Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: Nuclear Threat

  • British Petroleum, Imaginación y la Catástrofe Nuclear

    Click here for the English version.


    Antes del catastrófico derrame petrolero de la British Petroleum en el Golfo de México, hubo voces de ambientalistas que advertían que las perforaciones mar adentro están llenas de riesgos – riesgos exactamente del tipo de daño ambiental que está ocurriendo. Los comentarios fueron recibidos con burla por muchos que corearon consignas como “¡Perfora, cariño, perfora”. Ahora está claro que quienes gritaban  “¡Perfora, cariño, perfora” es una  multitud necia y codiciosa. El bienestar económico de las personas en y alrededor de la costa del Golfo ha sido gravemente dañada y, para algunos, destruida por completo. La vida acuática y de los estuarios, en el Golfo y más allá, ha sido víctima de un desastre ambiental que hubiera sido previsible con un poco de visión e imaginación.


    Albert Einstein llegó a la conclusión de que “La imaginación es más importante que el conocimiento.” Él dijo que “el conocimiento se limita a todo los que hoy conocemos y entendemos, mientras que la imaginación abraza el mundo entero, y todo los que alguna vez sabremos y entenderemos.”  Intentemos aplicar nuestra imaginación a las armas nucleares y la guerra nuclear. Éstos son algunos de los escenarios:


    Escenario 1: Al Qaeda logra lo que la mayoría de los comentaristas cree que es imposible. Obtienen los materiales para varias armas nucleares y contratan a científicos para construir primitivas armas nucleares.  Estas armas son detonadas en Londres, Nueva York y París en pocas horas una tras otra. Millones yacen muertos y heridos. Los mercados bursátiles del mundo se desploman. Antes de los ataques terroristas nucleares, las personas que advirtieron de tal posibilidad fueron objeto de burlas.


    Escenario 2: La disuasión nuclear fracasa totalmente, y la India y Pakistán inician una guerra nuclear por Cachemira. El centenar de ojivas nucleares detonadas en las ciudades de India y Pakistán dejan millones de muertos y disminuye la temperatura global a tal grado que se reducen significativamente el tamaño de las zonas agrícolas en donde los alimentos se pueden cultivar. La pérdida de cosechas deja cientos de millones de personas muriendo de hambre. Antes de la guerra, la gente que advirtió de tal posibilidad fue objeto de escarnio.


    Escenario 3: Una guerra nuclear comienza con un lanzamiento accidental de un misil con armas nucleares por parte de Rusia, seguido por un ataque de represalia por los EE.UU., que ocasiona más represalias de Rusia, y por supuesto más de los EE.UU.. Antes del  lanzamiento accidental, poca gente creía que un accidente tan catastrófico y la represalia fueran posibles. En su secuela, el escenario parece demasiado factible. La gente ahora se da cuenta que los dispositivos a prueba de fallos para evitar lanzamientos accidentales fracasaron, pero los que preveían este peligro y advirtieron al respecto, fueron víctimas de  burlas sangrientas.


    Escenario 4: El líder norcoreano Kim Jong-Il lanza un ataque nuclear que destruye bases militares de EE.UU. en la isla japonesa de Okinawa. Amenaza con destruir las ciudades de Kyoto, en Japón y Seúl, Corea del Sur a menos que reciba la ayuda para el desarrollo que dice que le fue prometida por Estados Unidos. Los que denunciaban que la continua posesión de armas nucleares por los cinco miembros permanentes del Consejo de Seguridad de las Naciones Unidas daría lugar a la proliferación nuclear, y que dichas armas podrían caer en manos de dirigentes irracionales, fueron denunciados como ignorantes.


    Hay muchos escenarios posibles para el inicio de una guerra nuclear y aún quedan muchas justificaciones para su posesión. Los líderes de Estados poseedores de armas nucleares sostienen que sólo son para la disuasión nuclear, es decir, para evitar la guerra con la amenaza de una represalia. No prevén el posible fracaso de la disuasión, a pesar de que reconocen las consecuencias catastróficas de un fracaso. Ellos creen que las armas nucleares apuntalarán el prestigio de un país y le darán mayor poder en el sistema internacional. Muestran con orgullo sus armas nucleares y ponen a prueba sus sistemas de lanzamiento de misiles. Los que argumentan que la disuasión nuclear podría fallar son ignorados por completo.


    Los líderes políticos y militares no han cumplido con la proposición de que en todo sistema complejo en el que los seres humanos están involucrados, la falla del sistema es una posibilidad. Han rechazado la idea de esta falla significaría la aniquilación de la humanidad. Los científicos que denuncian esta falta de visión, no son tomados en cuenta. Los ex políticos de alto nivel que advierten acerca de estos peligros, también son objeto de burlas. Incluso algunos jefes militares que se oponen a seguir dependiendo de las armas nucleares, son ridiculizados en público.  Los supervivientes de Hiroshima y Nagasaki, que fueron testigos de primera mano de los horrores de las bombas atómicas, han contado sus historias en un intento de alertarnos sobre el peligro de las armas nucleares, pero sus voces son débiles y poca gente en las altas esferas las han escuchado.


    Organizaciones de la sociedad civil de todo el mundo han declarado su compromiso con un plan urgente para la eliminación de las armas nucleares, y también sus palabras caen en oídos sordos. Pero, al igual que los supervivientes de Hiroshima y Nagasaki, continúan denunciando porque es lo correcto. Las armas nucleares pueden terminar con la vida en la Tierra tal como la conocemos. Son capaces de destruir la civilización. Una guerra nuclear de grandes proporciones, sería el fin de la  especie humana. Incluso una guerra nuclear limitada o aún accidental, aniquilaría ciudades y países.


    Ahora que el petróleo derramado por la British Petroleum en el Golfo de México continúa destruyendo el océano y el medio ambiente circundante, tal vez sea demasiado tarde para preguntarnos si vale la pena el riesgo de seguir perforando mar adentro Es evidente que no..  Sin embargo, todavía no es demasiado tarde para plantear la cuestión de si por la continua dependencia de las armas nucleares, vale la pena arriesgar la supervivencia de las generaciones futuras.

  • British Petroleum, Imagination and Nuclear Catastrophe

    Vaya aquí para la versión española.

    Before the catastrophic British Petroleum oil gush in the Gulf of Mexico, there were environmentalists who warned that offshore drilling was fraught with risk – risk of exactly the type of environmental damage that is occurring.  They were mocked by people who chanted slogans such as “Drill, baby, drill.”  Now it is clear that the “Drill, baby, drill” crowd was foolish and greedy.  The economic wellbeing of people in and around the Gulf coast has been badly damaged and, for some, destroyed altogether.  Aquatic and estuary life, in the Gulf and beyond, has fallen victim to an environmental disaster that was foreseeable with a modicum of vision and imagination.

    Albert Einstein reached the conclusion that “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” He said that “knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.”  Let us try applying our imaginations to nuclear weapons and nuclear war.  Here are some scenarios:

    Scenario 1: Al Qaeda does what most commentators believed to be impossible.  They obtain nuclear materials for several nuclear weapons and hire scientists to construct crude nuclear weapons.  These weapons are detonated in London, New York and Paris within hours of each other.  Millions would lie dead and injured.  Around the world stock markets would freefall.  Before the terrorist nuclear attacks, the people who warned against such a possibility were mocked.

    Scenario 2: Nuclear deterrence fails dramatically, and India and Pakistan engage in a nuclear war over Kashmir.  The hundred or so nuclear warheads that detonate on Indian and Pakistani cities leave millions dead and lower global temperatures so as to significantly shrink the size of agricultural areas in which food can be grown.  Crop failures leave hundreds of millions more people to starve to death.  Before the war, the people who warned against such a possibility were mocked.  

    Scenario 3: A nuclear war begins with an accidental launch of a nuclear-armed missile by Russia, followed by a retaliatory strike by the US, which brings further retaliation from Russia, leading to still more from the US.  Before the accidental launch, few people believed that such a cataclysmic accident and its retaliatory follow up were possible.  In its aftermath, the scenario seems far too feasible.  People now realize that the failsafe devices to prevent accidental launches could fail, but those who foresaw this danger and warned about it earlier were mocked.

    Scenario 4: North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il launches a nuclear attack that destroys US military bases on the Japanese island of Okinawa.  He threatens to destroy the Japanese city of Kyoto and Seoul, South Korea unless he receives the development assistance he says was promised to him by the United States.  Those who argued throughout the Nuclear Age that continued possession of nuclear weapons by the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council would result in nuclear proliferation and the weapons falling into the hands of irrational leaders were mocked.  

    There are many scenarios possible for the onset of nuclear war and there remain many justifications for nuclear weapons.  Leaders of nuclear weapon states argue that these weapons are only for nuclear deterrence, that is, to prevent war by threatening nuclear retaliation.  They don’t foresee the potential failure of nuclear deterrence, even though they recognize the cataclysmic consequences of failure.  They believe that nuclear weapons bolster a country’s prestige and give it greater power in the international system.  They proudly display their nuclear weapons and test their missile delivery systems.  Those who argue that nuclear deterrence could fail catastrophically are mocked.

    Political and military leaders have failed to honor the proposition that in every complex system in which humans are involved, system failure is a possibility.  They have dismissed the idea of system failure leading to nuclear annihilation.  Scientists spoke out about this shortsightedness, but they were mocked.  Former high-level policymakers spoke out about the dangers, and they, too, were mocked.  Even some former military leaders spoke out against the dangers of reliance on nuclear weapons, and they were mocked.  The survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, who witnessed the horrors of the atomic bombs firsthand, have told their stories in an attempt to awaken people to the danger of nuclear weapons, but their voices are soft and few people in high places have listened to them.  

    Civil society organizations from throughout the world have called out for a commitment to an urgent plan for the elimination of nuclear weapons, and they also have been mocked.  But, like the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they continue to speak out because it is the right thing to do.  Nuclear weapons can end life on Earth as we know it.  They can destroy civilization.  In a major nuclear war, they could bring the human species and most complex forms of life to extinction.  Even in a smaller nuclear war or accident, they could destroy cities and countries.  

    As the oil from the British Petroleum failure in the Gulf of Mexico continues to destroy the ocean and surrounding environment, it is perhaps too late to ask ourselves whether offshore drilling is worth the risk.  Clearly it is not.  It is still not too late, however, to raise the question of whether continued reliance on nuclear weapons is worth the risk to humanity and to future generations.  

  • Nuclear Deterrence Scam Blocking Progress to a Safer World

    This article was originally published on The Huffington Post.

    I recently returned home to New Zealand from attending a major conference at the United Nations in New York reviewing prospects for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. Because a shaky consensus was reached, the conference has been hailed a success. However, what struck me was how detached the negotiations were from the reality of what the diplomats were haggling over.

    As a former operator of British nuclear weapons, I try to articulate this reality, and to “get up close and personal” with this desperately serious issue for humanity, most recently in Security Without Nuclear Deterrence and a New York Review of Books symposium on “Debating Nuclear Deterrence.”

    The nuclear weapon states’ blocking of any serious moves towards honoring their obligation in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to get rid of their nuclear arsenals is driven by their uncritical acceptance of nuclear deterrence. Yet my carefully considered conclusion is that nuclear deterrence is a huge confidence trick – an outrageous scam cooked up fifty years ago by the US military industrial monster created by the Manhattan Project and now dominating US politics. Look at how President Barack Obama’s vision for a nuclear weapon free world, raising global expectations in his Prague speech in April last year, was quickly contradicted by his caveat that “as long as these weapons exist, we will maintain a safe, secure and effective arsenal to deter any adversary, and guarantee that defense to our allies…”

    In a statement on behalf of the non-governmental organization (NGO) community to delegates, I pointed out that belief in nuclear deterrence is based on a crazy premise: that nuclear war can be made less likely by deploying weapons and doctrines that make it more likely.

    A rational leader cannot make a credible nuclear threat against a nuclear adversary capable of a retaliatory strike. And a second strike is pointless, because it would be no more than posthumous revenge, in which millions of innocent people would die horribly. This is why enthusiasm for a nuclear weapon free world is incompatible with the nuclear-armed states’ copout mantra: “We’ll keep nuclear weapons for deterrence as long as anyone else has them.”

    Nuclear deterrence, like all theories, is not foolproof. It entails a hostile stand-off where, in the case of the US and Russia, each side still has over 2,000 warheads ready for launch within half an hour, over twenty years after the Cold War officially ended. What is more, they still have nearly 18,000 more nuclear warheads between them held in reserve.

    The George W. Bush administration was the first to admit nuclear deterrence would not work against terrorists, now perceived to be the greatest threat to Americans – other than the real risk of inadvertent nuclear war with Russia because nuclear deterrence dogma requires all those warheads on hair-trigger alert. As for terrorism, a nuclear “weapon” is militarily unusable, combining uniquely indiscriminate, long-term health effects, including genetic damage, from radioactivity with almost unimaginable explosive violence. In fact, it is the ultimate terror device, far worse than chemical or biological weapons, which are banned by global treaties.

    Recent research assessing a regional nuclear war involving use of just 100 warheads, each with an explosive power of 15 kilotons like the US bomb detonated over Hiroshima, on cities in India and Pakistan found that, in addition to millions of immediate casualties, smoke from fires could block enough sunlight to cause widespread famine. For all these reasons, the overwhelming majority of states feel more secure without depending on the circular logic, myths and misleading promises of nuclear deterrence – which is effectively state-sponsored nuclear terrorism.

    As in 2005, this year’s NPT Review Conference was bedevilled by two closely related issues: the nuclear programmes of Iran, which is suspected of trying to build nuclear weapons, and Israel, which has denied having them for over forty years. Intertwined with these is one of several fundamental contradictions about the NPT: its promotion of nuclear energy, which inevitably stimulates nuclear proliferation because it provides the fissile material for nuclear weapons. This, and the double standards imposed on the non-nuclear member states by the privileged five recognized nuclear-armed states, with their associated veto power in the UN Security Council, have finally reduced the NPT process to impotence.

    Perhaps the most positive outcome was a new groundswell of opinion among a large majority of the non-nuclear signatory states that the only hope of making any meaningful progress towards nuclear weapon abolition is to start a parallel process leading to a Nuclear Weapons Convention, like the ones banning chemical and biological weapons. A model treaty exists, drafted by a group of experts from the NGO community. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has been sufficiently impressed to have endorsed it as part of his five-point plan for nuclear disarmament.

    Meanwhile, in Britain a coalition government has taken power at a crucial moment for the future of British and global nuclear policy. The deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, leads the Liberal Democrats, whose election manifesto included opposition to both nuclear energy and replacing the Trident nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarine force with a similar system. What is more, Clegg challenged the value to Britain of the US-UK special relationship, after the debacle of blindly following the US into Iraq and Afghanistan. Such poor decisions, driven by British nuclear dependence on the US, have left a black hole in the British defence budget, with the white elephant of a replacement Trident system increasingly vulnerable.

    Britain should take this opportunity to reassert its sovereignty, and exploit the US-UK relationship in a dramatically new way. Making a virtue from necessity, it should announce that it had decided to rescue the dysfunctional non-proliferation regime by becoming the first of the P5 to rely on more humane, lawful and effective security strategies than nuclear deterrence.

    As with the abolition of slavery, a new world role awaits the British. Such a ‘breakout’ would be sensational, transforming the nuclear disarmament debate overnight. In NATO, the UK would wield unprecedented influence in leading the drive for a non-nuclear strategy – which must happen if NATO is to survive the growing strains from overstretch in Afghanistan and confusion over a common European security policy. British leadership would create new openings for shifting the mindset in the US and France, the other two most zealous guardians of nuclear deterrence.

    The key is to see nuclear disarmament as a security-building process, moving from an outdated adversarial mindset to a co-operative one where nuclear weapons are recognized as a lethal liability.

  • The Legacy of Nuclear Testing in the Marshall Islands

    This article was originally published on Common Dreams.

    The radiological legacy of U.S. nuclear weapons testing in the Marshall Islands remains to this day and will persist for many years to come. The most severe impacts were visited upon the people of the Rongelap Atoll in 1954 following a very large thermonuclear explosion which deposited life-threatening quantities of radioactive fallout on their homeland. They received more than three times the estimated external dose than to the most heavily exposed people living near the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986. It took more than two days before the Rongelap people were evacuated after the explosion. Many suffered from tissue destructive effects, such as burns, and subsequently from latent radiation-induced diseases.

    In 1957, they were returned to their homeland even though officials and scientists working for the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) determined that radiation doses would significantly exceed those allowed for citizens of the United States. The desire to study humans living in a radiation-contaminated environment appeared to be a major element of this decision. A scientist in a previously secret transcript of a meeting where they decided to return the Rongelap people to their atoll stated an island contaminated by the 1954 H-Bomb tests was “by far the most contaminated place in the world.” He further concluded that,

        “It would be very interesting to go back and get good environmental data… so as to get a measure of the human uptake, when people live in a contaminated environment…Now, data of this type has never been available. …While it is true that these people do not live, I would say, the way Westerners do, civilized people, it is nevertheless also true that they are more like us than the mice.”

    By 1985, the people of Rongelap fled their atoll, after determining that the levels of contamination were comparable to the Bikini atoll where numerous nuclear devices were detonated. The Bikini people were re-settled in 1969 but had to evacuate their homes in1978 after radiation exposures were found to be excessive. The Rongelap people fled for good reason. In 1982, a policy was secretly established by the energy department during the closing phase of negotiations between the United States and the nascent Republic of the Marshall Islands over the Compact of Free Association to eliminate radiation protection standards, so as to not interfere with the potential resumption of weapons testing. This resulted in a sudden and alarming increase in radiation doses to the Rongelap people eating local food.

    These circumstances were subsequently uncovered in 1991 by the U.S. Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs. As a result, the U.S. Congress terminated DOE’s nuclear test readiness program in the Pacific and in 1992 the U.S. Departments of Energy and Interior entered into an agreement with the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Local Rongelap Government that re-established radiation protection standards as a major element for the re-settlement of Rongelap.

    Apparently, this was not done for the southern islands of the atoll where local food is obtained. Despite the long and unfortunate aftermath of nuclear testing in the Marshalls, it appears that this critical element of safety was lost in the shuffle.

    As it now stands, if forced to return to their homeland the Rongelap people could receive radiation doses about 10 times greater than allowed for the public in the United States.

    Until the U. S. Government can assure that steps to mitigate doses to the same levels that are protective of American people are demonstrated, efforts to force the Rongelap people back to the home by Members of the U.S. Congress and the Obama Administration is unjustified and unfairly places the burden of protection on the Rongelap people. It appears that DOE and Interior have quietly crept away from the 1992 agreement, without verifying that its terms and conditions to allow for safe habitability will be met.

    Over the past 20 years, the U.S. Congress has enacted legislation to compensate to residents living near DOE’s Nevada Test Site uranium miners, nuclear weapons workers, and military personnel for radiation-related illnesses. These laws provide for a greater benefit of the doubt than for the people of the Marshall Islands where 66 nuclear weapons were exploded in the open air. In 2005, the National Cancer Institute reported that the risk of contracting cancer for those exposed to fallout was greater than one in three.

    The people of the Marshall Islands had their homeland and health sacrificed for the national security interests of the United States. The Obama Administration and the U.S. Congress should promptly correct this injustice.

  • Can We Live With the Bomb?

    This article was originally published on the History News Network.

    For some time now, it has been clear that nuclear weapons threaten the existence not only of humanity, but of all life on Earth.

    Thus, Barack Obama’s pledge to work for a nuclear weapons-free world—made during his 2008 presidential campaign and subsequently in public statements—has resonated nicely with supporters of nuclear disarmament and with the general public.

    But recent developments have called that commitment into question.  The administration’s Nuclear Posture Review does not indicate any dramatic departures in the use of nuclear weapons, while its nuclear weapons budget request for the next fiscal year represents a 14 percent increase over this year’s counterpart.  The most alarming sign that the administration might be preparing for a nuclear weapons-filled future is its proposal to spend $180 billion over the next ten years to upgrade the U.S. nuclear weapons production complex.

    From the standpoint of nuclear critics, the best interpretation of such measures—and one that might be accurate—is that they are designed to win support among hawkish Republican senators for the New START Treaty, which will reduce U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals.  After all, the political argument goes, if Obama is to secure the sixty-seven Senate votes necessary to ratify the treaty, he needs to pick up some Republican support.  Of course, these pro-nuclear measures might reflect a quite different scenario, one in which Obama is abandoning yet another political promise.

    In this context, we might ask:  would abandoning the promise of nuclear abolition be a bad idea?

    There are at least five good reasons why it would be:

    1. 1. If nuclear weapons are not scrapped, it is inevitable that, sooner or later, they will be used in war.  Nations (and before them, competing territories) have engaged in war for thousands of years, and for these wars they have been tempted to draw upon the most powerful weapons in their arsenals.  Today, such weapons are nuclear weapons—some 23,000 of them.  Although supporters of these weapons maintain that they deter nuclear war, there is no reason to assume that nuclear deterrence works, or at least works in all cases.  This is indicated by the U.S. government’s pursuit of national missile defense and its attempts to head off other nations (e.g. Iran) from developing nuclear weapons.
    2. If nuclear weapons are not scrapped, it is inevitable that additional nations will develop them.  When some nations maintain large, devastating nuclear arsenals, it is naïve to expect other nations to tamely sit back and accept their non-nuclear status.  Over the decades, this situation of military inequality has spurred on nuclear proliferation and, unless nuclear nations divest themselves of their nuclear weapons, it will continue to do so.
    3. If nuclear weapons are not scrapped, it is likely that they will be used by terrorists.  Terrorists do not have the production facilities for building or testing nuclear weapons, but they have the possibility of obtaining them, though theft or bribery, from national arsenals.  While nuclear weapons exist in national arsenals, obtaining and using them against civilian populations will provide a constant temptation to terrorists.
    4. If nuclear weapons are not scrapped, it is likely that they will be exploded accidentally.  Numerous nuclear accidents—from nuclear weapons dropped to mistaken nuclear war alerts—have already occurred, although so far without detonation.  In an age of BP oil explosions and other technological disasters, there are limits to how long we can press our luck with nuclear weapons technology.
    5. If nuclear weapons are not scrapped, they—and the uranium mining, warhead production, and testing they necessitate—will continue to pollute the earth with radioactive waste for thousands of years.  Nuclear waste disposal is already a very significant problem in the United States, and, not surprisingly, no state has yet volunteered to serve as the permanent dumping ground for it.

    In short, while nuclear weapons exist, we are living on the brink of an unprecedented catastrophe.

    Thus, if we are wise, we should draw back from the brink and address the problem posed by nuclear weapons.  If the U.S. government and others are serious about building a nuclear weapons-free world, they should begin negotiations on a nuclear abolition treaty.  And, if they are not serious about nuclear abolition, the public should raise enough of a ruckus so that they have no alternative to becoming serious.

    If we can’t live with the Bomb, we should begin planning to get rid it.

  • Open Letter on Nuclear Dangers

    The recently signed arms control treaty between the United States and
    Russia brings welcome reductions in deployed nuclear warheads and an
    agreed ceiling on the number of delivery vehicles that each side may
    possess. We applaud the new agreement and the acts of political
    leadership required in both countries to bring it about. The
    breakthrough is all the more welcome, coming just weeks before both the
    Washington Summit on Nuclear Security and the Review Conference of the
    Non-Proliferation Treaty. Across Europe, and at this moment of
    diplomatic opportunity, we have joined together to declare our
    unequivocal support for President Obama’s vision of a world without
    nuclear weapons, to declare our desire to re-set the security
    relationship between Europe, the US and Russia, and to show strong
    European support for the measures necessary to deliver these goals.

    Let no-one doubt the importance of this endeavour. The risks of
    proliferation are growing. India, Israel and Pakistan have already
    entered the nuclear club. If Iran gets the bomb, others certainly will
    follow.  We know that terrorist groups want to acquire nuclear
    materials, making the security of those materials an issue of truly
    global significance. Nuclear armed states inside the NPT have not been
    disarming fast enough, straining the confidence of their non-nuclear
    partners in the credibility of the NPT grand bargain. Without further
    action, there is a real danger that the world will be overwhelmed by
    proliferation risks and incidents of nuclear weapons use, with all their
    catastrophic consequences.

    The strategic implications of this are profound. Nuclear deterrence
    is a far less persuasive strategic response to a world of potential
    regional nuclear arms races and nuclear terrorism than it was to the
    Cold War.

    The circumstances of today require a shift in thinking. We must,
    through further multilateral agreement, reduce the role and the number
    of nuclear weapons in the world, deepen confidence in the
    non-proliferation regime, and improve the security of existing nuclear
    weapons and materials. We must achieve these goals while at the same
    time helping those countries that wish to go down the civil nuclear
    energy route do so safely.

    The practical steps necessary to achieve our goals are clear. In
    Washington, we must demonstrate wider international ownership of the
    issue of nuclear security. This is not just a concern for those fearing a
    nuclear terrorist attack. Any major nuclear security incident anywhere
    is likely to derail the civil nuclear renaissance everywhere. Regardless
    of whether we as individuals support the idea of more nuclear power,
    this may ultimately undermine global attempts to meet the challenge of
    climate change, an outcome we all have a stake in avoiding.

    The Washington Summit also must agree practical action on programmes
    to control and destroy nuclear materials and ready-made weapons within
    four years; and participants must agree to rationalise the many complex
    overlapping international conventions, initiatives and resolutions that
    are the current institutional architecture aimed at addressing this
    issue.

    In May, at the NPT Review Conference in New York, the Treaty, for 40
    years the foundation of counter-proliferation efforts, must be
    overhauled and reinforced. All signatory nations should accept the
    strengthened monitoring provisions of the Additional Protocol. The IAEA
    needs that strengthened inspection power if it is to provide effective
    monitoring of declared and undeclared nuclear material and activities.
    Nations wishing to develop a civil nuclear capability must first agree
    to proper verification procedures and unimpeded access for the IAEA.

    Progress of this nature will not be possible without a credible
    process for nuclear disarmament. Beyond START follow-on we need urgent
    and more radical initiatives from the nuclear weapons states.
    Increasingly it is becoming more challenging to explain why some
    countries should have, and others should not be allowed to possess
    nuclear weapons.

    All nuclear weapons, including tactical ones, must be included in
    disarmament talks. Where this necessitates discussion of conventional
    force imbalances, these too must be included. States that now possess
    nuclear weapons must work together to reduce their importance to
    national and international security.

    The establishment of nuclear free zones in Latin America, sub-Saharan
    Africa and Central Asia is very encouraging. By the end of the NPT
    Review Conference there must be a credible process for the discussion of
    a Weapons of Mass Destruction Free Zone in the Middle East.

    After May, attention must also return to other issues. The countries
    that have not yet ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty including
    the US, China, Israel, Pakistan, India and North Korea should do so
    urgently, allowing it to come into force. The stalemate in the Geneva
    Disarmament Conference on a Fissile Material Cut-Off Treaty must also be
    overcome. We need a treaty-sanctioned prohibition of the production of
    the basic materials required to manufacture nuclear explosive devices.

    Europe, through NATO, is central to the security relationship with
    Russia and can influence it through NATO diplomacy and the ongoing
    revision of NATO’s Strategic Concept. The UK and France, working with
    other nuclear weapons states, can play their full part in discussions on
    disarmament, and in efforts to implement any internationally agreed and
    verifiable reductions in warhead numbers. In addition to that
    leadership Europe is a key player in civil nuclear power and nuclear
    security.

    In short, Europe can and must play a vital role in building the
    cooperation necessary for meeting the global nuclear challenge. All our
    futures depend on it.

    Signed:

    1. Kåre Willoch, Former Prime Minister of Norway
    2. Kjell Magne Bondevik, Former Prime Minister of Norway
    3. Oddvar Nordli, Former Prime Minister of Norway
    4. Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, Former Prime Minister of Norway
    5. Thorvald Stoltenberg, Former Minister of Defense and Minister of
      Foreign Affairs of Norway
    6. Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz, Former Prime Minister and Foreign Minister
      of Poland
    7. Ruud Lubbers, Former Prime Minister of the Netherlands (author of
      “Moving beyond the stalemate”)
    8. Jean-Luc Dehaene, Former Prime Minister of Belgium and current MEP
    9. Guy Verhofstadt, Former Prime Minister of Belgium and current MEP,
    10. Lord Geoffrey Howe of Aberavon, Former British Deputy Prime
      Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Foreign Secretary
    11. Laurens Jan Brinkhorst, Former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of
      Economic Affairs of the Netherlands
    12. Jan Kavan, Former Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of the
      Czech Republic
    13. Volker Rühe, Former Defence Minister of Germany
    14. Elisabeth Rehn, Former Defence Minister of Finland, Former UN
      Under-Secretary-General, SRSG
    15. Hans Blix, Former Minister for Foreign Affairs of Sweden
    16. Wolfgang Ischinger, Former Deputy Foreign Minister of Germany
    17. General Bernard Norlain, Former French General, Former commander of
      the French Tactical Air Force and military counselor to the Prime
      Minister
    18. Lord George Robertson of Port Ellen, Former British Defence
      Secretary and Secretary General of NATO
    19. Sir Malcolm Rifkind, Former British Defence Secretary and Foreign
      Secretary
    20. Admiral the Lord Michael Boyce, Former British Chief of the Defence
      Staff
    21. Lord Charles Guthrie of Craigiebank Former British Chief of the
      Defence Staff
    22. Lord Douglas Hurd of Westwell Former British Foreign Secretary
    23. Margaret Beckett, Former British Foreign Secretary
    24. Des Browne, Former British Defence Secretary
    25. Lord Tom King of Bridgwater Former British Defence Secretary
    26. Louis Michel MEP Former, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Belgium
    27. Mogens Lykketoft MP, Former Minister for Foreign Affairs of Denmark
    28. Niels Helveg Petersen MP, Former Minister for Foreign Affairs of
      Denmark
    29. Uffe Ellemann-Jensen, Former Minister for Foreign Affairs of Denmark
    30. Frits Korthals Altes, Former President of the Senate and Minister of
      Justice of the Netherlands
    31. Michael Ancram, Former British Shadow Foreign Secretary and Shadow
      Defence Secretary
    32. Dr. John Reid, Former British Defence Secretary
    33. Sir Menzies Campbell, Former British Leader Liberal Democrat Party
      and Liberal Democrat Shadow Foreign Secretary
    34. Shirley Williams (Baroness Williams of Crosby) Former Adviser on
      Nuclear Proliferation to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
    35. Charles Clarke, Former British Home Secretary
    36. James Arbuthnot, Former British Chair of the Defence Select
      Committee
    37. Adam Ingram, Former British Defence Minister of State (Armed Forces)
    38. Prof. Ivo Šlaus, Former Croatian MP, former member of Foreign
      Affairs Committee and current Emeritus Professor of Physics
    39. Francesco Calogero, Italian theoretical physicist & former
      Secretary General of Pugwash
    40. Giorgio La Malfa MP, Former Italian Minister of European Affairs
    41. Federica On. Mogherini Rebesani, Member of the Italian Parliament

  • Nuclear Security

    This article was originally published by the International Herald Tribune

    The 47 heads of state who will assemble in Washington next week for the world’s first Nuclear Security Summit should focus like a laser beam on the biggest potential threat to civilization.

    Psychologically, it is almost impossible to imagine terrorists exploding a nuclear bomb that devastates the heart of Moscow or Mumbai, New York or Cairo. Analytically, however, there’s only one difference between Al Qaeda’s 9/11 attack that extinguished the lives of 3,000 people in New York, or the 11/26 attack that killed nearly 200 in Mumbai, and a nuclear Mumbai or 9/11 that could kill hundreds of thousands in a single blow. That difference is terrorists getting a nuclear bomb.

    No one who has examined the evidence has any doubt that terrorist groups — including Al Qaeda, Chechen separatists and Lashkar-e-Taiba — have shown serious interest and undertaken substantial efforts to acquire material and equipment for this purpose. The highly enriched uranium required to make an elementary nuclear bomb could be hidden inside a football.

    The big insight that motivates the summit is that the leaders assembled there have in their power the ways and means to successfully prevent nuclear terrorism. The key to success is to deny terrorists the means to achieve their deadliest aspirations.

    Fortunately, physics provides a syllogism that says: no fissile material, no mushroom cloud, no nuclear terrorism.

    All that the members of the international community have to do to prevent this ultimate catastrophe is to lock up all nuclear weapons and materials as securely as gold in Fort Knox or treasures in the Kremlin Armory. This is a big “all” — but it consists of actions we know how to take and can afford. Other powerful radioactive sources should be equally protected.

    How can this be done? The leaders who convene will address an issue the international community has so far been dragging its feet on — implementing the obligation states have already committed themselves to in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1540, to adopt “effective, appropriate measures to secure all nuclear materials.”

    In confronting this challenge, those assembled can apply many of the lessons learned by the United States and Russia over the past 18 years in their cooperative threat-reduction program, as well as the best practices and technologies developed by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

    The bottom line by which the summit should be scored is whether as a result of this effort, states take specific actions, including the allocation of resources to make the world safer from a nuclear explosion by an extremist group.

    A number of states will announce actions that they have already taken in preparation for the summit. Others, we hope, will make unambiguous commitments to take observable actions. We trust these actions will be supported by every state, reflecting a global recognition that a nuclear explosion anywhere is a nuclear explosion everywhere.

    This Nuclear Security Summit focuses on the most urgent dimension of nuclear danger. But this is only one part of a larger, more complex agenda. The “New START” arms control agreement between the United States and Russia takes another step on the path to eliminating all nuclear arsenals. Next month, the Nonproliferation Review Conference will provide a further opportunity for international cooperation in preventing the spread of nuclear weapons.

    To address the array of nuclear threats and specifically the specter of a nuclear bomb exploding in one of our cities with consequences that will fundamentally change our lives and our world, the supreme requirement is for meaningful, sustained international cooperation.

    We applaud the leaders for their initiative in focusing on this grave challenge. Still, as with many international summits that have gone before, we will withhold judgment until we see what leaders actually do measured in terms of the challenge we face.

  • Deadly Climate Change from Nuclear War: A Threat to Human Existence

    2010_02_18_starr_climate_change.pdf

  • Nuclear Terrorism: How It Can Be Prevented

    The recent furor over an unsuccessful terrorist attempt to blow up an airliner is distracting us from considering the possibility of a vastly more destructive terrorist act: exploding a nuclear weapon in a heavily-populated area.

    Such a disaster — which would kill hundreds of thousands of people — is not a remote possibility at all.  Although terrorist groups do not have the fissile material (that is, material capable of sustaining a nuclear chain reaction) necessary to build nuclear weapons on their own, they have been trying to obtain such weapons, either by purchase or theft, for decades.  According to the U.S.government, Osama bin Laden sought to acquire nuclear weapons at least since 1992.  Not only have there been dozens of thefts and sales of fissile material to potential terrorists (all of whom were supposedly arrested), but a significant number of nuclear weapons have been “lost” by nuclear-armed nations.  In addition, if either nuclear weapons or fissile material were available to overseas terrorists, it would not be very difficult to smuggle them into the United States.

    In 2004, when Dr. Graham Allison — founding dean of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and a former top Pentagon official — published his classic study, Nuclear Terrorism:  The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe, he argued that if governments continued their past policies, a nuclear terrorist attack was inevitable.  The problem, as he saw it, reflected a combination of terrorist activity, the ease of smuggling weapons across U.S.borders, and the accessibility of nuclear weapons and fissile materials. 

    Unfortunately, not much has changed since that time.  Terrorism, of course, shows no sign of disappearing.  Even if the “war on terror” produced a significant decline in terrorism (which it shows no sign of doing) and even if proper intelligence and police work reduced the number of terrorist activities, some terrorist acts almost certainly would continue, as they have for centuries.  Furthermore, as we have seen in the case of immigration, securing U.S.borders is not an easy task, and perfect security seems unlikely to be obtained.   

    But what about the third leg of the problem:  the accessibility of nuclear weapons and fissile materials?  Not much has been done about this.  But a lot could be done.

    Allison focused particularly on securing fissile material.  As he put it:  “No fissile material, no nuclear explosion, no nuclear terrorism.  It is that simple.”  He explained:  “There is a vast — but not unlimited — amount of it in the world, and it is within our power to keep it secure.”  Actually, in recent years there has been a tightening up of governmental controls over fissile material.  Also, there has been significant interest by the U.S.government and others in negotiating a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty, which would ban the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons.  During the 2008 presidential campaign, both Barack Obama and John McCain endorsed such a treaty, and since then both have spoken out in favor of it.

    Then, of course, there is the possibility of eliminating the vast stockpiles of nuclear weapons accumulated by nine nations.  At the moment, there are some 23,000 nuclear weapons in existence (mostly in Russia and the United States) — ripe pickings for any would-be mass murderer.  Any significant reduction in their number would significantly reduce the opportunities for nuclear terrorism.  And their elimination would wipe out these opportunities entirely.  To draw upon Allison’s phrasing:  no nuclear weapons, no nuclear explosion, no nuclear terrorism.

    Of course, there are other good reasons to eliminate nuclear weapons, as well, including the danger of nuclear war.  Doubtless this point will be on the minds of many government officials and citizens alike as the world prepares for the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference this coming May, at the United Nations.  The U.N. conference will consider the treaty pledges of non-nuclear nations to forgo nuclear weapons and the treaty pledges of nuclear nations to divest themselves of these implements of mass destruction.

    Even so, the ongoing danger of nuclear terrorism provides yet another reason to rid the world of fissile material and its final, terrible product, nuclear weapons.  Let’s not forget that.

  • A Dialogue Between Socrates and Einstein

    A Dialogue Between Socrates and Einstein

    Socrates was taking a walk through the countryside and he came across Professor Einstein. After the two men greeted each other, Socrates asked Einstein about his famous quotation concerning the atomic bomb: “The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking, and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.”

    Socrates: I’ve often wondered about this statement. What exactly did you mean by “modes of thinking”?

    Einstein: I meant that the new weapons we have created require us to think in a new way. We can no longer continue to use our old ways of thinking that have brought us this far. Our thinking must change.

    Socrates: How must it change?

    Einstein: To start with, we must recognize that these weapons have the power to destroy everything, including most life on the planet. We must make greater use of our imaginations, and imagine the outcome of a nuclear war. We must be able to imagine the outcome of a war that would end civilization and cause the death of all humans.

    Socrates: This may be difficult for many people to imagine.

    Einstein: I have no doubt that it is difficult to imagine. We tend to project the past into the future, but in the Nuclear Age the future could be very different from the past. But imagining a future without human life, or even all life, may be easier to imagine than it is to prevent such a future from occurring.

    Socrates: You mean imagining a future without a human presence on the planet is the easier part of changing our modes of thinking?

    Einstein: Exactly so, Socrates. But it is very important.

    Socrates: Why do you find it so important?

    Einstein: If you can imagine that we could have a world without human beings, then it should be motivating to do something to prevent this from happening.

    Socrates: Yes, Einstein. I can see that this would be motivating. But why aren’t more people motivated?

    Einstein: First, they aren’t motivated because they can’t really imagine such a world. Second, even if they can imagine it, they can’t figure out what to do.

    Socrates: I think the first problem, the failure of imagination, could be helped with education.

    Einstein: Yes, I think the right kind of education would help greatly.

    Socrates: And what would be the right kind of education?

    Einstein: Education that shows how devastating the use of these weapons would be. I have always felt that scientists should lead in providing this education, but political leaders should also educate in this regard. And also teachers in classrooms must help educate a new generation.

    Socrates: But many people still think that nuclear weapons make them safer.

    Einstein: This is an old mode of thinking. It must be changed through education. Nuclear weapons, rather than making us safer, make the world more dangerous.

    Socrates: But many leaders say that the threat to use nuclear weapons prevents other states from using nuclear weapons against you.

    Einstein: That, too, is an old mode of thinking. It is called deterrence, and it relies upon the rationality of other leaders. I’ve always believed in rationality, but I cannot believe that it makes sense to risk the future of humanity on the assumption that all leaders will act rationally at all times and under all circumstances.

    Socrates: I can’t imagine leaders who are rational all the time.

    Einstein: It would be irrational to believe that all leaders are rational at all times.

    Socrates: Yes, surely there are times when even the most rational leaders act irrationally. This is true of all humans.

    Einstein: Then surely we should not risk the future of the human species due to an unwarranted belief in the nature of rationality.

    Socrates: Do you find spirituality to be more important than rationality?

    Einstein: I find both are important human capacities requiring further development, and such development requires that we should not put the human species at risk of nuclear annihilation.

    Socrates: There is much we can imagine, but also much that is beyond our ability to imagine.

    Einstein: Of course, Socrates. But we must expand our capacity to imagine. Nuclear weapons make this necessary.

    Socrates: You said that even for those who could imagine a world without humans due to our nuclear arsenals, they still may not be able to imagine a way out of the dilemma.

    Einstein: Yes, to imagine a world without humans is only a way to understand that we must act to prevent this.

    Socrates: But some humans may view a world without humans as a positive outcome.

    Einstein: It would mean not only the end of the present and the future – that is bad enough – but also the eradication of all memory of the past, the end of every beautiful thing ever created by humans. There would be no one to appreciate music and poetry, art and architecture, no memory of great or small human triumphs of the past.

    Socrates: There would be no one to remember the heroism and heroes of the past.

    Einstein: It would be a world without humans. It would destroy the mirror of self-awareness that humans hold up to the universe.

    Socrates: That would indeed be a great loss. How can we prevent this from happening?

    Einstein: It will require us to summon our creativity and discipline, perhaps more than we have ever done before.

    Socrates: This is indeed a great challenge.

    Einstein: It is the challenge made necessary by the creation of nuclear weapons.

    Socrates: So it is one burst of creativity that brings on the need for new creativity.

    Einstein: Exactly so. We need new creative thinking. This problem is solvable. It just needs our best thinking.

    Socrates: What do you recommend, Professor Einstein?

    Einstein: We must be bold and meet this new danger with a new way of thinking. War can no longer be a way to settle differences between competing powers.

    Socrates: So you would do away with war?

    Einstein: We must. There is no choice. In a nuclear armed world, war has become too dangerous.

    Socrates: Even though I was a soldier and am proud of it, I understand that wars must end. War was never a healthy way to solve conflicts between contending parties.

    Einstein: You have a far more positive view of war than I do, but I’m glad we agree that nuclear weapons have made war far too dangerous to continue.

    Socrates: For a long time, countries have tried to achieve peace by preparing for war.

    Einstein: But this has never worked as they had hoped. Preparing for war has always led to war. Now we must change this paradigm and seek peace by preparing for peace.

    Socrates: This makes sense. This is the way forward.

    Einstein: There is more. Strong states can no longer prevail in war, as was once the case. With nuclear weapons, even a small extremist group will be able to destroy a powerful country.

    Socrates: All the more reason to end war and to do away with nuclear arms.

    Einstein: There is no global problem that can any longer be solved without global cooperation. That is also an essential new way of thinking that is necessary for global survival.

    Socrates: So we must learn to think as global citizens, owing our allegiance to humanity.

    Einstein: I believe this with all my heart. We must also end double standards, and have a single standard that applies to all countries and all people.

    Socrates: All of what you say makes sense to me, Einstein, but how can it come to pass?

    Einstein: It won’t come from our leaders. They are still leading in the old modes of thinking based on arms and force. They still believe in double standards, and the strong countries seek to impose their will on the weak. Leaders of nuclear armed states won’t give up their weapons without being pressed to do so by their people.

    Socrates: Then the people must be awakened, and they must demand an end to war, and a world free of nuclear weapons.

    Einstein: Yes, Socrates, you are a wise man. You understand the changes in thinking that are necessary.

    Socrates: I doubt that I am a wise man, Einstein, but you restore my belief in humanity. I will help you to awaken humanity to the dangers that now confront us. I will help you to change our modes of thinking.

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