Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Blog

  • Sunflower Newsletter: March 2015

    Issue #212 – March 2015

     

    Follow David Krieger on twitter

    Click here or on the image above to follow NAPF President David Krieger on Twitter.
    • Perspectives
      • Bush-Appointed Judge Dismisses Nuclear Zero Lawsuit; Marshall Islands to Appeal by David Krieger
      • Nuclear Nations in the Dock by Sue Wareham
      • Remember Your Humanity by John Scales Avery
    • Nuclear Zero Lawsuits
      • Foreign Minister Tony de Brum Addresses Marshallese Parliament
      • The Marshall Islands is “in it to Win it”
      • Nuclear Zero Profiles
    • U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy
      • More Bucks for the Bang
      • Over 10 Percent Increase for Nuclear Weapons in Budget Request
    • Nuclear Insanity
      • U.S. Missile Officer Ran Violent Street Gang
      • Prescribed Burn Canceled at Rocky Flats Plutonium Site
    • Nuclear Proliferation
      • Iran Nuclear Negotiations Progress
    • Nuclear Disarmament
      • Latin America and Caribbean Countries Commit to Austrian Pledge
    • Nuclear Testing
      • Fiji Compensates Nuclear Test Victims as UK Stalls
    • Resources
      • Recommended Reading on the Situation in Ukraine
      • This Month in Nuclear Threat History
      • SGI Peace Proposal
      • Nuclear Disarmament: The Road Ahead
    • Foundation Activities
      • 14th Annual Kelly Lecture Features Dr. Helen Caldicott
      • Swackhamer Disarmament Video Contest Now Underway
      • New Book by NAPF President David Krieger
      • PEACE LEADERSHIP ARTICLE
    • Quotes

     

    Perspectives

    Bush-Appointed Judge Dismisses Nuclear Zero Lawsuit; Marshall Islands to Appeal

    by David Krieger

    On April 24, 2014, the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), a Pacific Island country of 70,000 inhabitants, took bold action on nuclear disarmament. It brought lawsuits at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the world’s highest court, against the nine nuclear-armed countries, accusing them of violating their obligations under international law to negotiate in good faith to end the nuclear arms race and for total nuclear disarmament. Because of the importance of the US as a nuclear power and the fact that it does not accept the compulsory jurisdiction of the ICJ, the Marshall Islands at the same time brought a similar lawsuit against the US in US federal district court in Northern California.

    In the US case, rather than engaging in the case in good faith, the US government responded by filing a motion to dismiss the case on jurisdictional grounds. On February 3, 2015, George W. Bush appointee Judge Jeffrey White granted the US motion to dismiss the case on the grounds that the RMI, although a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), lacked standing to bring the case and that the lawsuit is barred by the political question doctrine.

    To read more, click here.

    Nuclear Nations in the Dock

    by Sue Wareham

    A little-known court case initiated by an inconspicuous Pacific Island state might not seem very newsworthy, but when there’s a David and Goliath element involving some of the world’s most powerful nations, with implications for Australia, we should take notice.

    For Australia, this is anything but a quaint and esoteric legal exercise, and we are anything but an innocent bystander.  Successive Australian governments pay lip service to the goal of a nuclear weapons free world, while simultaneously giving support to US nuclear weapons, under the extraordinarily foolish notion that they protect us. Goliath, with his genocidal weapons, has our unbridled loyalty and complicity. We are in fact part of the problem.

    To read more, click here.

    Remember Your Humanity

    by John Scales Avery

    This year, 2015, marks the 60th anniversary of the Russell-Einstein Manifesto, which contains the following words: “There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise. If you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.”

    [The elimination of nuclear weapons] is a life-or-death question. We can see this most clearly when we look far ahead. Suppose that each year there is a certain finite chance of a nuclear catastrophe, let us say 2 percent. Then in a century the chance of survival will be 13.5 percent, and in two centuries, 1.8 percent, in three centuries, 0.25 percent, in 4 centuries, there would only be a 0.034 percent chance of survival and so on. Over many centuries, the chance of survival would shrink almost to zero. Thus by looking at the long-term future, we can clearly see that if nuclear weapons are not entirely eliminated, civilization will not survive.

    To read more, click here.

    Nuclear Zero Lawsuits

    Foreign Minister Tony de Brum Addresses Marshallese Parliament

    On February 23, Tony de Brum, Foreign Minister of the Marshall Islands, delivered a speech to the Nitijela (parliament) about the Nuclear Zero Lawsuits. Mr. de Brum explained many of the key issues in the ruling granting the U.S. government’s Motion to Dismiss and responded to the recent statement by the U.S. embassy in the Marshall Islands.

    Importantly, Foreign Minister de Brum made it clear that the Marshall Islands was disappointed in the ruling in U.S. Federal District Court and plans to appeal to a higher court. He stated, “Nuclear weapons are not our friend, nor the friend of the U.S. or any other country. Rather, these weapons are the enemy of all humankind. That is why we will stand up for what we believe in, and we will be appealing the Court’s dismissal of the lawsuit to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the next step in the American judicial process.”

    “Marshall Islands Foreign Minister Speaks Out on Dismissal of Lawsuit and Plans to Appeal,” Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, February 24, 2015.

    The Marshall Islands is “In to Win” Nuclear Disarmament Case

     

    Laurie Ashton, Lead Counsel for the Marshall Islands in the Nuclear Zero Lawsuit against the United States in U.S. Federal District Court, has indicated that the Marshall Islands is willing to go as far as possible to win the case.

    Ashton said, “I think the Marshall Islands are among the bravest people, certainly among the people I know, in terms of siding against nuclear weapons and some of that comes from their tragic and horrible experience with the United States testing there…. it takes a great deal of determination and courage to bring lawsuits against what some people believe are the biggest and strongest countries on the planet, the nuclear-armed countries.

    Sally Round, “Marshalls ‘in to win’ nuclear disarmament case,” Radio New Zealand International, February 11, 2015.

    Nuclear Zero Profiles

     

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation has launched a series of profiles featuring people from the Marshall Islands who have been significantly impacted by U.S. nuclear weapon tests.

    Profiles have already been published of John Anjain, Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner, Lijon Eknilang, Jeban Riklon, Rokko Langinbelik and Tony de Brum.

    We encourage you to share these profiles with your friends and colleagues through social media.

    U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy

    More Bucks for the Bang

     

    The United States is now paying 500% more per nuclear warhead, on average, than it did in 1985. While the total number of U.S. nuclear warheads has declined from 23,368 in 1985 to 7,300 in 2015, the large infrastructure and bureaucracy remain in place. The average annual cost per warhead in 1985 was $354,000, compared to $1.8 million annually per warhead today.

    These costs will rise even further as the U.S. continues to design and build new nuclear warheads, delivery vehicles and production facilities that will allow it to retain nuclear weapons for many decades to come.

    Robert Alvarez, “More Bucks for the Bang,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, February 23, 2015.

    Over 10 Percent Increase for Nuclear Weapons in Budget Request

     

    The Obama administration has requested a 10.5% increase, to $8.85 billion, in the Fiscal Year 2016 budget request for the nuclear weapon programs of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The budget increase was requested to accommodate the United States’ 30-year nuclear weapon modernization plan. In contrast, funding for cleaning up radioactive contamination remains the same as previous years, even as the estimated cost for cleaning up this contamination rises. Similarly, the budget request contains only $48 million for dismantlement of retired nuclear warheads.

    “DOE Nuclear Weapons Budget Up 10%, Equals Cold War Record,” Nuclear Watch New Mexico, February 11, 2015.

    Nuclear Insanity

    U.S. Missile Officer Ran Violent Street Gang

     

    A U.S. Air Force nuclear missileer stationed at Minot Air Force Base, North Dakota, was tried for a plethora of crimes committed while leading a violent street gang. Capt. Leon Brown IV was eventually convicted of “two counts of sexual assault of a child younger than 16; distribution of marijuana and psilocybin; use of psilocybin; willful dereliction of duty; conduct unbecoming of an officer and a gentleman; pandering; unlawful entry; and four specifications of communicating threats.” He was sentenced to twenty-five years in prison and dishonorably discharged.

    Kristin Davis, “AF: Missileer Who Ran ‘Violent Street Gang’ Gets 25 Years,” Air Force Times, February 2, 2015.

    Prescribed Burn Canceled at Rocky Flats Plutonium Site

     

    The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has canceled a prescribed burn at the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge due to public opposition. From 1952-89, the United States produced plutonium cores for nuclear weapons at Rocky Flats. The site was raided by the FBI in 1989 and was shut down due to extreme environmental contamination.

    Activists argue that a prescribed burn would cause plutonium particles to be released into the air, carried by the wind and, ultimately, inhaled by people. Plutonium is extremely harmful to humans, even in minute quantities.

    LeRoy Moore, “Burn Canceled; What’s Next?,” Boulder Daily Camera, February 20, 2015.

    Nuclear Proliferation

    Iran Nuclear Negotiations Progress

     

    Following another round of high-level negotiations, both sides are mulling over a proposal that would see Iran’s nuclear production severely limited for 10 years, with another 5 years of diminished restrictions. The United States has insisted that Iran’s breakout capacity be constrained for “double-digit years.” The speed at which Iran might make a nuclear bomb is a paramount U.S. interest, one that forms the crux of these negotiations. With the March 31 deadline approaching, both sides are keenly aware that a framework for the final June 30 deadline is essential for a permanent deal.

    Michael Gordon and David Sanger, “Negotiators Weigh Plan to Phase Out Nuclear Limits on Iran,” The New York Times, February 23, 2015.

    Nuclear Disarmament

    Latin American and Caribbean Countries Commit to Austrian Pledge

     

    At the third annual summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), all 33 heads of state restated their commitment to a world without nuclear weapons. They also gave their unanimous support to the Austrian Pledge to address the “legal gap” between the commitment to nuclear disarmament and its legal manifestations. According to Daniel Högsta of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, “The Austrian Pledge is a rallying call for states to demand action to fill an unacceptable legal gap. The momentum generated by the humanitarian initiative is paving the way for the commencement of a process to ban nuclear weapons. CELAC states have added their voices to the call. We expect other regions to do the same.”

    “33 Latin American and Caribbean States Endorse Austrian Pledge and Call for Negotiations on a Ban Treaty,” International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, January 30, 2015.

    Nuclear Testing

    Fiji Compensates Nuclear Test Victims as UK Stalls

     

    The Fijian government recently compensated the remaining survivors of British nuclear tests done on Christmas Island in 1957-58. The payments came after decades of campaigning by veterans and their children for recognition of the serious health problems they suffered. After waiting for British compensation to no avail, the Fijian prime minister, Frank Bainimarama, said,  “The Pacific nation could wait no longer.” The personnel known to have suffered from conditions such as cancer, leukemia and other blood disorders were each given the equivalent of $4,788 U.S. dollars in payment for their suffering.

    “Fiji Compensates Its Veterans of British Nuclear Tests in the Pacific,” Agence France Presse, January 30, 2015.

    Resources

    Recommended Reading on the Dangerous Situation in Ukraine

     

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation has compiled a short list of recommended reading about the current dangerous situation in Ukraine. The list includes articles by Andy Lichterman of Western States Legal Foundation, Martin Hellman of Stanford University and Robert Parry, an author and investigative journalist.

    To see the list of recommended reading, click here.

    This Month in Nuclear Threat History

     

    History chronicles many instances when humans have been threatened by nuclear weapons. In this article, Jeffrey Mason outlines some of the most serious threats that have taken place in the month of March, including the March 10, 1956 crash  of a U.S. Air Force B-47 bomber, carrying two capsules of payload pits for nuclear warheads. The bomber was lost at sea while flying from MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, to a NATO base in Morocco.

    To read Mason’s full article, click here.

    For more information on the history of the Nuclear Age, visit NAPF’s Nuclear Files website.

    SGI Peace Proposal

     

    Daisaku Ikeda, President of Soka Gakkai International, has published his 2015 Peace Proposal. Regarding the abolition of nuclear weapons, a consistent theme of Ikeda’s proposals, he applauds the fact that, in October 2014, a total of 155 countries and territories signed the Joint Statement on the Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons. Over 80% of UN member states have now clearly stated that nuclear weapons should be never used under any circumstances.

    Ikeda asserts that, while the gulf between the nuclear-weapon states and those calling for nuclear abolition appears great, there is common ground in the desire to avoid the horrific outcome of any use of nuclear weapons. He urges heads of government to attend the 2015 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference and calls on them to voice there the pledges of their governments to eliminate the danger posed by nuclear weapons.

    To read a full copy of the 2015 Peace Proposal, click here.

    Nuclear Disarmament: The Road Ahead

     

    The International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms has published a new paper entitled “Nuclear Disarmament: The Road Ahead.” The paper recommends that states seek agreement on commencement of negotiations on a comprehensive convention prohibiting and eliminating nuclear weapons at the upcoming Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference and beyond. It explains the mandate for such negotiations arising out of General Assembly resolutions, the NPT, and the 1996 Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice,  as well as the illegality of nuclear weapons under international humanitarian law.

    To read a copy of the paper, click here.

    Foundation Activities

    14th Annual Kelly Lecture Features Dr. Helen Caldicott

     

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s 14th Annual Frank K. Kelly Lecture on Humanity’s Future will feature Dr. Helen Caldicott, an Australian physician and renowned anti-nuclear advocate. Her lecture, entitled “Preserving Humanity’s Future,” will take place on March 5, 2015 at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara, California.

    Tickets start at $10 and are on sale at the Lobero Theatre box office online or by phone at (805) 963-0761.

    Swackhamer Disarmament Video Contest Now Underway

     

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s annual Swackhamer Disarmament Video Contest is now underway. The contest is open to people of all ages around the world. Contestants must make a video of 90 seconds or less on the topic “The Imperative of Reaching Nuclear Zero: The Marshall Islands Stands Up for All Humanity.”

    Entries are due by April 1, and the top videos will receive cash prizes. For more information and a complete set of rules, click here. You can also “like” the contest’s Facebook page and see the videos as contestants post them.

    New Book by NAPF President David Krieger

     

    Wake Up! is the latest poetry book by David Krieger, in which he continues on his path of writing piercing and thought-provoking peace poetry. His poems are often poems of remembrance, as well as warnings about the dangers of the nuclear age. Wake Up! is divided into six sections: Truth Is Beauty; War; Remembering Bush II; Global Hiroshima; Peace; Portraits; and Imperfection.

    The book has received much praise. Nobel Peace Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu wrote, “There is haunting beauty and truth in this poetry.” Doug Rawlings, poet and Vietnam War veteran, said of Wake Up! that “…it reads like a series of eloquent telegrams sent directly to the heart of a culture, ours…”  Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet and author of A Coney Island of the Mind, wrote:  “Wake Up! is accessible and moving writing, setting itself against the dominant murderous culture of our time. Every poem hits home.”

    Click here to order a copy of the book.

    From Peace Leaders to Peace Heroes

     

    When Paul K. Chappell, Director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, visited the Dayton International Peace Museum in Dayton, Ohio, for a week’s worth of events, the museum made a request. Could Paul put down his thoughts about peace heroes that they could use in the spring campaign for their first annual peace heroes walk?

    Paul wrote a 2,500 word essay entitled “The Little Book of Peace Heroes,” which is published on the museum’s website and will soon be available as a pamphlet to be distributed nationwide to schools and concerned organizations.

    To read more about Paul’s recent trip to Ohio, click here.

    Quotes

     

    “It is time for States, and all those of us in a position to influence them, to act with urgency and determination to bring the era of nuclear weapons to an end.”

    — Peter Maurer, President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, in a speech to diplomats in Geneva.

     

    “The human failing I would most like to correct is aggression. It may have had survival advantage in caveman days, to get more food, territory or a partner with whom to reproduce, but now it threatens to destroy us all.”

    — Physicist Stephen Hawking.

     

    “It is my firm belief that the infinite and uncontrollable fury of nuclear weapons should never be held in the hands of any mere mortal ever again, for any reason.”

    — Mikhail Gorbachev, former President of the USSR and 1990 Nobel Peace Laureate. This quote is featured in the book Speaking of Peace: Quotations to Inspire Action, available from the NAPF Peace Store.

     

    “The experience of the Bravo explosion on March 1st, 1954 was a jolt on my soul that never left me.”

    — Tony de Brum, Foreign Minister of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, describing his memory of the U.S. Castle Bravo nuclear test, the largest ever conducted by the United States.

    Editorial Team

     

    Shervin Ghaffari
    David Krieger
    Carol Warner
    Rick Wayman

     

  • From Peace Leaders to Peace Heroes

    From Peace Leaders to Peace Heroes

    When Paul K. Chappell, Director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, visited the Dayton International Peace Museum in Dayton, Ohio, for a week’s worth of events, the museum made a request. Could Paul put down his thoughts about peace heroes that they could use in the spring campaign for their first annual peace heroes walk?

    Paul wrote a 2,500 word essay now called “The Little Book of Peace Heroes” published on the museum’s website and soon to be available as a pamphlet to be distributed nationwide to schools and concerned organizations. Paul will also give a presentation at Dayton’s Neon Theatre on peace hero ideals to the museum’s peace hero team captains on Sunday, April 19.

    Paul’s Dayton February events included the Wright State University Peace Club, a one day peace leadership training, lectures at Sinclair Community College and Wilmington College, and a peace leadership training for faculty and college staff from throughout the Dayton area.

    “Paul is a skilled and knowledgeable presenter whose engaging style appeals to a broad audience,” said Museum Director Jerry Leggett. “His approachability and practical responses to tough questions played well with the university students and faculty who represented the largest percentage of his audience.”

    Chappell will return to the Dayton area in late April for another series of events, including as featured speaker at a Regional Rotary Conference at the Hope Hotel in Dayton. The Hope Hotel, located at the No Pass Entrance to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, was the location for the Dayton Peace Accords that ended the 3 ½ year-long Bosnian War.

  • March: This Month in Nuclear Threat History

    March 1, 1982 – President Ronald Reagan watched the Pentagon’s National Military Command Center rehearse a full-scale nuclear exchange between the United States and Soviet Union. Thousands of red dots appeared on the map of the United States, each indicating the impact of thermonuclear warheads on U.S. territory and each symbolizing the resulting deaths and injuries of hundreds of millions of Americans. The same was true for the map of the Soviet Union. The 40th President eventually pronounced that, “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” (Source: Craig Nelson. “The Age of Radiance.” New York: Simon & Shuster, 2014, p. 328.)

    March 3, 1980 – The Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials, which set out levels of physical protection during the transport of nuclear materials and established a framework of international cooperation in the recovery and return of stolen nuclear material, was signed at U.N. Headquarters in New York City on this date, ratified by the U.S. on December 13, 1982 and by the Soviet Union of May 25, 1983, and entered into force on February 8, 1987. Comments: These and other agreements could be substantially strengthened with the multilateral negotiation and ratification of a comprehensive fissile materials elimination agreement and an international campaign, ideally initiated by President Barack Obama, to phase out and clean up all global civilian nuclear power generating plants as well as all global nuclear weapons production facilities by the year 2030. (Source: Jack Mendelsohn and David Grahame, editors. “Arms Control Chronology.” Washington, DC: Center for Defense Information, 2002, p. 64.)

    March 10, 1956 – A U.S. Air Force B-47 bomber, carrying two capsules of payload pits for nuclear warheads, crashed and was lost at sea while flying from MacDill Air Force Base, Florida to a NATO base in Western Europe. Comments: This incident represents yet another example of hundreds of nuclear accidents, near-misses, and “Broken Arrows,” only some of which the Pentagon and other members of the Nuclear Club have formally acknowledged. (Source: Eric Schlosser. “Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Incident, and the Illusion of Safety.” New York: Penguin Press, 2013.)

    March 11, 1985 – After the demise of Konstantin Chernenko, Mikhail Gorbachev was selected to serve as General Secretary of the Communist Party Central Committee (and eventually as President of the Soviet Union).   This new generation Soviet leader promoted glasnost (“openness”) and perestroika (“restructuring”) and other reforms including reductions in the size of the Soviet military. On March 24, 1985, Gorbachev wrote the first of a series of letters to President Reagan pleading for peaceful coexistence. On January 15, 1986, he announced a three-stage proposal to eliminate nuclear weapons by the year 2000 but, influenced by hardline advisors, President Reagan rejected this plan. Eventually both sides, including Reagan’s successor George H. W. Bush, signed the START I treaty and the Soviet Union was dissolved in December 1991. The Cold War was over. Gorbachev accepted the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990 and retired from politics. In January of 2015, Gorbachev warned that the current confrontation between NATO and Russia in Ukraine could trigger an all-out war. “I can no longer say that this Cold War will not lead to a ‘Hot War’,” he said, “I fear that they (U.S./E.U., Ukraine, and Russian governments) could risk it.”   Comments: The risks of nuclear war are as high as ever and yet politicians, pundits, and so-called “experts” on both sides continually downgrade and disregard the threat of Omnicide. (Source: Jack Mendelsohn and David Grahame, editors. “Arms Control Chronology.” Washington, DC: Center for Defense Information, 2002, pp. 30-31.)

    March 12, 1995 – America’s Defense Monitor, a half-hour documentary PBS-TV series that premiered in 1987, released a new film, “Managing America’s Nuclear Complex” produced by the Center for Defense Information, a non-partisan, nonprofit organization and independent monitor of the Pentagon, founded in 1972, whose board of directors and staff included retired military officers (Rear Admiral Eugene Carroll, Jr.), former U.S. government officials (Philip Coyle, who served as assistant secretary of defense), and civilian experts (Dr. Bruce Blair, a former U.S. Air Force nuclear missile launch control officer). The program discussed issues associated with the underfunded (then and now) cleanup of dozens of major sites (such as Fernald, Ohio, Hanford, Washington, Paducah, Kentucky, and Oak Ridge, Tennessee) and hundreds of smaller Pentagon and Department of Energy installations involved in nuclear weapon production. Comments: Today, there remain serious concerns about the continuing health and environmental risks of not only these military nuclear sites but of nearly one hundred civilian nuclear power reactors and the accompanying infrastructure including the flawed Waste Isolation Pilot Plant nuclear waste storage site near Carlsbad, New Mexico.

    March 15, 1954 – Although President Dwight Eisenhower later rejected a Joint Chiefs of Staff Advanced Study Group recommendation that the United States, “deliberately precipitate (nuclear) war with the U.S.S.R. in the near future…before the U.S.S.R. could achieve a large enough thermonuclear capability to be a real menace to the continental U.S.,” on this date, consistent with that study, a Strategic Air Command briefing given by General Curtis LeMay advocated the use of 600-750 atomic bombs in a two-hour period so that, “all of Russia would be nothing but a smoking radioactive ruin.” (Source: Richard Rhodes. “Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb.” New York: Simon & Shuster, 1996, pp. 563-564.)

    March 21, 1997 – At the Helsinki Summit, Presidents William Clinton and Boris Yeltsin issued a Joint Statement on the Parameters of Future Reductions in Nuclear Forces with significant START II reductions to 2,000 to 2,500 deployed strategic nuclear warheads by December 31, 2007 and with a bilateral goal of making the START treaties permanent. Presidents Obama and Medvedev reduced strategic nuclear weapons further in the New START Treaty however, despite Obama’s April 2009 Prague speech rhetoric about eliminating nuclear weapons, both nations have recently proposed increased spending for nuclear weapons, laboratory upgrades, and a new generation of launch platforms with the U.S. potentially spending $1 trillion in the next 30 years. (Sources: Jack Mendelsohn and David Grahame, editors. “Arms Control Chronology.” Washington, DC: Center for Defense Information, 2002, pp. 40-44, and mainstream and alternative news media reports from November 2014-February 2015.)

    March 26, 1999 – With the start of the NATO campaign of air strikes against Bosnian Serb forces, the Russian Duma postponed a vote on the START II Treaty (which was later ratified on April 14, 2000 by a vote of 288-131).   Comments: Just as today, NATO considers direct Russian military intervention in Ukraine a violation of the 35-nation August 1975 Helsinki Final Act, so too did Russia consider NATO military action against her Serbian allies in the Balkans as a similar violation of the 1975 agreement to prevent future nation-state conflict in Europe.   The U.S., NATO, Russia, and Ukraine all need to make major concessions to de-escalate the current Ukraine Crisis, which could conceivably trigger a wider European war or even a nuclear conflict!   (Source: Jack Mendelsohn and David Grahame, editors. “Arms Control Chronology.” Washington, DC: Center for Defense Information, 2002, pp. 42, 119.)

    March 28, 1979 – A partial meltdown of two reactors at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania near Harrisburg was one of the most serious nuclear accidents in history. It caused a massive release of radioactive products endangering residents in the region in the immediate aftermath and for decades after this incident. The “cleanup” of the accident between August 1979 and December 1993 cost taxpayers approximately $1 billion.   The incident came four years after the Norman C. Rasmussen-chaired Nuclear Regulatory Commission-sponsored report (designated “WASH-1400”), which downgraded the nuclear accident consequences noted in previous government and nongovernmental reports.   German-American nuclear physicist Hans Bethe (1906-2005) wrote an article in the January 1976 edition of Scientific American, which provided a more realistic threat assessment of a catastrophic nuclear reactor meltdown than the Rasmussen Report. Bethe’s analysis concluded that a serious nuclear accident would claim 3,300 prompt fatalities, create 45,000 instances of early radiation illness, impact 240,000 individuals with cancerous thyroid nodules over a 30-year period, produce 45,000 latent cancer fatalities over the same time period, and trigger approximately 30,000 genetic defects spanning a 150-year period. His estimated cost (in 1976 dollars) of such an accident was $14 billion. Comments: In addition to the dangerous risk of nuclear power plant accidents like Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima, the tremendously out-of-control civilian and military nuclear waste sequestration, remediation, and permanent storage conundrum, as well as the terrorist targeting potential, the economic unsustainability of civilian nuclear power, and the potential for nuclear proliferation points logically to an accelerated phase-out of global civilian nuclear power plants over the next decade. (Sources: “14 Year Cleanup at Three Mile Island Concludes.” New York Times. Aug. 15, 1993 accessed on February 6, 2015 at www.nytimes.com and various news media reports.)

  • Marshall Islands’ Foreign Minister Speaks Out on Dismissal of Lawsuit and Plans to Appeal

    On February 3, 2015, the U.S. Federal District Court granted the U.S. government’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the Marshall Islands. The lawsuit sought to hold the U.S. to its legal obligations to pursue negotiations in good faith for an end to the nuclear arms race and for nuclear disarmament.

    The Court dismissed the case on the jurisdictional grounds of standing and political question doctrine without getting to the merits of the case. On February 6, 2015, the U.S. Embassy in Majuro issued a statement welcoming the Court’s decision. On February 23, 2015, Foreign Minister Tony de Brum, of the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), delivered a speech to the RMI parliament in which he explained some of the key issues in the ruling and also responded to the U.S. Embassy’s statement.

    De Brum made it clear that the RMI was disappointed by the Court’s decision and plans to appeal it to a higher court. He stated, “Nuclear weapons are not our friend, nor the friend of the U.S. or any other country. Rather, these weapons are the enemy of all humankind. That is why we will stand up for what we believe in, and we will be appealing the Court’s dismissal of the lawsuit to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the next step in the American judicial process.”

    De Brum explained that the U.S. did not argue the case on the merits, but rather sought dismissal on jurisdictional grounds, claiming that the RMI did not have standing to bring the lawsuit and that the case was subject to the political question doctrine.

    With regard to standing, de Brum said that as a party to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), the RMI does have standing to bring this case against other NPT parties that are not fulfilling their obligations, including the U.S. He argued that the Court’s decision creates precedent that parties to treaties with the U.S. do not have legal recourse in U.S. courts.

    Regarding the political question doctrine, the Court held that it was up to the Executive and not the Court to fulfill (or, implicitly, decide not to fulfill) its legal obligations to negotiate in good faith for nuclear disarmament. The Court’s ruling would leave the disarmament obligation in the hands of the branch of government that has failed to fulfill the U.S. obligation for 45 years.

    The U.S. Embassy in the Marshall Islands cited President Obama’s vision of a world without nuclear weapons. De Brum agreed, “The RMI welcomes this reassertion of President Obama’s vision. We share this vision. That is why we implore the U.S. to honor its binding NPT Article VI obligations, namely negotiations in good faith relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament.”

    David Krieger, President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (NAPF), a consultant to the RMI in its lawsuits, stated, “It’s encouraging to hear the resolve of the Marshall Islands in Minister de Brum’s remarks. This tiny Pacific Island nation is taking a stand for all humanity. They are bold and courageous, and they know they are right in pressing the nuclear-armed countries to fulfill their legal obligations. I admire the persistence and spirit of the people of the Marshall Islands.”

    The RMI also remains engaged in the three lawsuits for which there is compulsory jurisdiction at the International Court of Justice – those against India, Pakistan and the UK. To learn more about the Nuclear Zero lawsuits, go to nuclearzero.org.

    To read the full statement by Minister de Brum, click here.

    Note to editor: to arrange interviews with David Krieger (President of NAPF) or Laurie Ashton (head of RMI legal team for U.S. case), please call Sandy Jones or Rick Wayman at (805) 965-3443.

    The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation was founded in 1982. Its mission is to educate and advocate for peace and a world free of nuclear weapons and to empower peace leaders. The Foundation is a non-partisan, non-profit organization with consultative status to the United Nations and is comprised of individuals and groups worldwide who realize the imperative for peace in the Nuclear Age.

  • Reagan’s Ambassador to Moscow Says US Suffers from Autistic Foreign Policy

    martin_hellman1This article was originally published by Defusing the Nuclear Threat.

    Three days ago, I posted excerpts I had found in news articles from an important but overlooked speech by Ambassador Jack Matlock. Today I found both a full transcript of his speech and its YouTube video. Matlock was our Ambassador to Moscow under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush.

    I compared the transcript to the video and found the transcript to be accurate. Other than cleaning up some verbal comments to make them more readable, I only found a few, inconsequential errors. I’ve attached what I saw as the most important parts of Ambassador Matlock’s speech below my signature line.

    If you think this speech deserve greater attention, please let friends know of this post via email, Facebook, Twitter, Linked-In, or other social media. This speech by one of America’s most respected experts on foreign relations – Matlock represented us in key negotiations to end the Cold War – still has not been covered by the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, and I suspect most other major American media. (An OpEd in the Washington Post did mention it, but only in passing and in derogatory terms. Another OpEd in the Post reported on the speech in favorable terms.)

    Martin Hellman

    === BEGIN EXCERPTS FROM AMBASSADOR MATLOCK’S SPEECH ===

    … as things have developed, and as I see debates now as to whether the United States should supply lethal weapons to Ukraine, I wonder what is going on.

    I see all these debates, and saying, “Oh, Russia’s only a regional power.” … I think the elephant in the room, which nobody is referring to, is the nuclear issue. No country which has ICBMs … is a regional power.* …

    The most important thing we did in ending the Cold War was cooling the nuclear arms race. If there are any issues for this country to face that are existential, that’s it. …

    If the United States gets further involved in what is, in the minds of the Russians, territory [Ukraine] which has historically been part of their country, given the present atmosphere, I don’t see how we are going to prevent another nuclear arms race. And that’s what scares me.

    … when we ended the Cold War, we had a coherent policy … Our goal, and that of our allies, and that of the Soviet leaders, and their successor Russian leaders, was a Europe whole and free. …

    Now, there’s been a lot of debate as to whether President Gorbachev was promised that there would be no NATO expansion to the East. There was no treaty signed saying that. But as we negotiated an agreement to end the Cold War, first President [George H.W.] Bush, at a Malta meeting in 1989, and then later, in 1990, almost all the Western leaders, told Gorbachev: If you remove your troops from Eastern Europe, if you let Eastern Europe go free, then we will not take advantage of it.

    Now, there’s no way, by moving an alliance that was originally designed to protect Western Europe from the aggression of the East, you move it to the East—how are you going to keep a Europe whole and free? If you have a Europe whole and free, Russia and all the others have to be part of the system.

    So later, not out of design, but simply, I think, largely because of domestic politics, and the East Europeans wanting protection against a threat that at that point didn’t exist, but [which] might in the future, we started expanding NATO.

    The Russian reaction at first was not that negative, but then other things began to happen. After 9/11, then President Putin was the first foreign President to call President [George W.] Bush, and offer their cooperation and support. And we got it when we invaded Afghanistan. We got their vote in the UN. We got intelligence support and other support, logistics support, in getting there.

    What did they get in return? … We walk out of the ABM Treaty, which was the basis of all of our arms control treaties, and the one in which we could deal with each other as equals. We keep on expanding NATO, and not only expand it, we begin to talk about bases there [in Eastern Europe], about deploying anti-ballistic missiles, for no good reason at all. Supposedly it was to defend the Europeans against the Iranians—the Iranians at that point didn’t have missiles that could attack them, nor was it apparent to many of us why the Iranians would ever want to attack the Europeans. What are they going to get out of that? …

    We didn’t set out … to stick it to Russia. I don’t think there was any intent. We had a lot of reasons, mainly domestic political reasons, to follow these courses. But, we were simply ignoring the Russian reaction, the inevitable Russian reaction.

    And so what we began to get was a reaction from what you could say was, at best, inconsiderate American actions, to a Russian over-reaction. And you know, when you set up these vibrations, they can be amplified. …

    But the process was, that we developed an atmosphere, which, even before this Ukrainian crisis broke upon us, was one of … perceived hostility … between us. Something that we had [ended], when we ended the Cold War. …

    [When President Reagan was working to end the Cold War, he wrote a memo that] said we’re much too upfront on human rights. We will get a lot of cheers from the bleachers by beating up on them on human rights, but it will not help the people involved. In fact, it could hurt them. And he went on to say, we’ve got to go private. It’s too important to confront them.

    And he concluded this memo by saying, whatever we achieve, we must not consider it victory, because that will simply make the next achievement more difficult.

    You have, in a nutshell, a description, I would say, of what, in the last 15 years at least, we have been doing the opposite. And I think what Reagan understood … was human relations. And he also understood, unlike many of the people on his staff, that the other side are made up also of human beings, with their own politics, their own requirements. And number one, you’ve got to deal with them with respect, and you’ve got to deal with them in a way that you don’t expect them to do something that is not in the true interest of their country.

    So, our effort then was simply, that we needed to convince the Soviet leader—and in this case, eventually, Gorbachev—that their past policy was not serving their interests. And it was not! …

    Now, what do we see has happened [today to make a new Cold War possible]? … I would say it’s not just the President—in fact, the worst offender by far is the U.S. Congress. And what Russia has been reacting to is what they consider insufferable arrogance and humiliation for several years. … we’re reading op-eds right now—to save the world system of peace, we must provide arms to Ukraine so that they can defend themselves. …

    Let me add another element now, which I find particularly disturbing, and that is the personalization of the whole relationship. It’s hard to read anything in most of our press that doesn’t attribute all the Russian actions to one man, and that man is usually characterized in the most unflattering terms, with various names. This is true both of the media, which, of course, can call things as they wish, but also, of our officials. You know, it seems to me that if you really want to settle the situation, you don’t set up, in effect, a public duel between your President and another person, particularly when the other President has most of the marbles in the nation at issue.

    When President Putin says we’re not going to allow the Ukrainian situation to be resolved by military means, he means it. And no amount of shouting about this is going to change that. And for the President of the United States to appear to challenge him to do other things, simply has a negative effect. …

    So, I think that one thing that we need to do, is to get this personal debate at the top of the government out. We really have to stop that, because it’s got a negative effect! When you say, “I’ve isolated him, he’s losing. Look, you didn’t like what I was doing, but this guy’s losing.” What’s his reaction? “I’ll show him if I’m losing!”

    So, who wins from that sort of exchange?

    But the biggest problem really hasn’t been the President. He’s been much better on many of these issues than Congress. And I would say one of the most outrageous things, that did much to create the atmosphere that we are in, which is one that nobody is going to benefit from, was the Magnitsky Act. [Search this blog on Magnitsky and Jackson-Vanik (its predecessor) for details.]

    Here you have the United States Congress, which, in that year [2012], could not even pass a budget, passing a law about a court case in Moscow, where it was alleged that the lawyer was mistreated, and he died while he was in detention. That was potentially a real scandal in Moscow.

    So, what does the U.S. Congress do? They pass legislation requiring the Administration to identify publicly, and take action … [against] specific people who might have been involved. One of the things, when I was ambassador in Moscow, I would talk about a lot, is how we really need to respect the principle of innocent until proven guilty. Here we have a case, in another jurisdiction—there may have been a scandal there, there may not have been—a law is passed, limited to Russia, by name, and when one Congressman was asked about it, he said, “Oh, it’s not about Russia, it’s about human rights.”

    If it’s not about Russia, why did you limit it to Russia? And I would point out, this was at a time when the United States had torturers and was not prosecuting them. Was that any concern to the American Congress? It was a time where, since then, we have learned that were several prisoners on death row who were proved to be innocent. … It would seem to me that the U.S. Congress should pay a little more attention [to those violations of human rights]. … human rights are important, very important. But you do not protect them by public pressure on another country, particularly when you are unwilling to judge yourself.

    The State Department, now for decades, has to report on human rights in every country in the world, but one—want to guess which one that is?

    … it seems to me when I really looked at what our policies have been … what we have gotten has been action/reaction, insults followed by insults answered, and so on. I wonder, when I think about how the policy is made, I was wondering, how do you characterize this?

    We’ve heard a lot recently about autism, and whether there’s any connection with vaccination and so on. And suddenly, I said, you know, we have an autistic foreign policy! Let me read you—I went back and looked at the actual definition of autism:

    “Autism is characterized by impaired social interaction, verbal and non-verbal communication, and restricted and repetitive behavior.”

    When the Congress of the United States votes over 30 times in a legislation they know is never going to become law, I would say that is restricted and repetitive behavior, and our problem is really an autistic foreign policy.

    ___________

    * Ambassador Matlock was referring to President Obama’s March 25, 2014, speech at The Hague, in which he said: “With respect to Mr. Romney’s assertion that Russia’s our number one geopolitical foe, the truth of the matter is that, you know, America’s got a whole lot of challenges. Russia is a regional power that is threatening some of its immediate neighbors — not out of strength, but out of weakness.”

  • Nuclear Nations in the Dock

    This article was originally published by ON LINE Opinion (Australia’s e-journal of social and political debate).

    A little known court case initiated by an inconspicuous Pacific Island state might not seem very newsworthy, but when there’s a David and Goliath element involving some of the world’s most powerful nations, with implications for Australia, we should take notice.

    The small nation state of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, with a population of just over 50,000 people, is taking the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, China, France, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).   What do this motley lot have in common?  Between them, they possess the world’s 16,300 most destructive, horrific and indiscriminate weapons, nuclear weapons.

    No nation has a stronger moral claim to call the nuclear armed states to account than the Marshall Islands.   From 1946 to 1958, the US conducted 67 nuclear weapons tests there, all the while reassuring the local people that the tests would “with God’s blessing, result in kindness and benefit to all mankind”.  Instead they resulted in dispossession, destruction of atolls and long term radioactive contamination.

    However Marshall Islands’ Foreign Minister Tony de Brum says that the lawsuit is not about compensation for past wrongs, but is an attempt to draw attention to the nuclear sword of Damocles still poised over all of humanity.  He reflects the grave concern of many nations.  A recent series of government conferences –  in Norway in 2013, Mexico in early 2014 and Austria in December, the latter attracting 159 governments – has examined the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons, with the unequivocal conclusion that any use of these weapons would cause human suffering on an unimaginable scale, far beyond any capacity for humanitarian response.  The impacts on health, the environment, agriculture, food security, and the economy would be catastrophic, widespread and long term. There would be no winners.

    The Marshall Islands claims that all nine nuclear armed states violate their legal duty to get rid of their weapons.  The claim rests in part on the 1996 advisory opinion of the ICJ on the legal status of nuclear weapons, which included the judges’ unanimous declaration that “There exists an obligation to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament in all its aspects…….”.  This judgement in turn drew on the disarmament obligation enshrined in article 6 of the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).  After nearly 45 years, and endless platitudes, it remains unfulfilled.  The 5-yearly NPT review conference will be held in New York in April; signs that article 6 will be given the pre-eminent focus it deserves are not strong.

    For Australia, this is anything but a quaint and esoteric legal exercise, and we are anything but an innocent bystander.  Successive Australian governments pay lip service to the goal of a nuclear weapons free world, while simultaneously giving support to US nuclear weapons, under the extraordinarily foolish notion that they protect us.  Goliath, with his genocidal weapons, has our unbridled loyalty and complicity.  We are in fact part of the problem.

    The Marshall Islands’ case faces big hurdles in The Hague, including acceptance of the jurisdiction of the ICJ.  However, in the court of public opinion there is no doubt.  Nuclear armed states have escaped accountability for far too long.

    De Brum, along with many other governments, leaders and a large civil society movement, are urging a new approach – a treaty to ban nuclear weapons, just as chemical and biological weapons are banned by treaty.  Such an achievement would not be a panacea (for we have none), but it would be a powerful tool, probably the best available, to delegitimise the weapons and stigmatise any nation with the deluded belief that it has a right to retain the worst of all weapons of mass destruction.

    There is a sense of urgency about this, which is hardly surprising.  In January the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the hands of its Doomsday Clock to three minutes to midnight, the closest they’ve been to nuclear catastrophe since 1984. Meanwhile, the major nuclear armed states, meeting in London on 6 February ahead of the NPT review in April, noted their progress on a glossary of key nuclear terms.  Deck chairs on the Titanic come to mind.

    This year marks the 70th anniversaries, in August, of the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, an appropriate if somewhat belated time to act. Decades after their own nuclear nightmares, the people of the Marshall Islands are to be applauded and supported as they attempt to hold the nuclear armed Goliaths accountable for their flagrant violation of the global norm against weapons of mass destruction.  The message should be heeded by countries such as Australia, for whom a nuclear alliance blinds us to the possibility of real progress.

    Dr Sue Wareham is a Canberra GP who joined the Medical Association for Prevention of War out of a “horror at the destructive capacity of a single nuclear weapon”. She has many interests and fields of expertise, including the contribution of peace to global sustainability. Sue believes that her work with MAPW is fundamental to her commitment to the protection of human life and the improvement of human well-being. She is immediate past President of the Medical Association for Prevention of War (Australia); and on the Australian Management Committee of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons.

  • Speech Delivered to the Marshall Islands Parliament

    This is the English translation of the speech delivered by Foreign Minister Tony de Brum to the Nitijela (Parliament) of the Republic of the Marshall Islands on February 23, 2015.

    Tony de BrumOn February 3, 2015, the US Federal District Court granted the US government’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the Marshall Islands seeking to hold the US to its legal obligations to pursue negotiations in good faith for an end to the nuclear arms race at an early date and for nuclear disarmament. On February 6, 2015, the US Embassy in Majuro issued a statement in which it welcomed the Court’s decision. We now wish to explain some of the issues in the February 3rd ruling, provide our position on certain aspects, and respond to certain parts of the US February 6th statement.

    Since the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) entered into force 45 years ago, and the US recommitted to its obligations under the NPT in 2010, we believe the time is right for legal action to enforce the US disarmament obligations. Every day that nuclear weapons remain in the world on high alert status, the Marshall Islands and every other country remains threatened. And every day that the US continues to refuse to negotiate for nuclear disarmament, the RMI is denied the benefit of the bargain under the NPT.

    The US did not argue the case on the merits, but rather sought dismissal on jurisdictional grounds. The Court upheld the US claims that the RMI did not have standing to bring the lawsuit, and that the case was subject to the Political Question doctrine and thus should be left in the hands of the political branches of government, in this case the Executive. We are disappointed with the Court’s ruling and, respectfully, believe it to be in error.

    Regarding standing to bring the case, the Court held that the harm to the Marshall Islands from the US breach of the NPT was speculative, and that even if the RMI were denied the benefit of its bargain under the NPT, the Court could not order the Executive to comply with the law. But the harm is not speculative, and the US Senate history confirms that—referring to vertical nuclear proliferation as the gravest threat to humankind. Indeed, it is hard to imagine the US arguing that harm from the pursuit of nuclear weapons by other countries is speculative. Yet the US Embassy welcomes a decision finding harm from a breach of the NPT to be speculative.

    As a party to the NPT, we believe that we have standing to bring this case against other NPT parties, including the US, that are not fulfilling their obligations. But the Court, in dismissing, creates precedent that parties to treaties with the US do not have legal recourse in US courts. Instead compliance with treaties is subject to the unassailable interpretation, politics and disposition of each changing President. Again, it is hard to imagine the US arguing that legal compliance by other countries with respect to the law concerning weapons of mass destruction is subject to the unassailable interpretation, politics and disposition of each sitting Executive.

    Regarding the Political Question doctrine, the Court held that it was up to the Executive to fulfill (or, implicitly, decide not to fulfill) its legal obligations to negotiate in good faith back for nuclear disarmament. Contrary to the US February 6th statement, the Court did not rule that the objective of a world without nuclear weapons “can only be achieved ‘politically,’ through patient diplomacy.” Instead, in its February 3rd decision, the Court cited cases that provide that if negotiations fail (or don’t even begin), then war may be the next option, as opposed to a peaceful judicial remedy. We could not disagree more. It is exactly because we seek a peaceful resolution of the issue that we brought the case to the courts.

    In its February 6th statement, the US said, “President Obama’s vision of a world without nuclear weapons…remains a key objective of U.S. national security policy.” The RMI welcomes this reassertion of President Obama’s vision. We share this vision. That is why we implore the US to honor its binding NPT Article VI obligations, namely negotiations in good faith relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament. We implore the US to do what we are asking the Courts to order it to do: call for and convene negotiations for nuclear disarmament in all its aspects. Instead of continuing to claim compliance with the NPT while refusing to call for or convene any such negotiations, why doesn’t the US demonstrate compliance by actually calling for and convening such negotiations? Perhaps then the US commitment to achieving nuclear disarmament could become “unassailable,” as it claims it is in its February 6th statement.

    Also in its February 6th statement, the US referred to the Marshall Islands as “our friend and ally.” We have the same feeling toward the US. It is with respect and as a sovereign nation that we have gone to court to insist that the US fulfill its obligations under Article VI of the NPT and customary international law. Nuclear weapons are not our friend, nor the friend of the US or any other country. Rather, these weapons are the enemy of all humankind. That is why we will stand up for what we believe in, and we will be appealing the Court’s dismissal of the lawsuit to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the next step in the American judicial process.

    Finally, we note the US recognition, repeated in its February 6th statement, that “the Marshall Islands ‘has played an outsized role in the fight for a safer world.’” The legal action is part of that continued fight.

  • Nuclear Zero Profiles: Tony de Brum

    Tony de Brum

    In his own words:

    I am a nuclear witness and my memories from Likiep Atoll in the northern Marshalls are strong. I lived there as a boy for the entire 12 years of the US nuclear testing program and when I was 9 years old, I remember vividly the white flash of the Bravo detonation on Bikini atoll.

    It was in the morning and my grandfather and I were out fishing. Unlike previous ones, Bravo went off with a very bright flash, almost a blinding flash; bear in mind we were almost 200 miles away from ground zero. No sound, just a flash and then a force, the shock wave – as if you were under a glass bowl and someone poured blood over it. Everything turned red: sky, the ocean, the fish, my grandfather’s net. People in Rongelap claim they saw the sun rising from the West.

    My memories are a mixture of awe, of fear, and of youthful wonder. We were young, and military representatives were like gods and so our reactions to the tests as they took place were confused and terrifying. We had no clue what was happening to us and to our homelands. I saw the injuries to our countrymen from Rongelap and to this day cannot recall in words my sense of helplessness and anxiety without severe emotional stress. But for as long as I can remember, the explosions and the bizarre effects that lit up our skies are still a source of pain and anger. How could human beings do this to other humans?

    The emotional and psychological trauma to our people, both young and old, cannot be measured in real terms. The pain is real and the uncertainty is overwhelming. But we will never give up. We have a voice that will not be silenced until the world is rid of all nuclear weapons.

    Sources:
    huffingtonpost.com/…marshall-islands-nuclear-lawsuit
    wagingpeace.org/tony-de-brum-at-the-nuclear-zero-lawsuits-forum/

  • A Dangerous Trend Line

    This article was originally published on Defusing the Nuclear Threat.

    martin_hellman1For a number of years I have advocated a risk framework for reducing the danger of a Russian-American crisis escalating out of control to nuclear threats. One tool in that approach is to highlight early steps in accident chains which could lead to catastrophe and, instead of ignoring them, to treat them as early warning signs needing remedial action. Doing that is one goal of this blog, but a recent Gallup poll shows how miserably I (and others) are succeeding. Gallup’s accompanying news release starts out:

    Russia now edges out North Korea as the country Americans consider the United States’ greatest enemy. Two years ago, only 2% of Americans named Russia, but that increased to 9% in 2014 as tensions between Russia and the U.S. increased, and now sits at 18%.

    An article in yesterday’s Moscow Times notes a similar trend in Russia:

    Meanwhile, the results of a recent Russian survey shows the feelings are mutual. Some 81 percent of Russians view the United States negatively, independent Moscow-based pollster the Levada Center revealed earlier this month. The findings represented an all-time high for the pollster, which has been conducting similar studies since 1990.

    The Gallup news release concludes with a possible prescription for halting this accident chain before it progresses any closer to the nuclear abyss (emphasis added):

    However, because Americans’ attitudes about Russia have changed substantially in the past and have been quite positive at times — which has not been the case for countries such as Iran, Iraq and North Korea — if Russian and American policy interests find more common ground, Americans’ views of Russia could recover quickly.

    While the release doesn’t say what that “common ground” might be, mutual survival in the nuclear age would seem to top the list. Another common interest would be to alleviate the human suffering in Ukraine, something which can only be done by reining in both the pro-Russian separatists and the most virulently nationalistic elements within the Ukrainian militias.

  • David Krieger’s Haunting Poetry: A Wake-Up Call

    This article was originally published by Truthout.

    Wake Up! by David KriegerAstonishingly, WAKE UP!, David Krieger’s most recent book of poetry, is fully alive to the beauty and promise of our precious world – despite the quotidian violence of those who continuously incite us to war.

    As the co-founder and long-time president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, David Krieger has been preaching peace to deafened warmongers for so long one would think he’d have grown faint with exhaustion by now. Or raised his voice. Or pounded his fist. Or hardened his heart. What is astonishing to me in WAKE UP!, his most recent book of poetry, is how deeply Krieger remains alive to the beauty and promise of our precious world – despite the quotidian violence of those who continuously incite us to war.

    For example, in his “The Mystery of Fog” he calls us to remember that:

    Our minds hold a place for what is missing,
    no matter how thick or dark the fog,

    Behind the veil, I am certain of this:
    there never was, nor will be, a country, a flag,
    worth a single human life.

    Nevertheless, perpetual warfare is deadening – to the soul as well as the body, as well as the earth. As Krieger writes in “Archeology of War”:

    The years of war numb us, grind us
    down as they pile up one upon the other
    forming a burial mound not only
    for the fallen soldiers and innocents
    who were killed, but for the parts of us,
    once decent and bright with hope,
    now deflated by the steady fall of death
    and sting of empty promises.

    Many of this book’s haunting poems remind us of the senseless tragedy and sorrow of war. “Among the Ashes,” for example reads:

    Among the ashes
    of Hiroshima
    were crisply charred bodies.

    In one of the charred bodies
    a daughter recognized
    the gold tooth of her mother.

    As the girl reached out
    to touch the burnt body
    her mother crumbled to ashes.

    Her mother, so vivid
    in the girl’s memory, sifted
    through her hands, floated away.

    Despite the lyrical beauty of many of Krieger’s poems, he doesn’t mince words when holding the guilty accountable. He devotes an entire section of the book to the crimes of George W. Bush. But Bush and Dick Cheney aren’t the only ones whose crimes are catalogued. In “The Torturers,” he writes:

    The torturers will gather in Hades.

    There will be no pleasantries.

    They will be stripped of all honors.

    They will be awakened
    to the baseness of their crimes.

    They will be purged of all justifications.

    Their smiles will be banished.

    They will see their true faces.

    They will be surrounded by the screams
    of their victims.

    They will understand who they are.

    Nor does Krieger let us pretend we are not complicit in the crimes of our leaders. In “Rules of Engagement,” he writes:

    “Golden like a shower.” – U.S. Marine

    Three Afghan men lay dead on their backs in the dirt.
    Above them, four U.S. Marines in battle gear celebrate
    by urinating on them. These young Marines
    with their golden showers are holding up a mirror
    to America. It reminds us: this is who we are.

    When we teach our children to kill we turn them
    into something we don’t understand: ourselves.
    Their lack of humanity is not different from ours.
    We have not taught these young men to value life,
    but they are teaching us how little we do.

    Why should they hold back when we have
    taught them and sent them to kill other men –
    men whose names they will never know?
    If we are shocked by their disrespect for the dead,
    we should consider our own for the living.

    People say that we save what we love. Surely, we love our planet and our children. But apparently we love our complacency more. That’s why I’m grateful that people like Krieger continue to shake us, crying “WAKE UP!”