Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: Articles by David Krieger

  • 2016 Kelly Lecture Introduction

    [February 18, 2016] – Welcome to the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s 15th Annual Frank K. Kelly Lecture on Humanity’s Future.  I want to thank our principal sponsor for this event, the Santa Barbara Foundation, as well as those of you who have supported the work of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation over the past three decades.  If you are not familiar with the Foundation’s work, please visit the Foundation online at www.wagingpeace.org.

    Looking to the future requires us to take a hard look at our past and present.  And when it comes to issues of “War, Peace, Truth and the Media,” our record as a country has not been admirable or even decent.  In my lifetime, our political leaders have lied us into at least two wars – Vietnam and Iraq – and our mainstream media has often furthered the rush to war rather than support international law and the sanctity of peace.

    Let me say a few words about Frank Kelly, for whom this lecture series is named.  He was a co-founder of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation and served as its Senior Vice President from our founding in 1982 until his death in 2010 at the age of nearly 96.  His life spanned most of the 20th century and intersected with some of the most important people and issues of his time.

    In creating the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, Frank and I shared the belief that peace is an imperative of the Nuclear Age.  Peace is no longer just desirable; it is essential for humanity’s future.

    Frank was a journalist, a soldier during World War II, a speech writer for Harry Truman, an assistant to the Senate Majority Leader, and the vice president of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions.  The Center is where Frank and I met, and where he also met Robert Scheer.

    Frank believed that everyone deserves a seat at humanity’s table.  He believed in democracy and in the inherent value of every person.  He believed, in short, in humanity’s future.  This lecture series honors Frank and his vision that “we can shape a more promising future for our planet and its inhabitants.”

    Our lecturer tonight, Robert Scheer, is one of our country’s most distinguished journalists.  He speaks truth to power.  In the 1960s he was a Vietnam War correspondent, managing editor, and editor in chief for Ramparts Magazine.

    In the 1970s through the early 1990s he was a correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and launched a nationally syndicated column that is now based at Truthdig.com, which he founded in 2005.  He currently serves as editor in chief of Truthdig.com.

    He is also a professor of clinical communications at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.  Among his many books are With Enough Shovels: Reagan, Bush and Nuclear War.   His most recent book, about corporate and government data-collection and the destruction of democracy, is They Know Everything about You.

    The title of Mr. Scheer’s lecture tonight is “War, Peace, Truth and the Media.”  This is a topic of considerable importance for obvious reasons, but particularly since no war in the Nuclear Age is trivial when nuclear weapons are lurking in the background.  If the stance of the media toward war is docile and deferent to authority, this helps support war and defeat peace.  On the other hand, if the media finds and reports the truth, war is less likely to be embraced.

    America needs more journalists like Robert Scheer, and we are very pleased to have him with us for this 15th annual Frank K. Kelly Lecture on Humanity’s Future.  The video of his lecture will soon be available at the Foundation’s www.wagingpeaace.org website.

  • Our Purpose is to Love

    Our purpose is to love and love some more.
    To fail to love would be a mortal crime.
    We don’t know what the future holds in store,
    but surely this: we will each run out of time.
    So we are charged to love beneath the sun
    while we live on this sacred planet Earth.
    Fast running time will not stop for anyone.
    By our love we show our worldly worth.
    In my garden I watch the seasons flow
    as time moves on passing through the years.
    We each have our faith and our fiery fears
    and through it all we know what we will know.

    When we love we pull our planetary weight.
    There is no time or place on Earth for war or hate.

    David Krieger
    February 2015

  • Message to Youth

    [February 4, 2016]

    You are not required
    to kill on command, to wear
    a uniform, to camouflage yourself,
    to place medals on your chest, to check
    your conscience at the door, to march
    in unison, to bear the burden of the body count.

    You are not required
    to pledge allegiance to the flag, to sing
    patriotic songs, to distort history,
    to believe lies, to support leaders when
    they are wrong, to turn a blind eye
    to violence, or to be cheerleaders for war.

    You are required
    to love, to live with compassion, to be kinder
    than necessary and to seek the truth
    in the time allotted to you.

  • Twelve Possible Names for World War Three

    [January 27, 2016]

    The Great Fire War.

    The Long Afternoon War.

    The End of Civilization War.

    The Unwanted War.

    The Failure of Deterrence War.

    The Ice Age Trigger War.

    The No Heroes War.

    The Mutant Creation War.

    The Dark Skies War.

    The Unending Fall-Out War.

    The Green Glow of Defeat War.

    The War of No Winners.

  • Controlling the Media, Narrowing the Conversation

    The mainstream media has great power to influence the public conversation about national and international policies. Not only are they able to choose the news and opinion pieces that they feature in their newspapers and news broadcasts, but they also choose the slant they put on the news and which letters they run in response to their articles.

    I recently responded with letters to two articles in The New York Times. Since the paper chose not to print either of these letters, I am sharing them on the websites of alternative media, including the website of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (wagingpeace.org).

    My first letter concerns North Korea’s fourth nuclear test on January 6, 2016.

    In “Stopping North Korea’s Nuclear Threat” (January 8, 2016), the authors argue, “North Korea’s leaders still believe that nuclear weapons will prevent others from attacking them…This is fanciful.”  But is it?  Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi both gave up their respective country’s nuclear weapons programs and their countries were subsequently attacked and they were overthrown and killed.  These are inducements to nuclear proliferation that have not been lost on the North Korean regime.

    The best way to assure that nuclear weapons are not transferred or used by North Korea or by any of the other nuclear-armed countries, is for all nine of them to negotiate in good faith for complete nuclear disarmament.  The U.S. can’t assure the success of these negotiations, but it can use its convening power to initiate and lead them.  All nine nuclear-armed countries need to be at the table and have their voices heard.  Unless this happens and the negotiations are successful, no one in the world will be secure.

    The second letter concerns the planned modernization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal.

    U.S. security officials, past and present, are taking positions on the modernization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, as reported in “As U.S. Modernizes Nuclear Weapons, ‘Smaller’ Leaves Some Uneasy” (January 11, 2016).  What is glaringly absent from their arguments, however, is the U.S. legal obligation under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to negotiate in good faith for an end to the nuclear arms race and for complete nuclear disarmament.  The modernization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal (and its delivery systems and infrastructure) directly violates the treaty obligation to end the nuclear arms race and will also spur other nuclear-armed countries to modernize their nuclear arsenals.  Further, the failure to negotiate for complete nuclear disarmament encourages nuclear proliferation, which could lead to nuclear terrorism and nuclear war.

    Nuclear modernization, expected to exceed $1 trillion, not only violates our legal obligations under the NPT, but diverts billions away from providing food, shelter, education and health care to those in need.  Nuclear modernization will benefit only the arms merchants and is a trapdoor to nuclear catastrophe.

    If the United States does not recognize its own responsibility for nuclear weapons proliferation and fulfill its obligations for nuclear disarmament under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it should expect countries such as North Korea to pursue their nuclear options.  Further, if the U.S. continues to modernize its nuclear arsenal rather than fulfill its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it is making not only nuclear proliferation more likely, but also nuclear war and nuclear terrorism.  These are issues that deserve a hearing and a conversation among the American people, especially in this election year when we are electing, arguably, the most powerful leader in the world.  His or her views on nuclear policy must be part of our national debates.  The lack of a national conversation about U.S. nuclear policy adversely affects the security of every American and every citizen of the world.

  • You Are Not One But Many

    Remembering Martin Luther King, Jr.

    Your deep voice still hangs in the air,
    Melting the cowardly silence.
    You are the one standing solidly there
    Looking straight in the face of violence.

    You are the one who dreams
    That this nation will honor its creed.
    You are the one who steps forward.
    You are the one to bleed.

    You are not one but many
    Unwilling to cower or crawl.
    You are the one who will take no less
    Than a world that is just for all.

    David Krieger is President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org). He is a councilor of the World Future Council.

  • North Korea: How Many Wake-Up Calls Will It Take?

    North Korea has been sounding alarms since it withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2003.  Its latest wake-up call in early 2016 was its fourth nuclear test.  This time it claimed to have tested a far more powerful thermonuclear weapon, although seismic reports do not seem to bear this out.

    North Korea has been roundly condemned for its nuclear tests, including this one.  To put this in perspective, however, the U.S. has conducted more than 1,000 nuclear tests, continues to conduct subcritical nuclear tests, has not ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, is in breach of its obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, regularly tests nuclear-capable missiles, and plans to spend $1 trillion modernizing its nuclear arsenal.  The U.S. and the other nuclear-armed countries are quick to point fingers at North Korea, but slow to recognize their own role in fanning the flames of nuclear catastrophe.

    What does an awakened world actually mean?

    As the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have repeatedly warned, “We must abolish nuclear weapons before they abolish us.”  This will require good faith negotiations to end the nuclear arms race and achieve nuclear zero.  And these negotiations must be convened and led by the US and Russia, the two most powerful nuclear-armed countries in the world.

    If we are not awakened by North Korea’s latest test, what will it take?  What other, louder alarm is necessary for the world to come together and work toward achieving nuclear zero before nuclear weapons are used again and we all become victims of a war from which humanity will never awaken?

  • Join Us in Working for a World Free of Nuclear Weapons

    2015 has been a strong and eventful year for the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

    We have:

    • Supported the Marshall Islands (and their legal team) in their courageous lawsuits against the nine nuclear-armed countries;
    • Supported the nuclear agreement with Iran;
    • Encouraged President Obama to fulfill the Prague Promise for a world free of nuclear weapons that he initiated in 2009;
    • Opposed the planned $1 trillion expenditure on the “modernization” of the U.S. nuclear arsenal;
    • Reached more than 5,000 people through our Peace Leadership Program;
    • Expanded our membership to 75,000 people;
    • Reached more than 1,000,000 people through our social media outreach (find us on Facebook and Twitter);
    • Hosted anti-nuclear activist Dr. Helen Caldicott for the 2015 Frank K. Kelly Lecture on Humanity’s Future;
    • Played an active role at the ninth Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty;
    • Participated in activities marking the 70th anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings;
    • Honored Hiroshima survivor Setsuko Thurlow with our 2015 Distinguished Peace Leadership Award;
    • Helped to organize an International Youth Summit on Nuclear Weapons Abolition in Hiroshima;
    • Been a steady voice for Nuclear Zero;
    • Played an influential role in the lives of 12 college interns who will carry with them into the world the spirit of peace and justice;
    • and much more.

    With your help we can make 2016 an even stronger and more eventful year. We have a great team in place for 2016. Please be a part of that team, working for peace and a world free of nuclear weapons. Stand up! Speak out! Join in!

    Together we can build a more peaceful world and end the nuclear weapons threat to all humanity.

  • We Are Living at the Edge of a Nuclear Precipice

    With nuclear weapons, what could possibly go wrong? The short answer is: Everything.

    Nuclear weapons could be launched by accident or miscalculation. There have already been several close calls related to false warnings nearly leading to actual launches, which would most likely have led to retaliatory responses. These false warnings are all the more dangerous for the US and Russia knowing that each side keeps hundreds of nuclear weapons on high alert, ready to be launched in moments of an order to do so.

    David KriegerThe mere possession of nuclear weapons and the prestige in the international community associated with such possession is an inducement to nuclear proliferation. There are currently nine nuclear-armed countries. How much more dangerous would the world become if there were 19, 29 or 99?

    Nuclear weapons are justified by a hypothesis about human behavior known as nuclear deterrence. It posits that a nation (with or without nuclear weapons) will not attack a nation that threatens nuclear retaliation. But nuclear deterrence is not foolproof and it does not provide physical protection. The security it provides is entirely psychological. It fails if one side does not believe that the other side would really engage in nuclear retaliation. It fails if one side is not rational. It fails in the case of a terrorist group in possession of nuclear weapons that does not have territory to retaliate against and additionally may be suicidal.

    Nuclear deterrence may provide some weak, uncertain and unreliable protection against other states, but it provides no protection against terrorists. Thus, terrorists in possession of nuclear weapons are any state’s worst nightmare, including nuclear-armed states. In light of such dangers, it would make sense to seek to reduce nuclear arsenals to the lowest possible number of weapons (on the way to zero) so that any that remained could be more effectively guarded and kept from the hands of terrorist groups.

    It is also true that the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) requires the 190 parties to the treaty to negotiate in good faith for effective measures to end the nuclear arms race at an early date and to achieve complete nuclear disarmament. The obligation to negotiate in good faith for nuclear disarmament also applies to the four nuclear-armed countries that are not parties to the NPT (Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea) through customary international law.

    Since it is clear that much could go wrong with nuclear weapons, including some weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, it is surprising that there is so much complacency around the issue. This complacency is fuelled by apathy, conformity, ignorance and denial. Without citizen engagement, pushing on political leaders to act, it is likely that the world will witness nightmarish nuclear terror, either of the state variety or that actually brought about by terrorists in possession of nuclear weapons. Apathy and denial have the potential to corrode and dissolve our common future.

    For the present, the nine nuclear-armed countries all have plans to modernize their nuclear arsenals, despite the immorality, illegality and waste of resources involved in doing so. The US alone is planning to spend $1 trillion on modernizing its nuclear arsenal over the next three decades. Where is the humanity in seeking to devote resources to improving nuclear weaponry and delivery systems when there are so many human needs that are going unfulfilled?

    Nuclear weapons are not a solution to any human problem, and they raise the specter of the devastation of civilization and the doom of the human species. What could possibly go wrong? Shouldn’t good citizens just ignore nuclear dangers and leave them in the hands of whoever happens to be leading the nuclear-armed countries? That would actually be a continuation of the status quo and would be no solution at all.

    We must recognize that we are living at the edge of a nuclear precipice with the ever-present dangers of nuclear proliferation, nuclear accidents and miscalculations, nuclear terrorism and nuclear war. Instead of relying on nuclear deterrence and pursuing the modernization of nuclear arsenals, we need to press our political leaders to fulfill our moral and legal obligations to negotiate in good faith for the prohibition and elimination of nuclear weapons. That is, we need to break free of our acidic complacency and commit ourselves to achieving a nuclear zero world.

    This article was originally published by truthout.

    Click here for the Spanish version.

  • Paris: War Is Not the Answer

    The attacks on innocents in Paris on November 13, 2015 were horrifying crimes, filling the city with grief and uniting people throughout the world in solidarity with the victims and with France.  These attacks were cold-blooded murders of innocent people, clearly crimes deserving punishment.  But when crimes are used as the impetus for war, the crimes and grief are multiplied and the toll of innocents increases to become the norm.  Surely, we must cry havoc, but we must also be wary of letting loose the dogs of war.

    The attacks in New York on September 11, 2001 were also unspeakable crimes.  These attacks also stirred the sympathy and solidarity of the world, in this case for the United States, until the U.S. answered the attacks by letting loose the snarling dogs of war, first against Afghanistan and then against Iraq, a country having nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks.  The leaders who perpetrated these wars also caused untold sorrow and death of innocents.  While perpetrators of the attacks in New York, including Osama bin Laden, have been tracked down and captured or killed, those U.S. leaders who committed the worst of the Nuremberg crimes, crimes against peace, particularly in Iraq, have never been brought to justice.

    It was the illegal U.S. war against Iraq, at least in part, that gave birth to ISIS and stoked its smoldering resentment and aggression against the West, and yet those who perpetrated this war still walk free.  And crimes within these wars, such as the bombing of the Doctors without Borders hospital in Kunduz (Afghanistan), still continue.  Unfortunately, we cannot roll back time or erase bad decisions by U.S. leaders, but we can learn from those bad decisions.  The West, particularly France, can seek out the perpetrators of the Paris crimes and bring them to justice.  Crimes demand justice for the victims, not warfare that will only create more victims in an ongoing loop of vengeance and retaliation.

    The challenge today is to find a means of ending this loop of vengeance and retaliation.  This will require acting morally, legally (under international law), and pragmatically (by not inflaming more deaths of innocents and more violence).  This is a great challenge, which will require a new way of thinking, based on avoiding wars rather than perpetuating them.  It will require righting many of the wrongs that the West has inflicted on the Middle East, including ending the long-standing injustices that have been brought to bear on the Palestinians.  It will require the West curbing its hunger for cheap oil from the Middle East.  It will require finding a means of cutting off sources of funding for ISIS, which allow it to pursue war and support terrorism.

    It is also clear that the West cannot fight terrorism with nuclear weapons.  These devices of mass annihilation are not suitable for stopping crimes associated with terrorism.  On the other hand, if the number of nuclear weapons in the world is not dramatically reduced (on the way to zero) and bomb-grade fissionable materials not brought under secure safeguards, terrorists will end up with nuclear or radiological weapons.  This could lead to disasters almost beyond comprehension.  Terrorists in possession of nuclear weapons will not be subject to nuclear deterrence.  They are suicidal, and they do not have territory to retaliate against.  Thus, nuclear deterrence won’t work against them.  If we don’t want to witness or be victims of nuclear terrorism, it is now past time to begin negotiating seriously to create a Nuclear Zero world, as we are required to do under international law.

    The terrorist acts in Paris were a terrible tragedy, but war is not the answer.  In solidarity with the people of France, we must seek justice, not war, if we are to end the cycle of violence that threatens us all and undermines our common humanity.