Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

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  • Stopping a Rogue Superpower: Time Is Running Out

    Stopping a Rogue Superpower: Time Is Running Out

    “If another country were planning to develop a new nuclear weapon and contemplating preemptive strikes against a list of non-nuclear powers, Washington would rightly label that nation a dangerous rogue state.”
    — New York Time Editorial, March 12, 2002

    In April the parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the world’s most important international agreement to achieve non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament, will meet at the United Nations to review progress toward achieving the goals of the Treaty. They will undoubtedly conclude that the Treaty stands in peril, as do the people of the world, due to the failure of the nuclear weapons states to fulfill their obligations under the Treaty to achieve progress on nuclear disarmament. This failure has been driven by the actions of the world’s only superpower.

    The United States has acted in defiance of the international community in flagrantly failing to fulfill its promises and in actions undermining nuclear arms control treaties. The United States, under its current administration, has taken the following actions in direct opposition to the 13 Practical Steps for Nuclear Disarmament agreed to by all parties to the Non-Proliferation Treaty at the 2000 NPT Review Conference:

    • given notice of its intention to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in order to unilaterally pursue missile defenses and the weaponization of outer space;
    • failed to ratify and promote the entry into force of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and made plans to shorten the time needed to resume underground nuclear testing;
    • developed contingency plans to use nuclear weapons against at least seven countries, five of which are non-nuclear weapons states that are parties to the NPT, in direct contradiction to long-standing security assurances given to countries without nuclear weapons;
    • made nuclear war more likely by making plans to use nuclear weapons for specific purposes, such as bunker busting or destroying chemical or biological weapons stockpiles, and by developing smaller, more useable nuclear weapons; and
    • made nuclear “disarmament” easily reversible by implementing policies that place deactivated nuclear warheads in storage rather than destroying them.

    Taken together, these polices demonstrate a clear failure to pursue the “unequivocal undertaking” to achieve nuclear disarmament that was agreed to at the 2000 NPT Review Conference. Rather, these unilateral policies threaten the entire non-proliferation regime and raise the specter of nuclear war.Time is running out, and what is at stake is the future of humanity and all life. The nations and people of the world are challenged to stop a “rogue” superpower, uphold the Non-Proliferation Treaty and fulfill the goal of nuclear disarmament before disaster strikes.
    *David Krieger is president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • Peace and Nuclear Disarmament: A Call to Action

    Speech by Dennis Kucinich

    “. . . Come my friends, ’tis not too late to seek a newer world,” . . . Alfred Lord Tennyson

    If you believe that humanity has a higher destiny, if you believe we can evolve, and become better than we are; if you believe we can overcome the scourge of war and someday fulfill the dream of harmony and peace on earth, let us begin the conversation today. Let us exchange our ideas. Let us plan together, act together and create peace together. This is a call for common sense, for peaceful, non-violent citizen action to protect our precious world from widening war and from stumbling into a nuclear catastrophe.

    The climate for conflict has intensified, with the struggle between Pakistan and India, the China-Taiwan tug of war, and the increased bloodshed between Israel and the Palestinians. United States’ troop deployments in the Philippines, Yemen, Georgia, Columbia and Indonesia create new possibilities for expanded war. An invasion of Iraq is planned. The recent disclosure that Russia, China, Iraq, Iran, Syria, North Korea, and Libya are considered by the United States as possible targets for nuclear attack catalyzes potential conflicts everywhere.

    These crucial political decisions promoting increased military actions, plus a new nuclear first-use policy, are occurring without the consent of the American people, without public debate, without public hearings, without public votes. The President is taking Congress’s approval of responding to the Sept. 11 terrorists as a license to flirt with nuclear war.

    “Politics ought to stay out of fighting a war,” the President has been quoted as saying on March 13th 2002. Yet Article 1, Section 8 of the United States Constitution explicitly requires that Congress take responsibility when it comes to declaring war. This President is very popular, according to the polls. But polls are not a substitute for democratic process. Attributing a negative connotation here to politics or dismissing constitutionally mandated congressional oversight belies reality: Spending $400 billion a year for defense is a political decision. Committing troops abroad is a political decision. War is a political decision. When men and women die on the battlefield that is the result of a political decision. The use of nuclear weapons, which can end the lives of millions, is a profound political decision. In a monarchy there need be no political decisions. In a democracy, all decisions are political, in that they derive from the consent of the governed.

    In a democracy, budgetary, military and national objectives must be subordinate to the political process. Before we celebrate an imperial presidency, let it be said that the lack of free and open political process, the lack of free and open political debate, and the lack of free and open political dissent can be fatal in a democracy.

    We have reached a moment in our country’s history where it is urgent that people everywhere speak out as president of his or her own life, to protect the peace of the nation and world within and without. We should speak out and caution leaders who generate fear through talk of the endless war or the final conflict. We should appeal to our leaders to consider that their own bellicose thoughts, words and deeds are reshaping consciousness and can have an adverse effect on our nation. Because when one person thinks: fight! he or she finds a fight. One faction thinks: war! and starts a war. One nation thinks: nuclear! and approaches the abyss. And what of one nation which thinks peace, and seeks peace?

    Neither individuals nor nations exist in a vacuum, which is why we have a serious responsibility for each other in this world. It is also urgent that we find those places of war in our own lives, and begin healing the world through healing ourselves. Each of us is a citizen of a common planet, bound to a common destiny. So connected are we, that each of us has the power to be the eyes of the world, the voice of the world, the conscience of the world, or the end of the world. And as each one of us chooses, so becomes the world.

    Each of us is architect of this world. Our thoughts, the concepts. Our words, the designs. Our deeds, the bricks and mortar of our daily lives. Which is why we should always take care to regard the power of our thoughts and words, and the commands they send into action through time and space.

    Some of our leaders have been thinking and talking about nuclear war. In the past week there has been much news about a planning document which describes how and when America might wage nuclear war. The Nuclear Posture Review recently released to the media by the government:

    1. Assumes that the United States has the right to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike.
    2. Equates nuclear weapons with conventional weapons.
    3. Attempts to minimize the consequences of the use of nuclear weapons.
    4. Promotes nuclear response to a chemical or biological attack.

    Some dismiss this review as routine government planning. But it becomes ominous when taken in the context of a war on terrorism which keeps expanding its boundaries, rhetorically and literally. The President equates the “war on terrorism” with World War II. He expresses a desire to have the nuclear option “on the table.” He unilaterally withdraws from the ABM treaty. He seeks $8.9 billion to fund deployment of a missile shield. He institutes, without congressional knowledge, a shadow government in a bunker outside our nation’s Capitol. He tries to pass off as arms reduction, the storage of, instead of the elimination of, nuclear weapons.

    Two generations ago we lived with nuclear nightmares. We feared and hated the Russians who feared and hated us. We feared and hated the “godless, atheistic” communists. In our schools, we dutifully put our head between our legs and practiced duck-and-cover drills. In our nightmares, we saw the long, slow arc of a Soviet missile flash into our very neighborhood. We got down on our knees and prayed for peace. We surveyed, wide eyed, pictures of the destruction of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. We supported the elimination of all nuclear weapons. We knew that if you “nuked” others you “nuked” yourself.

    The splitting of the atom for destructive purposes admits a split consciousness, the compartmentalized thinking of Us vs. Them, the dichotomized thinking, which spawns polarity and leads to war. The proposed use of nuclear weapons, pollutes the psyche with the arrogance of infinite power. It creates delusions of domination of matter and space. It is dehumanizing through its calculations of mass casualties. We must overcome doomthinkers and sayers who invite a world descending, disintegrating into a nuclear disaster. With a world at risk, we must find the bombs in our own lives and disarm them. We must listen to that quiet inner voice which counsels that the survival of all is achieved through the unity of all.

    We must overcome our fear of each other, by seeking out the humanity within each of us. The human heart contains every possibility of race, creed, language, religion, and politics. We are one in our commonalities. Must we always fear our differences? We can overcome our fears by not feeding our fears with more war and nuclear confrontations. We must ask our leaders to unify us in courage.

    We need to create a new, clear vision of a world as one. A new, clear vision of people working out their differences peacefully. A new, clear vision with the teaching of nonviolence, nonviolent intervention, and mediation. A new, clear vision where people can live in harmony within their families, their communities and within themselves. A new clear vision of peaceful coexistence in a world of tolerance.

    At this moment of peril we must move away from fear’s paralysis. This is a call to action: to replace expanded war with expanded peace. This is a call for action to place the very survival of this planet on the agenda of all people, everywhere. As citizens of a common planet, we have an obligation to ourselves and our posterity. We must demand that our nation and all nations put down the nuclear sword. We must demand that our nation and all nations:

    Abide by the principles of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
    Stop the development of new nuclear weapons.
    Take all nuclear weapons systems off alert.
    Persist towards total, worldwide elimination of all nuclear weapons.

    Our nation must:
    Revive the Anti Ballistic Missile treaty.
    Sign and enforce the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
    Abandon plans to build a so-called missile shield.
    Prohibit the introduction of weapons into outer space.

    We are in a climate where people expect debate within our two party system to produce policy alternatives. However both major political parties have fallen short. People who ask “Where is the Democratic Party?” and expect to hear debate may be disappointed. When peace is not on the agenda of our political parties or our governments then it must be the work and the duty of each citizen of the world. This is the time to organize for peace. This is the time for new thinking. This is the time to concieve of peace as not simply being the absence of violence, but the active presence of the capacity for a higher evolution of human awareness. This is the time to concieve of peace as respect, trust, and integrity. This is the time to tap the infinite capabilities of humanity to transform consciousness which compels violence at a personal, group, national or international levels. This is the time to develop a new compassion for others and ourselves.

    When terrorists threaten our security, we must enforce the law and bring terrorists to justice within our system of constitutional justice, without undermining the very civil liberties which permits our democracy to breathe. Our own instinct for life, which inspires our breath and informs our pulse, excites our capacity to reason. Which is why we must pay attention when we sense a threat to survival.

    That is why we must speak out now to protect this nation, all nations, and the entire planet and:
    Challenge those who believe that war is inevitable.
    Challenge those who believe in a nuclear right.
    Challenge those who would build new nuclear weapons.
    Challenge those who seek nuclear re-armament.
    Challenge those who seek nuclear escalation.
    Challenge those who would make of any nation a nuclear target.
    Challenge those who would threaten to use nuclear weapons against civilian populations.
    Challenge those who would break nuclear treaties.
    Challenge those who think and think about nuclear weapons, to think about peace.

    It is practical to work for peace. I speak of peace and diplomacy not just for the sake of peace itself. But, for practical reasons, we must work for peace as a means of achieving permanent security. It is similarly practical to work for total nuclear disarmament, particularly when nuclear arms do not even come close to addressing the real security problems which confront our nation, witness the events of September 11, 2001.

    We can make war archaic. Skeptics may dismiss the possibility that a nation which spends $400 billion a year for military purposes can somehow convert swords into plowshares. Yet the very founding and the history of this country demonstrates the creative possibilities of America. We are a nation which is known for realizing impossible dreams. Ours is a nation which in its second century abolished slavery, which many at the time considered impossible. Ours is a nation where women won the right to vote, which many at the time considered impossible. Ours is a nation which institutionalized the civil rights movement, which many at the time considered impossible. If we have the courage to claim peace, with the passion, the emotion and the integrity with which we have claimed independence, freedom and, equality we can become that nation which makes non-violence an organizing principle in our society, and in doing so change the world.

    That is the purpose of HR 2459. It is a bill to create a Department of Peace. It envisions new structures to help create peace in our homes, in our families, in our schools, in our neighborhoods, in our cities, and in our nation. It aspires to create conditions for peace within and to create conditions for peace worldwide. It considers the conditions which cause people to become the terrorists of the future, issues of poverty, scarcity and exploitation. It is practical to make outer space safe from weapons, so that humanity can continue to pursue a destiny among the stars. HR 3616 seeks to ban weapons in space, to keep the stars a place of dreams, of new possibilities, of transcendence.

    We can achieve this practical vision of peace, if we are ready to work for it.
    People worldwide need to be meet with likeminded people, about peace and nuclear disarmament, now.
    People worldwide need to gather in peace, now.
    People worldwide need to march and to pray for peace, now.
    People worldwide need to be connecting with each other on the web, for peace, now.

    We are in a new era of electronic democracy, where the world wide web, numerous web sites and bulletin boards enable new organizations, exercising freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of association, to spring into being instantly. Thespiritoffreedom.com is such a web site. It is dedicated to becoming an electronic forum for peace, for sustainability, for renewal and for revitalization. It is a forum which strives for the restoration of a sense of community through the empowerment of self, through commitment of self to the lives of others, to the life of the community, to the life of the nation, to the life of the world.

    Where war making is profoundly uncreative in its destruction, peacemaking can be deeply creative. We need to communicate with each other the ways in which we work in our communities to make this a more peaceful world. I welcome your ideas at dkucinich@aol.com or at www.thespiritoffreedom.com. We can share our thoughts and discuss ways in which we have brought or will bring them into action.

    Now is the time to think, to take action and use our talents and abilities to create peace:
    in our families.
    in our block clubs.
    in our neighborhoods.
    in our places of worship.
    in our schools and universities.
    in our labor halls.
    in our parent-teacher organizations.

    Now is the time to think, speak, write, organize and take action to create peace as a social imperative, as an economic imperative, and as a political imperative. Now is the time to think, speak, write, organize, march, rally, hold vigils and take other nonviolent action to create peace in our cities, in our nation and in the world. And as the hymn says, “Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me.”

    This is the work of the human family, of people all over the world demanding that governments and non-governmental actors alike put down their nuclear weapons. This is the work of the human family, responding in this moment of crisis to protect our nation, this planet and all life within it. We can achieve both nuclear disarmament and peace. As we understand that all people of the world are interconnected, we can achieve both nuclear disarmament and peace. We can accomplish this through upholding an holistic vision where the claims of all living beings to the right of survival are recognized. We can achieve both nuclear disarmament and peace through being a living testament to a Human Rights Covenant where each person on this planet is entitled to a life where he or she may consciously evolve in mind, body and spirit.

    Nuclear disarmament and peace are the signposts toward the uplit path of an even brighter human condition wherein we can through our conscious efforts evolve and reestablish the context of our existence from peril to peace, from revolution to evolution. Think peace. Speak peace. Act peace. Peace.

  • Global Military Expenditures 2002

    Global military expenditures currently exceed $800 billion.

    The top military spenders are:

    United States $343.2 Billion
    Russia* $60
    China* $42
    Japan $40.4
    United Kingdom $34
    Saudi Arabia $27.2
    France $25.3
    Germany $21
    Brazil $17.9
    India $15.6
    Italy $15.5
    South Korea $11.8

    *Based on 2000 funding (most recent year available)

    Global Priorities

    For approximately 30% of Annual World Military Expenditures (~$810 billion), all of the following could be accomplished***:
    o Eliminate Starvation and Malnutrition ($19 billion)
    o Provide Shelter ($21 billion)
    o Remove Landmines ($4 billion)
    o Build Democracy ($3 billion)
    o Eliminate Nuclear Weapons ($7 billion)
    o Refugee Relief ($5 billion)
    o Eliminate Illiteracy ($5 billion)
    o Provide Clean, Safe Water ($10 billion)
    o Provide Health Care and AIDS Control ($21 billion)
    o Stop Deforestation ($7 billion)
    o Prevent Global Warming ($8 billion)
    o Stabilize Population ($10.5 billion)
    o Prevent Acid Rain ($8 billion)
    o Provide Clean, Safe Energy: Energy Efficiency ($33 billion), Renewable Energy
    ($17 billion)
    o Stop Ozone Depletion ($5 billion)
    o Prevent Soil Erosion ($24 billion)
    o Retire Developing Nations Debt ($30 billion)

    ***For more information, please visit: http://www.worldgame.org

    sources: Center for Defense Information, Council for a Livable World, International Institute for Strategic Studies, US State Department, US Central Intelligence Agency

  • The Message of the Sunflowers: A Magic Symbol of Peace

    Dedicated to the Children of the World Who Will Sow the Sunflower Seeds of Peace

    Once upon a time the earth was even more beautiful than it is today. The water was pure and deep, reflecting within itself the sunlight which gave life to all the creatures beneath the waves.

    The earth was green with many kinds of trees and plants. These gave food and shelter to the birds, the animals, and to all mankind. At night the air was so clear that the starlight gave a glow almost as bright as the moon.

    The people of the earth lived close to nature. They understood it and honored it and never took more than what they needed from it. The people lived in peace so they prospered and began to build many nations all around the world according to nature’s climate.

    But one day, a terrible thing happened. A strange spirit of greed entered the hearts of mankind. People began to be jealous of one another, and they were not satisfied will all the good things they already had. The nations wanted more and more of everything: more land, more water, more resources. They squeezed precious minerals from the earth to build terrible weapons to defend their nations from other greedier nations. They killed one another. They polluted the air and the water with poisons. Nature began to die. This is called war. War is ugly. It destroys love and hope and peace.

    Then one day a magical thing occurred. The birds of the air, the animals of the land, and the creatures beneath the waters came to an agreement: if they were to survive, something would have to be done to stop these wars. Only through peace could their world survive.

    “We cannot speak the human language,” they declared, “and mankind can no longer understand ours. We must find among us a symbol of peace so brilliant that all who see it will stop and remember that peace and sharing is beautiful.”

    “I am what you need,” said a golden sunflower. “I am tall and bright. My leaves are food for the animals, my yellow petals can turn plain cloth to gold, my seeds are many and are used for food by all living beings. Yet, the seeds I drop upon the ground can take root and I will grow again and again. I can be your symbol of peace.”

    All nature rejoiced, and it was decided that the birds would each take one sunflower seed and that they would fly over every nation and plant the seed in the earth as a gift. The seeds took root and grew, and the sunflowers multiplied.

    Wherever the sunflowers grew, there seemed to be a special golden glow in the air. The people could not ignore such a magical sight.

    Soon they began to understand the message of the sunflowers so they decided to destroy all of their terrible weapons and to put an end to the greed and to the fear of war. They chose the sunflower as a symbol of peace and new life for all the world to recognize and understand.

    A ceremony was celebrated by planting a whole field of sunflowers. Artists painted pictures of the sunflowers, writers wrote about them, and the people of the world were asked to plant more sunflowers seeds as a symbol of remembrance.

    All nature rejoiced once more as the golden sunflowers stood tall with their faces turned eastward to the rising sun, then following the sun until the setting in the west.

    They gave their goodness to the world so that everyone who sees a sunflower will know that the golden light of peace is beautiful.

    Sunflowers have become the symbol of a world free of nuclear weapons. After Ukraine gave up its last nuclear warhead, the Defense Ministers of the US, Russia and Ukraine met on a former Ukrainian missile base, June 4, 1996. They celebrated by scattering sunflower seeds and planting sunflowers. Former US Secretary of Defense William Perry said, “Sunflowers instead of missiles in the soil will ensure peace for future generations.”

  • Revealed Nuclear Policies Are a Sign of Bad Faith To Rest of the World

    On 9 March, reports surfaced in major US media that the US Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) released on 9 January contains contingency plans for using nuclear weapons against seven states: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, North Korea, Russia and China. It also reportedly contains plans to develop and deploy new “earth-penetrating” nuclear weapons and to accelerate the time it would take to resume full-scale nuclear testing. Using nuclear weapons against other states or developing new nuclear weapons would directly violate US obligations to pursue the elimination of nuclear weapons under Article VI of the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

    At the 2000 NPT Review Conference, the US, along with the other state parties to the treaty, committed themselves to an “unequivocal undertaking” to eliminate nuclear weapons and to a diminishing role for nuclear weapons in security policies. Even if the US does not pursue the plans outlined in the NPR, as Secretary of State Colin Powell and other top military and government officials are claiming, the provocative rhetoric could unravel the non-proliferation regime.

    “The fact that the US is developing contingency plans to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states will certainly be viewed as a sign of bad faith by most of the world and will do serious damage to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,” said David Krieger, President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.”

    Weapons of mass destruction and missile proliferation do pose a legitimate threat not only to US security, but also to international security. However, unilateral US threats to use nuclear weapons, in conjunction with developing and deploying missile defenses, as a means of countering these threats is likely to provoke rather than prevent proliferation. A much better option would be for the US to take the lead on negotiations for the complete elimination of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery.

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation has issued an international appeal that has now been signed by over 100 prominent individuals, including 38 Nobel Laureates. The Appeal to End the Nuclear Weapons Threat to Humanity and All Life calls upon the US and other nuclear weapons states to take the following practical steps as a means to preserve the non-proliferation regime and achieve the complete elimination of nuclear weapons:

    * De-alert all nuclear weapons and de-couple all nuclear warheads from their delivery vehicles.

    * Reaffirm commitments to the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

    * Commence good faith negotiations to achieve a Nuclear Weapons Convention requiring the phased elimination of all nuclear weapons, with provisions for effective verification and enforcement.

    * Declare policies of No First Use of nuclear weapons against other nuclear weapons states and policies of No Use against non-nuclear weapons states.

    * Reallocate resources from the tens of billions of dollars currently being spent for maintaining nuclear arsenals to improving human health, education and welfare throughout the world.

  • Rethink the Unthinkable

    Nuclear weapons are back on the front pages, with news of a Bush administration policy document, the U.S. Nuclear Posture Review, which projects the role of nuclear weapons into the future — not as deterrents, but for the purpose of waging wars. The document even names potential targets. This document and the thinking behind it are reckless. They not only jeopardize international law but the support of America’s closest allies. Canada must state its opposition immediately.

    The document also breaks a commitment. In 2000, the United States joined the other nuclear-weapons states in making an “unequivocal undertaking to accomplish the total elimination” of their nuclear arsenals. The United States made this commitment at a review conference of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which, with 187 nations involved, is the world’s largest arms-control and disarmament treaty.

    There are still 31,000 nuclear weapons in the world, most of them American or Russian, with lesser amounts held by the United Kingdom, France and China, India, Pakistan and Israel. At least 5,000 of the U.S. and Russian nuclear weapons are maintained on hair-trigger alert, meaning they could be fired on 15 minutes notice.

    The Bush administration has offered cuts in the nuclear weapons the United States deploys, but is reinforcing its maintenance of core stocks and planning the development of new ones. By rejecting the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, it is holding open the door to resumed nuclear testing. This has greatly worried many non-nuclear weapons countries and has already led to charges that the United States is acting in bad faith. The Non-Proliferation Treaty insists that negotiations for elimination should be held in “good faith.”

    Periodically, the United States reviews its policies on nuclear weapons; it did so last year, the results of which are seen in this week’s alarming headlines. “Behind the administration’s rhetorical mask of post-Cold War restraint,” comments the U.S. National Resources Defence Council, a prestigious non-profit organization of scientists, lawyers and environmental specialists, “lie expansive plans to revitalize U.S. nuclear forces, and all the elements that support them, within a so-called ‘New Triad’ of capabilities that combine nuclear and conventional offensive strikes with missile defences and nuclear-weapons infrastructure.”

    According to the council’s analysis, the Bush team assumes that nuclear weapons will be part of U.S. military forces at least for the next 50 years; it plans an extensive and expensive series of programs to modernize the existing force, including a new ICBM to be operational in 2020 and a new heavy bomber in 2040.

    The administration’s Nuclear Posture Review says that there are four reasons to possess nuclear weapons: to “assure allies and friends”; “dissuade competitors”; “deter aggressors”; and “defeat enemies.” Over the next 10 years, the White House’s plans call for the United States to retain a total stockpile of intact nuclear weapons and weapons components roughly seven to nine times larger than the publicly-stated goal of 1,700 to 2,200 “operationally deployed weapons.”

    Moreover, the U.S. administration has ordered the Pentagon to draft contingency plans for the use of nuclear weapons against at least seven countries, naming not only the “axis of evil” (Iraq, Iran and North Korea) but also Russia, China, Libya and Syria.

    This position has prompted the editors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists to move the minute hand of their “Doomsday Clock” forward two minutes — to seven minutes to midnight, the same position as when the clock made its debut in 1947. “Despite a campaign promise to rethink nuclear policy, the Bush administration has taken no significant steps to alter nuclear targeting policies or reduce the alert status of U.S. nuclear forces,” said George A. Lopez, chairman of the Bulletin’s board of directors.

    The shift in U.S. policy has immense implications for Canada and the other members of NATO. NATO has traditionally presented its nuclear doctrine as one of deterrence, not war. Canada is now caught in the middle, between its international legal obligations to support negotiations for the elimination of nuclear weapons, or to support the United States in its determination to keep them. All this will come to a head at an important Non-Proliferation Treaty meeting at the United Nations, starting April 8.

    Canada has higher obligations to international law, as it is being developed in the United Nations system, than it does to its friendship with the United States, which is violating the very law that Canada stands for. Good friends don’t let their friends drive drunk. It’s time for Canada to blow the whistle on its U.S. friends in Washington, who are veering out of control in their pursuit of nuclear weapons.

    Because of its military strength and commanding position as the world’s lone superpower, the United States occupies the central position when it comes to making progress on nuclear disarmament. NATO’s stance — that nuclear weapons remain “essential” — would fold in an instant if the United States took action in entering comprehensive negotiations for elimination. Russia and China, struggling to move their economies into strong positions, do not want to engage in a new nuclear arms race, which is precisely what they fear will happen if and when the United States actually deploys a National Missile Defence system.

    Most people do not realize that the United States spends $100-million (U.S.) a day maintaining its nuclear weapons. Because Washington is pouring huge new sums into its defence budget — it will soon be spending, at $400-billion annually, more than the next 15 countries combined — the international community has become rightfully alarmed about U.S. intentions.

    Nor is the rest of the world reassured when we see the Pentagon’s Web site proclaiming the U.S. intention to weaponize space and thus ensure “full-spectrum dominance” on land, sea, air and space.
    *Douglas Roche is an independent senator from Alberta and Canada’s former ambassador for disarmament. He is a former chairman of the UN Disarmament Committee. Currently, Senator Roche is Chairman of the Middle Powers Initiative and a member of Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

  • Israeli Weapons of Mass Destruction: a Threat to Peace

    DC Iraq Coalition, Centre for Research on Globalisation (CRG), globalresearch.ca

    “Should war break out in the Middle East again,… or should any Arab nation fire missiles against Israel, as the Iraqis did, a nuclear escalation, once unthinkable except as a last resort, would now be a strong probability.”
    Seymour Hersh(1)

    “Arabs may have the oil, but we have the matches.” Ariel Sharon(2)

    ——————————————————————————–

    With between 200 and 500 thermonuclear weapons and a sophisticated delivery system, Israel has quietly supplanted Britain as the World’s 5th Largest nuclear power, and may currently rival France and China in the size and sophistication of its nuclear arsenal. Although dwarfed by the nuclear arsenals of the U.S. and Russia, each possessing over 10,000 nuclear weapons, Israel nonetheless is a major nuclear power, and should be publically recognized as such. Since the Gulf War in 1991, while much attention has been lavished on the threat posed by Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, the major culprit in the region, Israel, has been largely ignored. Possessing chemical and biological weapons, an extremely sophisticated nuclear arsenal, and an aggressive strategy for their actual use, Israel provides the major regional impetus for the development of weapons of mass destruction and represents an acute threat to peace and stability in the Middle East. The Israeli nuclear program represents a serious impediment to nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation and, with India and Pakistan, is a potential nuclear flashpoint (prospects of meaningful non-proliferation are a delusion so long as the nuclear weapons states insist on maintaining their arsenals). Citizens concerned about sanctions against Iraq, peace with justice in the Middle East, and nuclear disarmament have an obligation to speak out forcefully against the Israeli nuclear program.

    Birth of the Israeli Bomb

    The Israeli nuclear program began in the late 1940s under the direction of Ernst David Bergmann, “the father of the Israeli bomb,” who in 1952 established the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission. It was France, however, which provided the bulk of early nuclear assistance to Israel culminating in construction of Dimona, a heavy water moderated, natural uranium reactor and plutonium reprocessing factory situated near Bersheeba in the Negev Desert. Israel had been an active participant in the French Nuclear weapons program from its inception, providing critical technical expertise, and the Israeli nuclear program can be seen as an extension of this earlier collaboration. Dimona went on line in 1964 and plutonium reprocessing began shortly thereafter. Despite various Israeli claims that Dimona was “a manganese plant, or a textile factory,” the extreme security measures employed told a far different story. In 1967, Israel shot down one of their own Mirage fighters that approached too close to Dimona and in 1973 shot down a Lybian civilian airliner which strayed off course, killing 104.(3) There is substantial credible speculation that Israel may have exploded at least one, and perhaps several, nuclear devices in the mid 1960s in the Negev near the Israeli-Egyptian border, and that it participated actively in French nuclear tests in Algeria.(4) By the time of the “Yom Kippur War” in 1973, Israel possessed an arsenal of perhaps several dozen deliverable atomic bombs and went on full nuclear alert.(5)

    Possessing advanced nuclear technology and “world class” nuclear scientists, Israel was confronted early with a major problem- how to obtain the necessary uranium. Israel’s own uranium source was the phosphate deposits in the Negev, totally inadequate to meet the need of a rapidly expanding program. The short term answer was to mount commando raids in France and Britain to successfully hijack uranium shipments and, in1968, to collaborate with West Germany in diverting 200 tons of yellowcake (uranium oxide).(6) These clandestine acquisitions of uranium for Dimona were subsequently covered up by the various countries involved. There was also an allegation that a U.S. corporation called Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) diverted hundreds of pounds of enriched uranium to Israel from the mid-50s to the mid-60s.

    Despite an FBI and CIA investigation, and Congressional hearings, no one was ever prosecuted, although most other investigators believed the diversion had occurred (7), (8). In the late 1960s, Israel solved the uranium problem by developing close ties with South Africa in a quid pro quo arrangement whereby Israel supplied the technology and expertise for the “Apartheid Bomb,” while South Africa provided the uranium.

    South Africa and the United States

    In 1977, the Soviet Union warned the U.S. that satellite photos indicated South Africa was planning a nuclear test in the Kalahari Desert but the Apartheid regime backed down under pressure. On September 22, 1979, a U.S. satellite detected an atmospheric test of a small thermonuclear bomb in the Indian Ocean off South Africa but, because of Israel’s apparent involvement, the report was quickly “whitewashed” by a carefully selected scientific panel kept in the dark about important details. Later it was learned through Israeli sources that there were actually three carefully guarded tests of miniaturized Israeli nuclear artillery shells. The Israeli/South African collaboration did not end with the bomb testing, but continued until the fall of Apartheid, especially with the developing and testing of medium range missiles and advanced artillery. In addition to uranium and test facilities, South Africa provided Israel with large amounts of investment capital, while Israel provided a major trade outlet to enable the Apartheid state avoid international economic sanctions.(9)

    Although the French and South Africans were primarily responsible for the Israeli nuclear program, the U.S. shares and deserves a large part of the blame. Mark Gaffney wrote (the Israeli nuclear program) “was possible only because (emphasis in original) of calculated deception on the part of Israel, and willing complicity on the part of the U.S..”(10)

    From the very beginning, the U.S. was heavily involved in the Israeli nuclear program, providing nuclear related technology such as a small research reactor in 1955 under the “Atoms for Peace Program.” Israeli scientists were largely trained at U.S. universities and were generally welcomed at the nuclear weapons labs. In the early 1960s, the controls for the Dimona reactor were obtained clandestinely from a company called Tracer Lab, the main supplier of U.S. military reactor control panels, purchased through a Belgian subsidiary, apparently with the acquiescence of the National Security Agency (NSA) and the CIA.(11) In 1971, the Nixon administration approved the sale of hundreds of krytons(a type of high speed switch necessary to the development of sophisticated nuclear bombs) to Israel.(12) And, in 1979, Carter provided ultra high resolution photos from a KH-11 spy satellite, used 2 years later to bomb the Iraqi Osirak Reactor.(13) Throughout the Nixon and Carter administrations, and accelerating dramatically under Reagan, U.S. advanced technology transfers to Israel have continued unabated to the present.

    The Vanunu Revelations

    Following the 1973 war, Israel intensified its nuclear program while continuing its policy of deliberate “nuclear opaqueness.” Until the mid-1980s, most intelligence estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal were on the order of two dozen but the explosive revelations of Mordechai Vanunu, a nuclear technician working in the Dimona plutonium reprocessing plant, changed everything overnight. A leftist supporter of Palestine, Vanunu believed that it was his duty to humanity to expose Israel’s nuclear program to the world. He smuggled dozens of photos and valuable scientific data out of Israel and in 1986 his story was published in the London Sunday Times. Rigorous scientific scrutiny of the Vanunu revelations led to the disclosure that Israel possessed as many as 200 highly sophisticated, miniaturized thermonuclear bombs. His information indicated that the Dimona reactor’s capacity had been expanded several fold and that Israel was producing enough plutonium to make ten to twelve bombs per year. A senior U.S. intelligence analyst said of the Vanunu data,”The scope of this is much more extensive than we thought. This is an enormous operation.”(14)

    Just prior to publication of his information Vanunu was lured to Rome by a Mossad “Mata Hari,” was beaten, drugged and kidnapped to Israel and, following a campaign of disinformation and vilification in the Israeli press, convicted of “treason” by a secret security court and sentenced to 18 years in prison. He served over 11 years in solitary confinement in a 6 by 9 foot cell. After a year of modified release into the general population (he was not permitted contact with Arabs), Vanunu recently has been returned to solitary and faces more than 3 years further imprisonment. Predictably, the Vanunu revelations were largely ignored by the world press, especially in the United States, and Israel continues to enjoy a relatively free ride regarding its nuclear status. (15)

    Israel’s Arsenal of Mass Destruction

    Today, estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal range from a minimum of 200 to a maximum of about 500. Whatever the number, there is little doubt that Israeli nukes are among the world’s most sophisticated, largely designed for “war fighting” in the Middle East. A staple of the Israeli nuclear arsenal are “neutron bombs,” miniaturized thermonuclear bombs designed to maximize deadly gamma radiation while minimizing blast effects and long term radiation- in essence designed to kill people while leaving property intact.(16) Weapons include ballistic missiles and bombers capable of reaching Moscow, cruise missiles, land mines (In the 1980s Israel planted nuclear land mines along the Golan Heights(17)), and artillery shells with a range of 45 miles (18). In June, 2000 an Israeli submarine launched a cruise missile which hit a target 950 miles away, making Israel only the third nation after the U.S. and Russia with that capability. Israel will deploy 3 of these virtually impregnable submarines, each carrying 4 cruise missiles.(19)

    The bombs themselves range in size from “city busters” larger than the Hiroshima Bomb to tactical mini nukes. The Israeli arsenal of weapons of mass destruction clearly dwarfs the actual or potential arsenals of all other Middle Eastern states combined, and is vastly greater than any conceivable need for “deterrence.”

    Israel also possesses a comprehensive arsenal of chemical and biological weapons. According to the Sunday Times, Israel has produced both chemical and biological weapons with a sophisticated delivery system, quoting a senior Israeli intelligence official, “There is hardly a single known or unknown form of chemical or biological weapon . . .which is not manufactured at the Nes Tziyona Biological Institute.”)(20) The same report described F- 16 fighter jets specially designed for chemical and biological payloads, with crews trained to load the weapons on a moments notice. In 1998, the Sunday Times reported that Israel, using research obtained from South Africa, was developing an “ethno bomb; “In developing their “ethno-bomb”, Israeli scientists are trying to exploit medical advances by identifying distinctive a gene carried by some Arabs, then create a genetically modified bacterium or virus… The scientists are trying to engineer deadly micro-organisms that attack only those bearing the distinctive genes.” Dedi Zucker, a leftist Member of Knesset, the Israeli parliament, denounced the research saying, “Morally, based on our history, and our tradition and our experience, such a weapon is monstrous and should be denied.”(21)

    Israeli Nuclear Strategy

    In popular imagination, the Israeli bomb is a “weapon of last resort,” to be used only at the last minute to avoid annihilation, and many well intentioned but misled supporters of Israel still believe that to be the case. Whatever truth this formulation may have had in the minds of the early Israeli nuclear strategists, today the Israeli nuclear arsenal is inextricably linked to and integrated with overall Israeli military and political strategy. As Seymour Hersh says in classic understatement ; “The Samson Option is no longer the only nuclear option available to Israel.”(22) Israel has made countless veiled nuclear threats against the Arab nations and against the Soviet Union (and by extension Russia since the end of the Cold War). One chilling example comes from Ariel Sharon, the current Israeli Prime Minister “Arabs may have the oil, but we have the matches.”(23) (In 1983 Sharon proposed to India that it join with Israel to attack Pakistani nuclear facilities; in the late 70s he proposed sending Israeli paratroopers to Tehran to prop up the Shah; and in 1982 he called for expanding Israel’s security influence to stretch from “Mauritania to Afghanistan.”) In another example, Israeli nuclear expert Oded Brosh said in 1992, “…we need not be ashamed that the nuclear option is a major instrumentality of our defense as a deterrent against those who attack us.”(24) According to Israel Shahak, “The wish for peace, so often assumed as the Israeli aim, is not in my view a principle of Israeli policy, while the wish to extend Israeli domination and influence is.” and “Israel is preparing for a war, nuclear if need be, for the sake of averting domestic change not to its liking, if it occurs in some or any Middle Eastern states…. Israel clearly prepares itself to seek overtly a hegemony over the entire Middle East…, without hesitating to use for the purpose all means available, including nuclear ones.”(25)

    Israel uses its nuclear arsenal not just in the context of deterrence” or of direct war fighting, but in other more subtle but no less important ways. For example, the possession of weapons of mass destruction can be a powerful lever to maintain the status quo, or to influence events to Israel’s perceived advantage, such as to protect the so called moderate Arab states from internal insurrection, or to intervene in inter-Arab warfare. (26) In Israeli strategic jargon this concept is called “nonconventional compellence” and is exemplified by a quote from Shimon Peres; “acquiring a superior weapons system(read nuclear) would mean the possibility of using it for compellent purposes- that is forcing the other side to accept Israeli political demands, which presumably include a demand that the traditional status quo be accepted and a peace treaty signed.”(27) From a slightly different perspective, Robert Tuckerr asked in a Commentary magazine article in defense of Israeli nukes, “What would prevent Israel… from pursuing a hawkish policy employing a nuclear deterrent to freeze the status quo?”(28) Possessing an overwhelming nuclear superiority allows Israel to act with impunity even in the face world wide opposition. A case in point might be the invasion of Lebanon and destruction of Beirut in 1982, led by Ariel Sharon, which resulted in 20,000 deaths, most civilian. Despite the annihilation of a neighboring Arab state, not to mention the utter destruction of the Syrian Air Force, Israel was able to carry out the war for months at least partially due to its nuclear threat.

    Another major use of the Israeli bomb is to compel the U.S. to act in Israel’s favor, even when it runs counter to its own strategic interests. As early as 1956 Francis Perrin, head of the French A-bomb project wrote “We thought the Israeli Bomb was aimed at the Americans, not to launch it at the Americans, but to say, ‘If you don’t want to help us in a critical situation we will require you to help us; otherwise we will use our nuclear bombs.’”(29) During the 1973 war, Israel used nuclear blackmail to force Kissinger and Nixon to airlift massive amounts of military hardware to Israel. The Israeli Ambassador, Simha Dinitz, is quoted as saying, at the time, “If a massive airlift to Israel does not start immediately, then I will know that the U.S. is reneging on its promises and…we will have to draw very serious conclusions…”(30) Just one example of this strategy was spelled out in 1987 by Amos Rubin, economic adviser to Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, who said “If left to its own Israel will have no choice but to fall back on a riskier defense which will endanger itself and the world at large… To enable Israel to abstain from dependence on nuclear arms calls for $2 to 3 billion per year in U.S. aid.”(31) Since then Israel’s nuclear arsenal has expanded exponentially, both quantitatively and qualitatively, while the U.S. money spigots remain wide open.

    Regional and International Implications

    Largely unknown to the world, the Middle East nearly exploded in all out war on February 22, 2001. According to the London Sunday Times and DEBKAfile, Israel went on high missile alert after receiving news from the U.S. of movement by 6 Iraqi armored divisions stationed along the Syrian border, and of launch preparations of surface to surface missiles. DEBKAfile, an Israeli based “counter-terrorism” information service, claims that the Iraqi missiles were deliberately taken to the highest alert level in order to test the U.S. and Israeli response. Despite an immediate attack by 42 U.S. and British war planes, the Iraqis suffered little apparent damage.(32) The Israelis have warned Iraq that they are prepared to use neutron bombs in a preemptive attack against Iraqi missiles.

    The Israeli nuclear arsenal has profound implications for the future of peace in the Middle East, and indeed, for the entire planet. It is clear from Israel Shahak that Israel has no interest in peace except that which is dictated on its own terms, and has absolutely no intention of negotiating in good faith to curtail its nuclear program or discuss seriously a nuclear-free Middle East,”Israel’s insistence on the independent use of its nuclear weapons can be seen as the foundation on which Israeli grand strategy rests.”(34) According to Seymour Hersh, “the size and sophistication of Israel’s nuclear arsenal allows men such as Ariel Sharon to dream of redrawing the map of the Middle East aided by the implicit threat of nuclear force.”(35) General Amnon Shahak-Lipkin, former Israeli Chief of Staff is quoted “It is never possible to talk to Iraq about no matter what; It is never possible to talk to Iran about no matter what. Certainly about nuclearization. With Syria we cannot really talk either.”(36) Ze’ev Shiff, an Israeli military expert writing in Haaretz said, “Whoever believes that Israel will ever sign the UN Convention prohibiting the proliferation of nuclear weapons… is day dreaming,”(37) and Munya Mardoch, Director of the Israeli Institute for the Development of Weaponry, said in 1994, “The moral and political meaning of nuclear weapons is that states which renounce their use are acquiescing to the status of Vassal states. All those states which feel satisfied with possessing conventional weapons alone are fated to become vassal states.”(38)

    As Israeli society becomes more and more polarized, the influence of the radical right becomes stronger. According to Shahak, “The prospect of Gush Emunim, or some secular right-wing Israeli fanatics, or some some of the delerious Israeli Army generals, seizing control of Israeli nuclear weapons…cannot be precluded. …while israeli jewish society undergoes a steady polarization, the Israeli security system increasingly relies on the recruitment of cohorts from the ranks of the extreme right.”(39) The Arab states, long aware of Israel’s nuclear program, bitterly resent its coercive intent, and perceive its existence as the paramount threat to peace in the region, requiring their own weapons of mass destruction. During a future Middle Eastern war (a distinct possibility given the ascension of Ariel Sharon, an unindicted war criminal with a bloody record stretching from the massacre of Palestinian civilians at Quibya in 1953, to the massacre of Palestinian civilians at Sabra and Shatila in 1982 and beyond) the possible Israeli use of nuclear weapons should not be discounted. According to Shahak, “In Israeli terminology, the launching of missiles on to Israeli territory is regarded as ‘nonconventional’ regardless of whether they are equipped with explosives or poison gas.”(40) (Which requires a “nonconventional” response, a perhaps unique exception being the Iraqi SCUD attacks during the Gulf War.)

    Meanwhile, the existence of an arsenal of mass destruction in such an unstable region in turn has serious implications for future arms control and disarmament negotiations, and even the threat of nuclear war. Seymour Hersh warns, “Should war break out in the Middle East again,… or should any Arab nation fire missiles against Israel, as the Iraqis did, a nuclear escalation, once unthinkable except as a last resort, would now be a strong probability.”(41) and Ezar Weissman, Israel’s current President said “The nuclear issue is gaining momentum (and the) next war will not be conventional.”(42) Russia and before it the Soviet Union has long been a major (if not the major) target of Israeli nukes. It is widely reported that the principal purpose of Jonathan Pollard’s spying for Israel was to furnish satellite images of Soviet targets and other super sensitive data relating to U.S. nuclear targeting strategy. (43) (Since launching its own satellite in 1988, Israel no longer needs U.S. spy secrets.) Israeli nukes aimed at the Russian heartland seriously complicate disarmament and arms control negotiations and, at the very least, the unilateral possession of nuclear weapons by Israel is enormously destabilizing, and dramatically lowers the threshold for their actual use, if not for all out nuclear war. In the words of Mark Gaffney, “… if the familar pattern(Israel refining its weapons of mass destruction with U.S. complicity) is not reversed soon – for whatever reason – the deepening Middle East conflict could trigger a world conflagration.” (44)

    Many Middle East Peace activists have been reluctant to discuss, let alone challenge, the Israeli monopoly on nuclear weapons in the region, often leading to incomplete and uninformed analyses and flawed action strategies. Placing the issue of Israeli weapons of mass destruction directly and honestly on the table and action agenda would have several salutary effects. First, it would expose a primary destabilizing dynamic driving the Middle East arms race and compelling the region’s states to each seek their own “deterrent.” Second, it would expose the grotesque double standard which sees the U.S. and Europe on the one hand condemning Iraq, Iran and Syria for developing weapons of mass destruction, while simultaneously protecting and enabling the principal culprit. Third, exposing Israel’s nuclear strategy would focus international public attention, resulting in increased pressure to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction and negotiate a just peace in good faith. Finally, a nuclear free Israel would make a Nuclear Free Middle East and a comprehensive regional peace agreement much more likely. Unless and until the world community confronts Israel over its covert nuclear program it is unlikely that there will be any meaningful resolution of the Israeli/Arab conflict, a fact that Israel may be counting on as the Sharon era dawns.
    ——————————————————————————–

    Footnotes:

    1. Seymour Hersh, The Samson Option: Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy, New York,1991, Random House, p. 319 (A brilliant and prophetic work with much original research)2

    2. Mark Gaffney, Dimona, The Third Temple:The Story Behind the Vanunu Revelation, Brattleboro, VT, 1989, Amana Books, p. 165 (Excellent progressive analysis of the Israeli nuclear program)

    3. U.S. Army Lt. Col. Warner D. Farr, The Third Temple Holy of Holies; Israel’s Nuclear Weapons, USAF Counterproliferation Center, Air War College Sept 1999 <www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/farr,htm (Perhaps the>best single condensed history of the Israeli nuclear program)

    4. Hersch, op.cit., p. 131

    5. Gaffney, op.cit., p. 63

    6. Gaffney, op. cit. pp 68 – 69

    7. Hersh, op.cit., pp. 242-257

    8. Gaffney, op.cit., 1989, pps. 65-66 (An alternative discussion of the NUMEC affair)

    9. Barbara Rogers & Zdenek Cervenka, The Nuclear Axis: The Secret Collaboration Between West Germany and South Africa, New York, 1978, Times Books, p. 325-328 (the definitive history of the Apartheid Bomb)

    10. Gaffney, op. cit., 1989, p. 34

    11. Peter Hounam, Woman From Mossad: The Torment of Mordechai Vanunu, London, 1999, Vision Paperbacks, pp. 155-168 (The most complete and up to date account of the Vanunu story, it includes fascenating speculation that Israel may have a second hidden Dimona type reactor)

    12. Hersh, op. cit., 1989, p. 213

    13. ibid, p.198-200

    14. ibid, pp. 3-17

    15. Hounman, op. cit. 1999, pp 189-203

    16. Hersh, 1989. pp.199-200

    17. ibid, p. 312

    18. John Pike and Federation of American Scientists, Israel Special Weapons Guide Website, 2001, Web Address <http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/index.html (An invaluable>internet resource)

    19. Usi Mahnaimi and Peter Conradi, Fears of New Arms Race as Israel Tests Cruise Missiles, June 18, 2000, London Sunday Times

    20. Usi Mahnaimi, Israeli Jets Equipped for Chemical Warfare October 4, 1998, London Sunday Times

    21. Usi Mahnaimi and Marie Colvin, Israel Planning “Ethnic” bomb as Saddam Caves In, November 15, 1998, London Sunday Times

    22. Hersh, op.cit., 1991, p. 319

    23. Gaffney, op.cit., 1989, p. 163

    24. Israel Shahak, Open Secrets: Israeli Nuclear and Foreign Policies, London, 1997,Pluto Press, p. 40 (An absolute “must read” for any Middle East or anti-nuclear activist)

    25 ibid, p.2

    26. ibid, p.43

    27. Gaffney, op.cit., 1989, p 131

    28. “Israel & the US: From Dependence to Nuclear Weapons?” Robert W. Tucker, November 1975 pp41-42

    29. London Sunday Times, October 12, 1986

    30. Gaffney, op. cit. 1989. p. 147

    31. ibid, p. 153

    32. DEBKAfile, February 23, 2001 WWW.debka.com

    33. Uzi Mahnaimi and Tom Walker, London Sunday Times, February 25, 2001

    34. Shahak, op. cit., p150

    35. Hersh, op.cit., p. 319

    36. Shahak, op. cit., p34

    37. ibid, p. 149

    38. ibid, p. 153

    39. ibid, pp. 37-38

    40. ibid, pp 39-40

    41. Hersh, op. cit., p. 19

    42. Aronson, Geoffrey, “Hidden Agenda: US-Israeli Relations and the Nuclear Question,” Middle East Journal, (Autumn 1992), 619-630.

    43 . Hersh, op. cit., pp. 285-305

    44. Gaffney, op. cit., p194
    Copyright, John Steinbach, DC Iraq Coalition, 2002. Reprinted for fair use only

  • The Return of the Undead

    On March 9 and 10, the Los Angeles Times published some of the classified portions of the US Nuclear Posture Review presented to Congress on January 8. The two most important revelations from this document were: American plans for the possible use of nuclear weapons against a list of seven potential adversaries in the event of military conflict, and, closely related, proposals for the development of a new class of smaller nuclear weapons that would be “useable” against military targets with minimum civilian “collateral damage”.

    The notion of “useable” nuclear weapons is not recent, but like the Undead in an Anne Rice novel, just keeps resurfacing each generation when everyone thought it discredited. In the ’50’s and ’60’s, it was “battlefield” nuclear weapons. Two problems, their guidance systems were imprecise and they weren’t small enough to avoid getting your own guys.

    Then in the ’70’s there was the so-called “neutron bomb” (actually a mini – H-bomb), which NATO was going to deploy until forced to stop by public opinion (primarily German, this battle put the Green Party there on the map).

    Under Reagan, it was “escalation dominance”, in which “tactical” nukes were part of an overall strategy of strategic nuclear warfighting. Reagan’s confident public pronouncements that the US could “prevail” in a nuclear war gave birth to a massive new peace movement (those were the days when we got 100, 000 marching across the Burrard bridge).

    The point is that the twin notions of first – use and nuclear warfighting have been part of US doctrine since the beginning of the nuclear age (the Pentagon’s own documents now declassified in the National Security Archive prove this beyond any doubt).

    After the Cold War ended, most analysts assumed (especially given such dramatic battle proven advances in “smart” conventional weapons) that Clinton would move away from existing nuclear doctrine and abandon reliance on nuclear weapons. But after the fiasco over policy about gays in the military, and Clinton’s inability to keep his pants zipped, he never again took on the military on any issue and nuclear policy treaded water for eight years.

    Now the old gang is back, every retread from the Reagan, the Ford, and yea, even the Nixon Administration, and they are nuclear True Believers one and all. They’ve been certain that nuclear weapons are an essential political as well as military currency for the US since they were weaned.

    Ominously, this time around the technology will soon catch up with the concept, and, with a bit more testing, real nuclear warfighting will become “feasible” to the sort of people who populate the Bush Administration. So goodbye to the dream of nuclear disarmament, and hello to the ghost of General Curtis LeMay, head of the Strategic Air Command during much of the ’50’s and early’60’s. He once said to a reporter re: the Middle East and Vietnam that the President should “just nuke the gooks and ragheads”, and during the Cuban Missile Crisis he’s on tape as virtually calling Kennedy a coward to his face for not invading Cuba (which we now know would have triggered nuclear use). The Undead have returned to Washington once more, and are clearly in charge again.
    *Michael D. Wallace is Professor of Political Science and Faculty Fellow at the Simons Centre for Peace and Disarmament at the University of British Columbia.

  • Nonviolence 101

    Conversations pertaining to work often begin like this:
    “What do you do?”
    “I’m a high school teacher.”
    “What do you teach?”
    “Peacemaking.”
    “Huh?”
    And then it takes a moment to register. The follow-up question usually is, “Is that a real class in high school?”

    And thus begins the story of how classes on nonviolence wind up in high schools.

    I tell people about the various chapters, how we start out at the beginning of the semester with personal peacemaking and nonviolent responses to assault. Students always want to know how a pacifist would respond if he or she were to be attacked by a random stranger leaping from the bushes or from behind a dumpster in a dark alley. So I ask them how many of them have ever been physically hit by a random stranger in any way at any point in their lives. Maybe one or two people. Then I ask them how many people have ever been physically hit by a member of their family or someone they know at any point in their lives. Nearly every hand goes up. We worry about the boogeyman and abandoned buildings but fail to address some of the most conflict-ridden arenas, the places where we usually go like home, school and work.

    That’s how the semester begins, by examining our own personal lives. This first chapter introduces students to nonviolence, the myths, the truths and the power of responding with nonviolent force to our precarious lives. We create a working definition of peace, of violence, conflict and of nonviolence. We explore where we need to create spaces for peace in our lives, in our communities, in our state, in our nation and in our world. We start to learn about consensus, following a process and taking turns. We begin to disarm our disbeliefs, our doubts and our misgivings about peacemaking. We start to let our defenses down in order to let peace in.

    After establishing a baseline for conceptualizing nonviolence, the class learns about historical figures who usually get the short end of the stick in traditional high school classes. Primary sources are a must in Solutions to Violence, the name of the course which I teach and which my mentor, Colman McCarthy, founded. We study Gandhi in his own words. We watch A Force More Powerful, the video series by York&Ackerman which aired on PBS in October 2000. We read Dr. King in his own words, and learn about the civil rights movement, hassle lines and nonviolence trainings. The class begins to understand the structure and discipline which nonviolence requires. We then read Dorothy Day, learning about intentional communities and communal living. The students I teach are accustomed to mass marketing, consumerism and capitalism, so Dorothy Day’s commitment to generosity, hospitality and precarity tends to shock them. That chapter demonstrates a very exciting learning curve.

    Next we read Gene Sharp, Tolstoy’s “Patriotism or Peace”, Daniel Berrigan and a very articulate piece by Joan Baez which examines a dialogue between a pacifist and a skeptic. We learn about the humanitarian crisis in Iraq as a result of the economic embargo, about the School of the Americas Watch movement, about Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers, about sweatshops and maquiladoras, about child labor and child soldiers, about economics and the Pentagon and about the environment and animal rights. By the end of the semester, the Students in Solutions to Violence know how to find alternative news and pacifist perspectives on the Internet from websites like Commondreams, Indymedia and the Nonviolence Web.

    What students really learn…

    “This class made a difference in my life. I see things in a whole new way now that I didn’t see before. I’m not saying this class changed my whole viewpoint on life, but it did help me to be a little more open-minded. I’m seeing a little more color these days than just black and white. I don’t think this class is about learning a bunch of stats and info. It’s more than that. I’ve learned to be a little more positive than negative. I hope that the class becomes required in the future.”

    I hope that my students learn the specifics of nonviolence, that they learn to tell the stories of nonviolence and that they grow in their understanding of key nonviolent figures both past and present. Even more than the facts, though, I hope that they learn about themselves. About halfway through the semester, I ask the class what they think my goals are in teaching Solutions to Violence. Items from the following list invariably arise each semester in their responses to that question:

    Compassion. Compassion is a difficult skill to teach. Everywhere around them in the world, they learn to be tough, not to show their softer side and that kindness is a weakness. Perhaps the best place to start is teaching with compassion. My mentor, Colman McCarthy, gave me some good advice about how to do this. He told me that before every class, he reminds himself to listen more than talk. He says that good listeners have many friends and poor listeners have many acquaintances. Many people like to talk just to hear their heads rattle. The skill of being a good listener is perhaps the most important one in the teaching profession.

    I have learned many things from my students just by listening. In fact, even if I just show up to class and don’t say a word, the students will create their own dialogue because they so often need a forum to vent their emotions and share their experiences. When we study Gandhi and review the nine steps for conflict transformation, “Work on your listening skills” is one of the toughest on the list. I ask my class if, when they’re having a conversation or argument, if they are truly digesting the words of the other person, or if they’re planning in their heads what to say next, letting the other person’s words go in one ear and out the other. We so desperately want to be heard and understood, but have little experience in truly listening with patient hearts.

    Compassion also comes from empathy. I always hope for my students that they make other people’s experiences a part of their own, whether they live in the same town or around the globe.

    Ownership of their learning. Students have very little opportunity to exercise their natural creativity in school in no small part to the reliance on standardized testing and multiple-choice exams. These brain-numbing techniques lull the students into a passive state of receiving information without truly testing the measure of its worth, without examining it for relevance and truthfulness. Standardized tests stratify students into categories that teachers, administrators and colleges are comfortable with, but have little bearing on what students have actually learned.

    I am interested in students learning. I want them to assume responsibility for their own education, and become partners with the school and their teachers in an active pursuit of knowledge. In Solutions to Violence, students have the opportunity to grade themselves, and each semester they report that this is the toughest assignment. The class writes about what they are learning, how they are learning and how it is affecting them in their daily lives. Then they must assign a comparable grade so that the administration is satisfied. Learning ought to be a cooperative process. Sharing power with the students demonstrates respect and attentiveness to their autonomy and gives them the opportunity to demonstrate what they have learned. It is also tremendously valuable insight for me to know what parts of the curriculum reach the students and what elements of truth they have gleaned from the stories, videos and discussions.

    This semester, one student said the following: “Why can’t you just give us grades, Miss Wells? I mean, if you gave us grades then we could just be angry with you if we didn’t like them. If we give ourselves grades, we have to live with what we have done and either be angry or happy with our own effort. Can’t you just do our grades for us?” For me, this says it all. Students are too far-removed from the processes by which we measure them. Perhaps we don’t trust them to give honest evaluations of their work. Perhaps it ought to be part of the teacher’s job to evaluate the students independently. But I believe that empowering students to grade themselves is one of the best privileges to bestow on them. They must assume responsibility this way.

    Occasionally, students will respond with less-than-honest recommendations for their grades. So we review what they have written as a part of their evaluation, and use their overestimated grade as a jumping off point. What I have realized all too often, though, when a student grades himself or herself higher than I would have is that I have not accurately measured what that student has learned, and upon closer inspection, I learn that indeed that student has assumed a great deal of responsibility for taking back his/her education. Sometimes it takes a while to know what you know, though, and test-centered accountability does not take into account this gestation period for knowledge to develop.

    Knowledge about the world. Most students do not read the news section of the newspaper. Many students read the sports section, but that is just not comparable. Solutions to Violence teaches them how to dissect the newspaper, learn about the places in the stories and try to connect with the lives of those impacted by international events. We talk about letters to the editor, discuss news items and read through articles, point to places on the map and follow up with case studies about places that interest the students, like Palestine and South Africa.

    But Solutions to Violence is more than just encouraging students to be more informed. It is giving them the tools to take action and create change in their lives, in their school, in their community and in their world.

    In the past few semesters that I have been teaching in California, my students have incorporated their theoretical knowledge about how and why nonviolence works into practical action to address current needs in the community and in the world. For example, in response to learning about the mushroom workers’ struggles to win a contract for fair pay, better health and retirement benefits, the students organized a school-wide canned food drive to benefit the farmworkers. This particular action impressed me because it was during the last week of school and coordinated primarily by the seniors in the class, people who had tuned out of nearly every other subject and had their minds only on graduation.

    Nonviolence is not only about changing the world. Students begin to learn about how their hearts and minds can be transformed by considering peacemaking a legitimate skill. We read a selection from Thich Nhat Hanh’s book Peace is Every Step, learning to be mindful of our breathing and to recover ourselves and refocus when our attention turns to anger and potential violence. Many times my students have reported that in a tense situation, one where they were ready to loose their cool, they remembered the conscious breathing exercises we do in class, concentrating on naming our in-breath and out-breath. When they were in control of their own emotions through mindful breathing, they felt less likely to react violently. It is this exact personal transformation which makes me believe that Solutions to Violence is a worthwhile class that ought to be a part of any standard high school curriculum.

    It teaches them how to be better friends, better children, better students and better people. It helps them define their talents, articulate their thoughts and cooperate with each other.

    I, too, am transformed each semester, impressed with the level of life experience and wisdom my students bring. I learn from them as much as they learn from me.

    Teaching peacemaking in school is the most logical non-reactive component to ending intolerance, racism, ageism and all other forms of personal, structural and institutional violence. I am hoping that more people will recognize this and that the movement to teach peace will be the saving grace for the sake of our young people, our communities and our world.
    *Leah Wells is a high school teacher and the Peace Education Coordinator for the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. This article was initially published in the spring edition of Peacebuilding, the newsletter of the Peace Education Commission.

  • What’s Wrong with Yucca Mountain?

    1. It is on Western Shoshone treaty land, and the US cannot show title.
    The Treaty of Ruby Valley, ratified by Congress in 1863, is the supreme law of the land. The US has never shown legal title to this land, even when requested by federal and international courts.

    2. The Repository would contaminate groundwater.
    Yucca Mountain scientists will readily tell you that the question is not if the repository will release its contents, but when. Groundwater moves rapidly down through the site. Tracers from atmospheric nuclear weapons tests have been found at the underground level at which waste would be placed. This means that precipitation on the surface can reach the waste in less than 50 years, then carry the radioactive material using the groundwater in as little as possibly a few hundred years.

    3. The Repository would endanger millions of people nearby.
    Downstream from the site, groundwater is used for drinking, irrigation, and the largest dairy in the Nevada, supplying thousands of children with milk. Seventeen miles away, California hosts 1.4 million tourists a year going to Death Valley. Seven tributaries flow down Yucca Mountain to the underground Amargosa River, said by some to be the longest and biggest in the world. The Amargosa empties into Death Valley, after flowing right through a number of towns. Flash floods are frequent, and can close roads for days.

    4. Transportation would endanger millions of people across the country.
    Nuclear waste is safer sitting still than going 60-90 MPH. Distinctive casks are an obvious and vulnerable target. No study has been done on specific risks of transporting the waste to Yucca Mountain over a 30 year period, through 43 states, more than 100 cities with population over 100,000 and within one?half mile of over 50 million people.

    5. It is not geologic disposal, and violates the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.
    The Nuclear Waste Policy Act requires that geology be the primary barrier to radioactive contamination. This is not possible at Yucca Mountain, so the DOE’s design depends on an engineered barrier, of unproven durability. The State of Nevada has filed suit against DOE claiming this is a violation of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act requirement for geologic isolation.

    6. Insufficient data exists to evaluate waste containers.
    The Department of Energy is proposing to place the waste in “corrosion resistant” metal containers, which it claims will contain the wastes for more than 10,000 years, the duration of the regulatory period set by the EPA and Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The wastes remain hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years. The claim of corrosion resistance is based on about 2 years of lab experiments under conditions less severe than would be expected in the repository, and then these corrosion results have been extrapolated for the thousands of years of containment necessary.

    7. Yucca Mountain is an active earthquake zone, with 33 faults on site.
    Yucca Mountain is the third most seismically active area in the continental US (after Alaska and coastal California). In the past 20 years, there have been over 600 earthquakes within 50 miles, with the largest, in 1992, causing $1.4 million in damage to DOE’s Yucca Mountain field office.

    8. DOE’s rush to please the nuclear industry is premature and illegal.
    The Yucca Mountain studies and site recommendation have been called inadequate and/or incomplete by the General Accounting Office, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Broad and several international peer review panels. The DOE still has at least 293 studies of site and design factors that it has agreed to complete before it submits a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act requires that site characterization be complete at the time of a site recommendation (Feb. 14th, 2002) and that the license application must be submitted within 90 days of site designation. However, the DOE’s Yucca Mountain Management and Operating contractor has estimated that it will take 4 years to complete these studies.

    For more information, e-mail: heal@h-o-m-e.org or visit: http://www.h-o-m-e.org/