civilization and humanity itself to political or military leaders. We must bring about change – change in vision and in leadership. Our work is to educate and inspire you and others throughout the world to become the leaders we have been waiting for so that together we can change the barren landscape of nuclear arrogance, threat and absurdity to a beautiful global garden, alive with diversity, which assures a future for our children and all children, including those of Iraq, Iran and North Korea. We will not be safe until all the world’s children are safe, and this cannot happen in a nuclear-armed world.

    In the past week, the Foundation sponsored its third Think Outside the Bomb Conference, bringing together more than 150 young people to learn about nuclear dangers and to develop the tools of leadership that they will need to change the world. I’d like to ask our Youth Empowerment Director, Will Parrish, who organized this conference, to stand and be recognized. Next week Will travels to New York, where he will lead an East Coast Think Outside the Bomb Conference with more than 100 young leaders. Let me also ask the rest of our committed and hardworking staff at the Foundation to stand and be recognized.

    I’ve recently returned from Japan where I participated in the 3rd Nagasaki Global Citizens’ Assembly for the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons. The event was sponsored by the city of Nagasaki, and reflected the desire of the people of Nagasaki to assure that they would remain the last city ever to be destroyed by nuclear weapons.

    At the conference, there was considerable concern expressed about the North Korean nuclear test, which took place very much in the neighborhood of Japan. Rather than seek heavy sanctions on North Korea or push for Japan itself to develop a nuclear force, the desire of the Global Citizens’ Assembly was for the creation of a Northeast Asian Nuclear Weapons Free Zone to include all the countries in the region as well as the nuclear weapons states, such as the United States, with nuclear forces in the region.

    The conference concluded with the adoption of a 15-point Appeal. I’d like to share with you just two points from this Appeal.

    The first point stated: “We strongly proclaim that nuclear weapons are the most barbaric, inhumane and cowardly of weapons, and we call upon the governments of all countries, without exception, to renounce the practice of seeking security through nuclear weapons.”

    The final point of the Appeal stated: “We call upon citizens everywhere to add their voices to those of the Hibakusha [atomic bomb survivors] in calling for the total elimination of nuclear weapons before these weapons destroy our cities, our countries and civilization itself.”

    The survivors of the atomic bombings speak as World Citizens, as does our honoree for our World Citizenship Award tonight.

    A World Citizen recognizes the fundamental unity of humankind, and the increased need to embrace that unity brought about by the dangers of the Nuclear Age. A World Citizen recognizes that our greatest problems can neither be contained nor controlled within national borders. Solving all the great problems of our time – from preserving the environment, to halting global warming, to upholding human rights, to living in peace and preventing war, to ending the nuclear threat to humanity – all of these require global cooperation that must be built on a foundation of World Citizenship.

    Bianca Jagger was born in Nicaragua and witnessed first-hand the terror and brutality of the Somoza regime. Witnessing the greed and injustice of this regime set her on a lifetime path of speaking out and working for the oppressed and dispossessed of the world.

    Ms. Jagger has traveled the world in support of the poor, the infirm and the disadvantaged, those whose lives have been torn apart by war and environmental devastation. Wherever she has gone she has taken a strong and outspoken stand for peace and justice. She has put her life at risk in war-torn countries, and used her celebrity to be a voice for those who would not otherwise be heard or even noticed.

    For her tireless efforts, she has received many awards, including the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the Alternative Nobel Prize. She honors us with her presence this evening, and we are very pleased to present her with the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s 2006 World Citizenship Award.

     

    David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is a leader in the global effort for a world free of nuclear weapons.

  • Helen Caldicott: Credo

    I believe that women have the fate of the Earth in the palm of their hands. Some 53 per cent of us are women and we really are pretty wimpish. We don’t step up to the plate – and it’s time we took over. I think men have had their turn and we’re in a profound mess.

    I believe that money is the root of all evil. When people start believing that materialism will produce ultimate, lasting happiness, it is a sure sign that they will be intensely unhappy. One third of Americans are on anti-depressants. Instead, what they should be doing is lifting their souls, not their faces.

    I believe in the sanctity of nature. I believe we can save the planet. We are smart enough to do that, but we must act with a sense of dire emergency.

    I believe that the media are controlling and determining the face of the Earth. As Thomas Jefferson said, an informed democracy will behave in a responsible fashion.

    I believe in the beauty of classical music. I must have it; it feeds my soul.

    I believe in the goodness in every person’s soul even though it’s sometimes hard to see. I treat a lot of patients where either their children are dying or they are dying. Even though sometimes it’s heavily obscured, in extremes this goodness will emerge.

    I don’t believe in a god. I have helped many people to die and believe that it’s ashes to ashes and dust to dust.

    I believe that heaven and hell are present every day.

    I believe that life is an absolute gift to be treasured accordingly. We are very privileged to even have been conceived.

    I believe that we are here to serve. We are not here to make ourselves happy, to be self-indulgent or to be hedonistic. The happiest state that I achieve is when I work in my clinic helping my children with cystic fibrosis to face death and help to treat them and look after their siblings. I’m utterly exhausted at the end of the day, but deeply, deeply fulfilled.

    I believe in the beauty of my garden. I’ve got two and a half acres and I’m never more in touch with the power of the universe than when I’m in my garden on a warm, sunny day tending to my flowers and my trees, with the pelicans circling overhead.

    I believe that there are far too many people on the planet. In the year 1900 there were one billion of us in the world. Now there are 6.5 billion and the predictions are that within a few decades there will be 14 billion.

    I believe that the greatest terror in the world is not a few terrorists hitting the World Trade Center. It’s the fact that half the world’s people still live in dire poverty and 30,000 to 40,000 children die every day from malnutrition and starvation, while the rich nations continue to get richer and richer.

    I believe that the most important job in the world is parenting. Women need to be financially supported for it. Their job is far more important than that of chief executive officers at the head of huge corporations.

    I believe the secret of happiness is a) serving our fellow human beings and loving and caring for everyone. I don’t mean crappy Californian love; I mean really deep caring for each other; b) to understand our own psychology in a profound way, so we can be a more constructive human being; and c) to care for this incredible planet of ours.

    Helen Caldicott, a pediatrician, is president of the Nuclear Policy Research Institute and author of Nuclear Power Is Not the Answer (The New Press). She lives near Sydney, Australia.

    Originally published by The Independent UK

  • Building Global Peace in the Nuclear Age

    Building Global Peace in the Nuclear Age

    In an age in which the weapons we have created are capable of destroying the human species, what could be more important than building global peace? The Nuclear Age has made peace an imperative. If we fail to achieve and maintain global peace, the future of humanity will remain at risk. This was the view of the preeminent scientists, led by Albert Einstein and Bertrand Russell, who issued the Russell-Einstein Manifesto in 1955. They stated, “Here, then, is the problem which we present to you, stark and dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race; or shall mankind renounce war?” They continued, “People will not face this alternative because it is so difficult to abolish war.”

    With the end of the Cold War, nuclear dangers did not evaporate. Rather, new dangers of nuclear proliferation, terrorism and war emerged, in a climate of public ignorance, apathy and denial. Awakening the public to these dangers and building global peace are the greatest challenges of our time, challenges made necessary by the power and threat of nuclear arsenals.

    Peace is a two-sided coin: it requires ending war as a human institution and controlling and eliminating its most dangerous weapons, but it also requires building justice and ending structural violence. One of the most profound questions of our time is: How can an individual lead a decent life in a society that promotes war and structural violence?

    The answer is that the only way to do this is to be a warrior for peace in all its dimensions. This means to actively oppose society’s thrust toward war and injustice, and to actively support efforts to resolve disputes nonviolently and to promote equity and justice in one’s society and throughout the world. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “The arc of history is long, but it bends toward justice.” We know, though, that it doesn’t bend of its own accord. It bends because people care and take a stand for peace and justice.

    If we are committed to building global peace in the Nuclear Age, we must say an absolute No to war, and we must demonstrate by our words and actions our commitment to peace. We must have confidence that our acts, though the acts of a single person, can and will make a difference. We must understand that we are not alone, although we may be isolated by a corporate media and a sea of indifference. It is our challenge to awaken ourselves, to educate others and to consistently set an example for others by our daily lives. To be fully human is to put our shoulders to the arc of history so that it will bend more swiftly toward the justice and peace that we seek.

    Humanity is now joined, for better or worse, in a common future, and each of us has a role to play in determining that future. Issues of peace and war are far too important to be left only to political leaders. Most political leaders don’t know how to lead for peace. They are caught up in the war system and fear they will lose support if they oppose it. They need to be educated to be peace leaders. Strangely, most political leaders take their lead from the voters, so let’s lead them toward a world at peace.

    If you are an educator, educate for peace. If you are an artist, communicate for peace. If you are a professional, step outside the boundaries of your profession and act like the ordinary human miracle that you really are. If you are an ordinary human miracle, live with the dignity and purpose befitting the miracle of life and stand for peace.

    This will not be easy. There will be times when you will be very discouraged, but you must never give up. You will find that hope and action are intertwined. Hope gives rise to action, as action gives rise to hope. The best and most reliable way to build global peace in the Nuclear Age is to take a step in that direction, no matter how small, and the path will open to you to take a next step and a next. In following this path, your life will be entwined with the lives of people everywhere.

     

    David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is a leader in the global effort for a world free of nuclear weapons.
  • Nuclear Weapon Abolition and Multilateral Negotiations

    Nuclear Weapon Abolition and Multilateral Negotiations

    In the six decades since the beginning of the Nuclear Age, despite the critical need, there have not been multilateral negotiations for nuclear weapons abolition. The closest to achieving such negotiations was the inclusion of Article VI in the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which calls for “negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament….”

    On the basis of NPT Article VI, a 1996 World Court Advisory Opinion unanimously stated, “There exists an obligation to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective international control.” At the 2000 NPT Review Conference, the parties to the treaty agreed to 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament, including “[a]n unequivocal undertaking by the nuclear-weapon States to accomplish the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals leading to nuclear disarmament to which all States parties are committed under Article VI.”

    These are clear directives and commitments to pursue multilateral negotiations for nuclear disarmament, but none have taken place. For ten years the Conference on Disarmament, the international community’s single multilateral negotiating body on disarmament issues, has been blocked by rules of consensus from making any progress.

    Even partial measures aimed at arms control have been blocked or diverted by nuclear weapons states. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), although opened for signatures in 1996, has not entered into force because all nuclear capable states must ratify the treaty for this to happen. As yet, the treaty has not been ratified by the US, China and Israel, and three nuclear weapons states – India, Pakistan and North Korea – have not yet even signed the treaty.

    A Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT) has long been discussed as an important next step on the path to nuclear disarmament, and was included as one of the 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament. In May 2006, the United States tabled a draft FMCT in the Conference on Disarmament, but one that contained no provisions for verification, making it largely meaningless. Nonetheless, it could provide a starting point for negotiations.

    In addition to their failure to negotiate nuclear disarmament in good faith, as called for by the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and by the International Court of Justice, the nuclear weapons states have failed to take nearly all of the other steps called for in the 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament. The US scrapped the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in order to pursue missile defenses, and has failed to proceed with negotiating with Russia a third Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START III). In the bilateral Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT) negotiated by the US and Russia, there are no provisions for transparency, verification or irreversibility as called for in the 13 Practical Steps.

    The failure of the nuclear weapons states to fulfill their obligations was noted in the 2006 report of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, Weapons of Terror. The report stated, “The erosion of confidence in the effectiveness of the NPT to prevent horizontal proliferation has been matched by a loss of confidence in the treaty as a result of the failure of the nuclear-weapon states to fulfill their disarmament obligations under the treaty and also to honour their additional commitments to disarmament made at the 1995 and 2000 NPT Review Conferences.”

    The result of the failure of the NPT nuclear weapons states (US, Russia, UK, France and China) to pursue multilateral negotiations for nuclear weapons abolition has led to the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the potential for even further proliferation. India, Pakistan and Israel, all of which never signed the NPT, have developed nuclear arsenals; and North Korea, which withdrew from the NPT in 2003, has announced its entry into the nuclear weapons club. Some 35 to 40 other countries are nuclear weapons capable and could decide in the future to develop nuclear arsenals.

    Israel does not publicly acknowledge its nuclear arsenal, but it is evident to all parties that they are a nuclear weapons state, and other Middle Eastern countries question why they should accept a second tier nuclear status. Proposals for a Middle East Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone have been consistently rebuffed or ignored by Israel and the US.

    In 1998, India and Pakistan conducted nuclear tests and announced their nuclear weapons capacity to the world. These tests were greeted with elation in both countries, as if they were a badge of honor rather than dishonor. Both countries made clear over a long period of time that they were not prepared to be second class global citizens in a world of nuclear apartheid. Although, the nuclear tests were at first condemned, this condemnation has turned to acceptance. The US now seeks to change its own non-proliferation laws as well as the rules of the Nuclear Suppliers Group in order to provide nuclear technology and materials to India.

    Most recently, North Korea conducted its first nuclear weapons test, raising considerable alarm around the world. The North Korean test carries with it the potential for a dangerous nuclear arms race in Northeast Asia involving North Korea, Japan, South Korea and China. This would create a far more dangerous region and world.

    North Korea’s nuclear test should be setting off loud warning sirens. Instead of looking at their own obligations, however, the nuclear weapons states are only pointing a finger at North Korea, in effect looking only at the symptom and not the root of the problem. The root of the problem is the ongoing possession and reliance on these weapons of mass annihilation by the nuclear weapons states. The Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission stated what should be obvious to all: “So long as any such weapons remain in any state’s arsenal, there is a high risk that they will one day be used, by design or accident. Any such use would be catastrophic.”

    Five countries of Central Asia – Kazakhstan, Krygyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan – recently established a Central Asian Nuclear Weapon Free Zone (CANWFZ) in their region. They became the world’s sixth nuclear weapons-free zone, following Antarctica; Latin America and the Caribbean; the South Pacific; Africa; and Southeast Asia. Unfortunately, the United States has expressed its opposition to this new treaty and is reportedly pressuring the United Nations and other international bodies to withhold their support of the treaty.

    The question that I would pose is this: What is the world to do when the governments of nuclear weapons states act immorally, illegally and dangerously in failing to fulfill their obligations for good faith negotiations to achieve the elimination of nuclear weapons? This question is, of course, not easy to answer. We may seem largely powerless in the face of bad faith by the nuclear weapons states, particularly the United States. It may be difficult to see the way forward, but once we have seen the problem we have no choice but to keep trying.

    I don’t have an answer to this question. I believe it is one we must find together. I have faith that the answer will be found as we move forward, step by step. My fear is that the urgency of the situation does not seem to be recognized widely, and the many efforts that have been made to influence the nuclear weapons states seem to fall on deaf ears.

    I want to encourage us all to appreciate each other on this journey. Each of us who embrace this issue, embraces humanity. I want to express my deep appreciation to the Hibakusha of Nagasaki and Hiroshima and to the cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima for their persistent efforts. And to the Mayors for Peace for their wonderful 2020 Campaign to Ban Nuclear Weapons, as well as to my colleagues throughout the world in Abolition 2000 and the Middle Powers Initiative.

    On the barren landscape of nuclear arrogance and absurdity we must have faith that humans of goodwill will triumph over catastrophically dangerous technologies in the hands of national leaders with proven capacities to act in ways that are foolish, shortsighted and incompetent. That is a leap of faith that we have all taken. We know that we cannot trust the future of the human species to political or military leaders. We must be the leaders we have been waiting for, and we must prevail in awakening humanity to the cause of a nuclear weapons-free future. Despite the odds, we have no choice but to continue and to prevail. Given the clear record of human fallibilities, there is no place for nuclear weapons in our world, and no alternative to our efforts.

     

    David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is a leader in the global effort for a world free of nuclear weapons.

  • We Are Not Powerless

    My father, Judge Blase Bonpane of the Superior Court, died here in Santa Barbara in 1977. He arrived in the United States in 1898, probably without papers, and that is one reason why some people were called WOPS (without papers). Dad went to law school at Ohio Northern University in Ada, Ohio. On January 16, 1914, dad gave the winning oration at the Dr. Albert Edwin Smith Annual Oratorical Contest. The prize money of $50.00 covered his room and board for almost six months.

    The title of my father’s oration was, “The Call of Our Age.” World War I had begun in Europe. There was no League of Nations; there was no United Nations, but the second Hague Conference had been held in the spring of 1907, giving the global hope of making war illegal. World War I crushed that hope. Here are some of dad’s words that cold and snowy evening in Ada, Ohio.

    Public opinion has enacted a law against murder; so should international public opinion demand a law against war, which is merely organized murder. Shall we execute a man for taking a single life, and glorify nations for slaughtering its thousands? To curb crime, to protect justice, police powers are instituted in all realms. Why not go beyond the transitory interest of a nation and establish an international police power? Let the representatives of the world powers meet in one body! Let a world code be compiled! God made humanity one. But man is now divided against himself…through common interest, through common needs, the world must move towards the unity of all its peoples. Let internationalism be our watchword, our aim, our duty. Let us hear the call of our age! Then the “Golden ‘Cestus of Peace” shall clothe all with celestial beauty; and serene, resplendent, on the summit of human achievement shall stand the miraculous spectacle, the congress of nations, with a common purpose of agreeing, not upon military plans, not to foster cruelty and incite other people to carnage, not to bow before the god of battles, but to announce the simple doctrine of peace and brotherhood—our only hope, our only reliance against which all powers of the earth shall not prevail.

    That was January 16, 1914. Dad’s entire oration is found in my book, Common Sense for the Twenty-First Century. On that same date, January 16th, exactly 77 years later, I had just returned from Iraq, my wife Theresa, my son Blase Martin and I were handcuffed and on our bellies on the marble floor of the Los Angeles Federal Building because we blocked the doors of that edifice with scores of other protesters in a massive act of national civil disobedience. Later that day, from holding cells deep in the bowels of the Federal Building, we heard that the bombing of Iraq had begun. Eighty-eight thousand tons of bombs, very dumb bombs, represented the beginning of a war initiated by George Herbert Walker Bush, continued by Bill Clinton and still raging out of control with the current incumbent in the White House. Anyone igniting a one-pound bomb against innocents should be called a terrorist. Just what name do we have for an opening salvo of 88,000 tons of bombs on a civilian population?

    So here we are, nearly a century after my dad’s oration, living in a run-away war system. We are living in the midst of the greatest crisis in history. Our Constitution and Bill of Rights have been placed on hold. There is a plan in place to attack Iran. Actually there are many possible futures. The best of those futures depends on our response to the current crisis.

    The greatest myth in our culture is that we are powerless. I hear that myth frequently, “we are so powerless!” But we are not powerless; we are powerful and every worthwhile change in our society has come from the base, not from the top down. What makes us feel so powerless? Mass commercial media has a large role in this. Television creates a sense of passivity—life going by as a river over which we have no control. But we can transcend that passivity.

    As we hear of wars and rumors of wars we are inclined to ask: what can I do? I certainly will not attempt to tell you what to do, but I can tell you some things that are being done and some things that need to be done. Here in Santa Barbara, as well as in Santa Monica and many other locations, we have the amazing statement of Arlington West on the beach. Markers representing the troops who have died are placed on the beach every Sunday. Respect is shown for the Iraqi dead as well, but the Veterans cannot put up 650,000 markers every Sunday, so they express their respect for the Iraqi dead in a poster (that figure is only the dead from 2003; millions have died since 1991).

    The Veterans are a vanguard of the peace movement. A parade of military people are coming forward and following their conscience. They are refusing to serve. Some have exposed the rampant practice of torture, which now, to our shame, has been codified.

    Let’s not have any parlor games about saving the whole world by torturing someone into telling us where they hid their nuclear bomb. Torture is nothing else but a classic form of terrorism designed to get people to agree with the torturer and to frighten other members of the society into compliance. But justice does not permit exceptionalism. Our hypocrisy rattles the heavens as we chip away at others doing nuclear research, while we have planet-busting nukes ready to fire in all directions.

    No exceptionalism in regard to weapons of mass destruction. No exceptionalism regarding torture. Our dogs and cats are protected. If we should torture one of them the way we torture our “suspected terrorists,” we would be guilty of a felony.

    What is to be done? We need you to volunteer with these Veterans of Arlington West on your beach every Sunday. We need you to support them financially as well. I also want to mention a nuclear vanguard. Sister Ardeth Platte, Sister Carol Gilbert and Sister Jackie Hudson symbolically disarmed weapons of mass destruction by pouring their blood on a nuclear silo in Colorado. Forty-one months in prison for Ardeth Platte, 33 months in prison for Carol Gilbert and 30 months in prison for Jackie Marie Hudson. The vast majority of us may not imitate such acts of heroism by the nuns. But we can be in solidarity with them and so many others like them who are standing up in the face of evil. We can tell their story; the commercial media is certainly not telling it. The commercial media has new and meaningless stories to tell us about the rich and the famous.

    What can we do? Imagination and creativity are required. We can ask the corporate sector to come out against our wars as many did during Vietnam. We can tell our political servants that they do not have a future in politics unless they demand an immediate end to the rape of Iraq. Surely the Congress must become more than a group of clappers who stand around and applaud the president as he fosters organized murder and mayhem.

    Ours is a spiritual quest. The struggle to end nuclearism and war forever is doable. We have the technology and legal structure to outlaw and destroy every nuclear weapon on the planet. We can have a functional peace system, and we have the basis for such a system in the universal declaration of human rights.

    We must demand that our media cover the acts of peacemaking rather than attempting to marginalize or demonize them. Let us live each day as if it were our last; let us do now what we want to be said in our eulogy. If we are retired, let’s get back to work for peace and justice.

    Please bear in mind that we who believe that an international peace system is possible are the realists of our time. On the contrary, it is the militarists, as the title of Bob Woodward’s new book states, who are in a state of denial. These people are not realists. They are living in a fantasy land of unreality. The military of the world at peace is the biggest threat to the global environment. And should militarism and nuclearism prevail, there is no future for life on this planet. So it really makes no difference how much some may love war. They can’t have war and also have the planet.

    We are now in the fifteenth year of the Iraq disaster. We will never be able to count the dead or the myriad of ruined lives of Iraqis and of our young and trusting troops. We have yet to do protests that are proportional to the Holocausts we have created in Korea, Vietnam, Central America, Iraq and Afghanistan. None of our peace actions have been proportional to the evils committed in our name. Actually, war is the most prominent expression of conventional wisdom, and conventional wisdom is a waste of time.

    There is another wisdom which I would call the wisdom of the ages. This is the wisdom that says, happy are you who work for peace, you shall be called the children of god. This is the wisdom of the ages:

    Happy are you who hunger and thirst for justice, you shall be satisfied. Indeed this is the answer to what we can do. Junk the conventional wisdom which surrounds us and live with the wisdom of the ages.

    We must use new and sacred instruments of change in place of the clubs, guns, bombs and nukes of the past—the general strike, the boycott, mass mobilizations, non-cooperation with the war-making machine. These are non-violent instruments of change. And taxation without representation is still tyranny. There is not one thing to do; there are many things to do. As Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero said, “Everyone can do something.”

    Yes, electoral politics is a legitimate place for our peacemaking efforts and so are the plethora of non-governmental organizations such as the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and the Office of the Americas. We must make use of peacemaking efforts in education and recall the mandate of Einstein that we concentrate on creativity and imagination. I fail to see creativity in standardized tests and I certainly don’t want to see any standardized students.

    War is made sacred by the very manner in which young students study our revolution and the endless wars that followed. As we change our way of thinking, we will continue to study the past, but we must make it clear that to repeat the past is to be unfaithful to the past. To be faithful to the past, we must foster change in our static educational practices. The only question to ask after students study a war is, “now tell us how that war could have been avoided.”

    We have become isolated by our militaristic nationalism, but at this time the nation state as the terminus of sovereignty is as outdated as the city states of old. We live on a small planet that is in extreme danger. Various religions have developed by way of anthropology and geography. Corrupt politicians have used and continue to use religion as a cloak for malice. But the ideals in religion are known as the fruits and gifts of the spirit. These are the qualities that will unite the planet as one family. Sectarian, dogmatic and fundamentalist approaches are counterproductive.

    I am a Roman Catholic and served in Guatemala as a Maryknoll priest, but I would have more in common with an atheist working for peace than I would have with a fellow Catholic who happens to be a war monger. The name of our religion or non-religion is really not very meaningful. We are known by the fruits of our labors. Let us join together with like-minded people to create an international community of justice and peace.

     

    Blase Bonpane was the recipient of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s 2006 Distinguished Peace Leadership Award

  • Can We Change Our Thinking?

    Can We Change Our Thinking?

    It is a privilege to return to Nagasaki for this third Global Citizens’ Assembly to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons. I am convinced that it is only by the actions and initiatives of citizens leading leaders that humanity shall bring nuclear weapons, its most deadly invention, under control.

    I want to return to what may seem an old theme, but one that remains critically important. More than fifty years ago, Albert Einstein warned, “The splitting of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking, and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.” I would like to explore what Einstein meant in reference to changing our “modes of thinking.”

    I believe Einstein was referring to humankind’s continued reliance on force as a means of settling differences as the old way of thinking. He believed that in the Nuclear Age reliance on force was pushing us toward catastrophe. Einstein’s warning was a recognition that with the advent of nuclear weapons, the use of force – a long-standing currency in the international system – placed not only countries but civilization and even humanity itself at risk, making force as a means of resolving disputes between nations too dangerous to be acceptable. If we are to move away from reliance on force to resolve conflicts, we must substitute something else in its place. What must take the place of threat or use of force is honest diplomacy, a willingness to engage in continuous dialogue with the goal of resolving even major differences between nations. That was the purpose for which the United Nations was created in June 1945, less than a month before the first test of an atomic weapon by the United States.

    The United Nations sought to “end the scourge of war.” To achieve this, the UN Charter prohibits the use of force except in the limited circumstance of self-defense, and then only until the United Nations can take control of the situation, or when authorized by the Security Council under Chapter VII of the UN Charter.

    Unfortunately, the United Nations has not been very effective in prohibiting the threat or use of force. This is largely due to its structure, which gives special power to the five permanent members of the Security Council. These states can cast a veto on actions that would subject their behavior to appropriate scrutiny and control. Despite the bold opening words of the UN Charter, “We, the Peoples,” the UN is not a Peoples Parliament. Rather, it is a club of nation-states, and its most powerful members play by a different set of rules than do the other members.

    The United Nations has been used cynically by the most powerful states to gain advantage rather than to seriously engage in problem solving about the world’s most pressing dangers. If we wish to move toward non-violent solutions to conflict, we must reform and strengthen the United Nations to truly become a House of Dialogue and a Parliament of Humanity.

    One aspect of changed thinking that is needed is recognition of the importance of citizen participation in efforts to change the world. The world’s problems are too grave and dangerous to be left to governments without the active participation of citizens. Citizens must take responsibility for the actions of their governments as if their very lives depended upon those actions, as indeed they do. In the Nuclear Age, the actions of nuclear-armed states affect the future of all citizens on the planet. If citizens remain ignorant, apathetic and in denial, it is likely that governments will blunder into wars, inevitably including nuclear war.

    Another aspect of the changed thinking that is needed is the disassociation of nuclear weapons with security both as a concept and as a national policy. Nuclear weapons do not make a country more secure. These weapons can be used to threaten retaliation, but they cannot provide actual physical security. Deterrence is a theory that requires rationality on all sides and effective communications. If there is one thing we know about humans, especially in the context of crises, they are not always rational and they do not communicate perfectly. This was one of the important findings of the meetings of key decision makers in the Cuban Missile Crisis. They came to understand that many of the assumptions they had made about the other participants in the crisis were incorrect and they were very fortunate to have averted nuclear war.

    Still another aspect of thinking in which change is needed is the complacency of the rich within the two-tier structure of rich and poor nations. It is unlikely that wars will be eliminated while the economic divide is great and many people in the world live in deep poverty with all its disadvantages, while a minority lives in superabundance. Modern communications make the have-nots aware of what goes on behind the high walls of the rich, exacerbating the tensions.

    This two-tier structure of rich and poor nations is also mirrored in our world of nuclear haves and have-nots. The world cannot go on indefinitely with bastions of the rich thinking they are protected by nuclear and other arms, while the majority of the world’s population lives in abject poverty. Nor can the world safely continue to be divided along religious and ideological fault lines.

    Nuclear weapons, like other weapons, are part of the currency of power in a divided world. If there were widespread recognition of the essential oneness of humanity and the miracle of life that all humans share, it would be far more difficult to justify resort to arms and, in particular, to continue to threaten the indiscriminate mass destruction that is inherent in the use of nuclear weapons.

    David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is a leader in the global effort for a world free of nuclear weapons.

  • Is There A Reason To Be Concerned About War With Iran?

    The short answer is YES! A more complete answer becomes visible when we look at recent war signals. For insights on how war can be prevented, it is helpful to go back in history to when the governments of the US and Iran were the best of friends.

    As the US war propaganda intensifies, I sometimes wonder what Iran and the Middle East would look like today if the CIA did not overthrow Iran’s democratic government in 1953?

    A Timeline Worth Remembering

    — 1950s & 1960s — In 1951, US and Iranian relations were so good that Mohammad Mossadeq was named Time magazine’s Man of the Year. To show his admiration of America’s democracy, Mossadeq made a high-profile trip to the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia. In 1953, the US and Britain illegally overthrew Iran’s democratically elected government because Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq interfered with US and British oil interests. In 1967, Mossadeq died after many years of living under house arrest. Mossadeq’s comment on his arrest was “My only crime is that I nationalized the oil industry and removed from this land the network of colonialism and the political and economic influence of the greatest empire on Earth.”

    — 1970s — In 1973, the US offered Israel a defense treaty after the Yom Kippur war. Israel rejected this offer because Israel would have to define its boundaries. Contrary to incorrect statements by President Bush, there is no defense treaty between the US and Israel. Why does President Bush now continue to say that the US has a defense alliance with Israel? In 1976 Chief of Staff Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld persuaded President Gerald Ford to approve offering Iran nuclear reprocessing facilities. Cheney and Rumsfeld stated that Iran needed a nuclear program to meet future energy requirements which is what Iranian officials are saying today. In 1979 US embassy personnel in Iran were held captive for 444 days and the Islamic revolution changed the balance of power in the Middle East. Iran’s current President Ahmadinejad was a leader of the student group that stormed the embassy.

    — 1980s — In 1980, Iraq attacked Iran. The US initially provided weapons to Iraq but eventually sold weapons to both sides. Iraq ended up spending more on weapons than it earned from oil sales. The war ended in 1988. In 1980, President Reagan’s campaign manager and future CIA Director, William Casey, made a deal with Iran’s leadership to delay the release of the US embassy personnel until a few hours after President Jimmy Carter leaves office. For compensation, President Reagan arranged for Iran to receive $4 billion dollars and a letter stating the US would never attack Iran. Since the 1980s Iran has had anthrax and other weapons of mass destruction. In 1981, Israel destroyed the Iraqi Osirak nuclear facility. Israel’s attack, against international law, motivated Iran to disperse, bury and harden its nuclear facilities. Between 1984 and 1988, Iraqi air attacks damaged Iran’s Bushehr nuclear facility. In 1986, Pakistan began helping Iran develop nuclear weapons. Abdul Qadeer Khan transfers over 2000 components and by 1995, P-2 centrifuge components are transferred to Iran. In 1987 and 1988 US forces secretly attacked Iranian forces, including strikes on Gulf oil platforms. In 1988 the US cruiser Vincennes mistakenly shot down an Iranian commercial plane and 290 people are killed.

    — 1990s – In 1995, Russia resumed work on the Bushehr nuclear facility. In 1996, China sold Iran a conversion plant and provided the gas needed to test the uranium enrichment process. In 1997, the Project For A New American Century, authored by Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and other neo-cons now in power, calls for preemptive attacks so that the US will remain the dominant power in the new century. A cornerstone of the strategy is to keep a rising China subordinate by denying access to resources in Central Asia and the Middle East.

    — 2000 to 2002 — Sep 2001: Pakistan’s Khan network and assistance to Iran is shut down after the US threatens to nuke Pakistan and bring it back to the stone age. Jan 2002: President Bush, in his State of the Union address, described Iran, Iraq and North Korea as an “axis of evil”. Aug 2002: Iranian dissident, Alireza Jafarzadeh, revealed two previously undeclared nuclear sites: a uranium enrichment facility in Natanz and a heavy water facility in Arak.

    — 2003 — Mar: The US illegally invaded Iraq. Aug: A confidential UN report revealed that Iran has developed two kinds of enriched uranium that are not needed for peaceful energy production. Dec: US sent humanitarian aid to Iran after earthquake kills up to 50,000 people in city of Bam. Dec or earlier: President Bush had the 1980 document stating the US will not attack Iran nullified because it was signed under duress.

    — 2004 — Jun: The International Atomic Energy Agency claims to have found new traces of enriched uranium that exceeded the levels necessary for civilian energy production. Jul: Iran admited to having resumed production of parts for centrifuges that are used for enriching uranium, but insists that it has not resumed its enrichment activities. Sep: Iran refused to accept an unlimited suspension of uranium enrichment and says it will not stop manufacturing centrifuges. Sep: To facilitate military operations in Iran, the U.S. sent 4,500 smart bombs to Israel and built a staging base in Afghanistan near its border with Iran. Oct: The Iranian parliament passed a bill approving resumption of enrichment activities. Dec or earlier: Israel built a model of Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility to practice attacks on the facility.

    — 2005 — Jan: Iran’s Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani indicated that Iran has a nuclear bomb. Shamkhani said, “we have rapidly produced equipment that has resulted in the greatest deterrent.” Feb: The book American Hiroshima is published and warns the US will attack Iran’s nuclear facilities and this will lead to Iran’s Qods Force attacking US nuclear facilities. Feb: The inner cabinet of Ariel Sharon, at his private ranch in the Negev desert, gave “initial authorization” to attack Iran. They agreed to coordinate the attack with the most supportive US administration since Israel was created in 1948. Feb: Iranian Information Minister Ali Yunessi confirmed that US spy planes have been spotted in Iran. The objective of these spy missions is to identify approximately 36 nuclear weapons-related targets that can be destroyed by an Israeli or US surprise attack. Feb: North Korea, secretly collaborated with Iran. North Korea declared it has nuclear weapons. Aug: President Bush made the first of several statements in which he refused to rule out using force against Iran.

    — 2006 — Feb to present: The war propaganda, direct from the playbook of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, is repeated daily. The “battlefield of public perception” is prepared for war with statements from Donald Rumsfeld that Iran is the “world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism.” Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist repeated the mantra “we cannot allow Iran to become a nuclear nation.” Richard Perle said “If we just let our vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely and we don’t try to piece together clever diplomacy, but just wage a total war … our children will sing great songs about us years from now.” We also see Iran’s President repeatedly misquoted (e.g., he is quoted as saying military force should be used to wipe Israel off the map when President Ahmadinejad’s actual statement never used the words “wipe” or “off the map”). Feb: President Bush was asked if the United States would rise to Israel’s defense militarily, he said: “You bet, we’ll defend Israel.” Mar: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says the US faces “no greater challenge” than Iran’s nuclear program. Apr: A report by Seymour M. Hersh in the New Yorker warns the US is planning a tactical nuclear strike against Iran. Apr: The Washington Post reports the US is studying military strike options on Iran. Apr: The Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported Iran’s military response to an attack is called Operation Judgment Day. May: President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sends a letter to President Bush proposing new and peaceful solutions to their differences. This is the first communication between Iranian and US leaders in 27 years. May: The Physicians for Social Responsibility publish a report titled “Medical Consequences of a Nuclear Attack on Iran.” The report illuminates that millions of lives will be lost if the US attacks Iran. Jul & Aug: Israel responds to the kidnapping of soldiers with war. This is seen by many as an attempt to draw Iran into a direct conflict with Israel. As a result of Israel’s attack, Hamas and Hezbollah “near” enemies are subsequently less able to inflict harm on Israel when the “far” enemy of Iran is attacked. Aug: Former Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence Chief, Maj. Gen (R) Hameed Gul “predicted” that America will attack Iran and Syria simultaneously in October. Aug: War propaganda continues to ramp up with Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney, and other prominent proponents for attacking Iran, stating Iran is 5 to 10 years away from having a bomb. The public is “sold” this ridiculous piece of information, especially given Pakistan’s previous direct assistance, to minimize concerns about what Iran can do to retaliate. In addition, as media commentators increasingly demand America attack Iran, there is no mention of Iran’s existing chemical and biological weapons. Aug: Iran started the “Blow of Zolfaqar” military exercise in the Persian Gulf. Aug: Iran rejected the US led UN Security Council offer to stop uranium enrichment. Aug: Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is interviewed by Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes and calls for peaceful dialogue. He subsequently offers to debate with President Bush. The White House rejects the offer. Sep: Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), “asked for fresh eyes” to review the existing U.S. plans to blockade two Iranian oil ports on the Persian Gulf. Sep: The Pentagon announced the extension of overseas assignments for US soldiers. Oct: A major naval strike force carrying nuclear weapons received surprise “prepare to deploy” orders to depart for the Persian Gulf. Oct: North Korea sees the US as preoccupied with attacking Iran and conducted a nuclear test. The US media ignores North Korea’s 2005 public announcement that it had nuclear weapons to reinforce the fiction that a new rogue state has become a nuclear power stressing the message “this is what happens if we don’t strike Iran.” Oct: Ayatollah Ali Khamenei held an AK 47 on October 13 to symbolized Iran’s readiness to repel an Israeli and US attack. Oct: The Defense Department started mandatory anthrax immunizations. Oct: Iran’s military forces are deployed to battle positions as the Eisenhower naval strike force entered the Persian Gulf. Oct: Respected US whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg warns the US is planning to attack Iran with H-bombs. An H-bomb, also known as thermonuclear bomb, can be over one thousand times more powerful than an atomic bomb. Oct: According to Muslim tradition, the “Night of Determination” (10/26-10/27) is when Allah determines the fate of the world for the coming year. An Operations Northwoods (i.e., a self-inflicted attack so that Americans will support attacking Iran) event increasingly appears likely, especially with US elections taking place in November.

    If The US Attacks Iran, What Happens? On April 27, 2006 the Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported Iran’s military response to a US and Israeli attack is a plan called Operation Judgment Day.

    The attack has several components. The final component is the American Hiroshima attack.

    1. A missile strike directly targeting the US military bases in the Persian Gulf and Iraq, as soon as Iranian nuclear installations are hit.
    2. Suicide operations in a number of Arab and Muslim countries against the US and US allies.
    3. Stepped up attacks by the Basij, the Revolutionary Guards and Iraqi fighters loyal to Iran against US and British forces in Iraq.
    4. Hezbollah launches hundreds of rockets against military and economic targets in Israel.

    The final Judgment Day component is for Iran to give the al Qods Brigades the go-ahead for more than 50 terrorists cells in Canada, the US, and Europe to attack civil and industrial targets in these countries. This could lead to an American/global Hiroshima attack to maximize civilian casualties by attacking nuclear and chemical facilities.

    Is component 1 why the anthrax vaccinations of US military personnel started in October? Components 2 and 3 are already happening. Israel attempted to minimize component 4 with the July and August war with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

    A detailed explanation of why this is happening and how it can be prevented is the subject of the American Hiroshima book.

    While War With Iran Is On The Horizon – Choose Hope! Iran may or may not have developed the “greatest deterrent.” In the 1960s, it was unknown to US intelligence that the Soviet Union had almost 100 nuclear weapons in Cuba at the time of the 1962 missile crisis. Regardless of Iran’s status as a nuclear weapons power, Iran’s Qods Force has been capable of attacking US nuclear power facilities for over a decade. Therefore, the issue is really not Iran’s nuclear program but how can we return to the friendship that existed in 1951?

    A first step would be for President Bush to acknowledge that the US was wrong to overthrow Iran’s democratically elected government in 1953. Regardless of what President Bush elects to do, we must choose hope and work to prevent war. History has shown us that a peaceful future is possible. In 1962 the US and the Soviet Union were on the brink of nuclear war and yet the Cuban Missile Crisis was solved without war.

    As Martin Luther King, Jr. said “We still have a choice today: nonviolent co-existence or violent co-annihilation. History will record the choice we made. It is still not too late to make the proper choice. If we decide to become a moral power we will be able to transform the jangling discords of this world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. If we make the wise decision we will be able to transform our pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of peace. This will be a glorious day. In reaching it, we can fulfill the noblest of American dreams.”

    Americans bear a special responsibility for preventing war with Iran. I challenge my fellow citizens and people around the world to work to save lives in the Middle East and around the world. When we accept our share of the responsibility for a better world, everyone will be more secure. Please share this information with your political leaders. Please take action now so that we can create a groundswell for peace that is too powerful to be set aside.

     

    David Dionisi is the author of American Hiroshima, the Northern California Representative for the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and the National Awareness Officer for Freedom From War.

  • North Korea’s Nuclear Test: Turning Crisis into Opportunity

    David KriegerThe North Korean nuclear test will surely be viewed as one of the major foreign policy failures of the Bush administration. There were many warnings from North Korea that this test was coming. As far back as 1993, North Korea announced that it would leave the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but later suspended its withdrawal. The Clinton administration tried to resolve the issue by working out a deal with North Korea to give them two nuclear power plants in exchange for North Korea freezing and eventually dismantling its nuclear weapons program.

    When the Bush administration came into office, however, it scrapped the deal worked out by the Clinton administration and began talking tough to North Korea. In 2001, Mr. Bush told North Korea that it would be “held accountable” if it develops weapons of mass destruction. In his State of the Union Address the following year, Mr. Bush labeled North Korea as part of the Axis of Evil, along with Iraq and Iran.

    North Korea all along was asking Washington to meet with them in one-to-one discussions, and made clear that their objectives were to receive security assurances, including normalizing post-Korean War relations with the US, and development assistance. The Bush administration opted instead for six-party talks that also included China, Japan, South Korea and Russia, but not before the North Koreans had withdrawn from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003.

    To gain perspective on the North Korean nuclear test on October 9th, a global overview is helpful. Globally, there have been more than 2,000 nuclear tests since the inception of the Nuclear Age. The United States has conducted 1054 nuclear weapons tests, including 331 atmospheric tests. India and Pakistan joined the nuclear club in 1998 with multiple nuclear tests, and received much international condemnation. Today, however, the Bush administration wants to change the US non-proliferation laws as well as international agreements in order to provide India with nuclear technology and materials. The Bush administration is also silent on Israel’s nuclear arsenal.

    Clearly, the Bush administration does not treat nuclear weapons as the problem, but rather specific regimes that might possess them – acceptable for some countries, but not for others. In adopting this posture, the US promotes an untenable nuclear double standard. Countries like North Korea and Iran, having been branded as part of the “Axis of Evil” and having seen what happened to the regime in Iraq at the hands of the US, are encouraged to develop nuclear weapons if only to prevent US aggression against them.

    Mr. Bush has condemned the North Korean test as a “provocative act,” but stated that “[t]he United States remains committed to diplomacy.” If the North Korean test is taken as a significant warning sign of the potential for increased nuclear proliferation and increased danger to humanity that can only be countered by diplomacy, the crisis could be turned to opportunity.

    Three steps need to be urgently undertaken to reduce nuclear dangers in the aftermath of the North Korean test. First, the United States should engage in direct negotiations with North Korea to achieve a nuclear weapons-free Korean Peninsula in exchange for US security assurances and development assistance to North Korea. Second, the countries of Northeast Asia, along with the nuclear weapons states with a presence in the region, need to negotiate the creation of a Northeast Asia Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone, prohibiting all nuclear weapons in the region. This treaty would be a reasonable outcome of the Six-Nation Nuclear Talks between North Korea, South Korea, Japan, China, Russia and the US that have been going on since 2003. Third, the United Nations should convene a Global Conference for Nuclear Disarmament to negotiate a treaty for the phased and verifiable elimination of all nuclear weapons as required under international law.

    Whether or not such steps are taken will depend almost entirely on US leadership. If they are not taken, we can anticipate a deepening nuclear crisis on the Korean Peninsula, in Northeast Asia and throughout the world. If they are taken, we could emerge from this crisis in a far better position to end the nuclear threat that is the greatest terror faced by our nation and the world.

    David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is a leader in the global effort for a world free of nuclear weapons.