Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Category: Peace

  • Encomium for David Krieger

    Encomium for David Krieger

    NAPF Chair Robert Laney delivered these remarks on October 20, 2019, at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s 36th Annual Evening for Peace.

    With this assignment to speak about David I feel the dilemma that others have felt in similar circumstances when trying against impossible odds to do justice to a subject too large for their talents and too large for the time allotted. I proceed.

    David Krieger has played a variety of roles in my life and, I suspect, in the lives of our many friends in and around the Foundation, past and present. Many of you already know much of what follows, but please bear with me.

    First, David as our visionary: Since the Foundation’s beginning in 1982 David has personified a vision of a better world than the world in which we live today — a more safe, sane, secure, just, and peaceful world — a world free of the threat that nuclear weapons pose to all of humanity.  Many people, especially in the political world, have scoffed at such a vision and continue to scoff. But David, knowing the true nature of the nuclear threat and having grappled with it over many years, has never lost heart or waivered from his vision of a better world. As David has reminded us on countless occasions, peace is an imperative of the nuclear age.

    Next, David as our leader: The Foundation’s 37-years-and-counting campaign to create a more safe, sane, and secure world has faced daunting odds in the powers-that-be who always resist the changes that we seek. Nevertheless throughout this period the Foundation has been able to keep its lights on, its telephones and computers in operation, and its amazing and dedicated Staff fully engaged with the challenges we face. Let me be clear: none of this would have been remotely possible without David’s steady, clear-eyed leadership and hand on the helm. I shall cite just a few examples among many:

    It has been David who assembled and trained our Staff of all-stars, each of whom treats his or her responsibilities as a calling rather than just a job.

    It has been David who has done the heavy lifting in fund-raising throughout this period.

    It has been David who has kept the Foundation current with developments in the field of nuclear weapons policy.

    It has been David who caused the Foundation to achieve consultative status at the United Nations and to play an active and influential role in nuclear weapons-related conferences at the UN in New York and in Europe.

    It has been David who forged essential alliances with other NGOs and various political, social, and religious leaders around the world, some of whose names you would recognize instantly.

    It has been David who has guided each Staff member in his or her personal growth as a peace activist and as an effective member of our team.

    And it has been David who established our program for interns and has guided our interns not only in their contributions to the work of the Foundation but also in their personal growth as peace activists.

    I could go on about David’s decisive accomplishments as our leader since 1982, but you get my drift. As an organization with an effective voice in the world, we owe our existence this evening to David Krieger.

    Next, David as our teacher: Not all of us were peace activists or anti- nuclear weapons campaigners when we first met David. Some of us needed to be “brought along,” as they say, and in my case, over a period of years. I confess this as one who came from all the educational

    advantages that one would expect should have taught me such things. But under David’s gentle guidance I gradually came to understand not only the gravity of the nuclear threat, but also the moral impossibility of staying on the sidelines while this threat exists. I know that some of you were more developed in this respect than I was upon first meeting David.  Nevertheless I suspect that you have your own stories about how David has influenced your thinking about why and how to create a safer and more secure world. But David as a teacher has gone far beyond our circle at the Foundation. As everyone knows, David’s books, essays, and letters to editors over many years have provided the public with a rich source of education on matters of peace and security in the nuclear age.

    Next, David as our brother and comrade in the campaign for a  better world: Throughout my association with David and the Foundation over more than two decades, I have observed how David places himself among our team rather than over our team, offering hints, praise, suggestions, and encouragement as circumstances would indicate.  Not one to feed his ego in the position of President and CEO even  though he has had plenty of opportunities to do so, David has preferred  to guide by soft-spoken example in the manner of an elder brother   rather than as chief executive. I have always felt and appreciated David’s genuine interest in the people of the Foundation for their own sakes, as if we are all a family.

    Finally, David as our poet in residence: Most of you know that David has a poetic soul. Indeed one wonders where this poetic inclination would have taken him but for his 37 years at the helm of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. Look into his poetry, and you will see what I mean. This is where you will see David’s heart most clearly – the heart of one deeply in touch with humanity’s cri de coeur for a better world – a world free of war, free of mindless cruelty, and free of the threat that nuclear weapons present to all that we hold dear.

    So David, as our visionary, our leader, our teacher, our brother and comrade, and our poet in residence, you have brought us farther in 37 years than we ever had a right to expect. But our journey is not over, and I for one look forward to continuing our work together in the ranks of our comrades in disarmament. May it ever be thus.

  • Ten Ways that the Climate Crisis and Militarism Are Intertwined

    Ten Ways that the Climate Crisis and Militarism Are Intertwined

    Medea BenjaminThe environmental justice movement that is surging globally is intentionally intersectional, showing how global warming is connected to issues such as race, poverty, migration and public health. One area intimately linked to the climate crisis that gets little attention, however, is militarism. Here are some of the ways these issues—and their solutions—are intertwined.

    1. The US military protects Big Oil and other extractive industries. The US military has often been used to ensure that US companies have access to extractive industry materials, particularly oil, around the world.The 1991 Gulf War against Iraq was a blatant example of war for oil; today the US military support for Saudi Arabia is connected to the US fossil fuel industry’s determination to control access to the world’s oil. Hundreds of the  US military bases spread around the world are in resource-rich regions and near strategic shipping lanes. We can’t get off the fossil fuel treadmill until we stop our military from acting as the world’s protector of Big Oil.

    2.  The Pentagon is the single largest institutional consumer of fossil fuels in the world. If the Pentagon were a country, its fuel use alone would make it the 47th largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world, greater than entire nations such as Sweden, Norway or Finland. US military emissions come mainly from fueling weapons and equipment, as well as lighting, heating and cooling more than 560,000 buildings around the world.

    3. The Pentagon monopolizes the funding we need to seriously address the climate crisis. We are now spending over half of the federal government’s annual discretionary budget on the military when the biggest threat to US national security is not Iran or China, but the climate crisis. We could cut the Pentagon’s current budget in half and still be left with a bigger military budget than China, Russia, Iran and North Korea combined. The $350 billion savings could then be funnelled into the Green New Deal. Just one percent of the 2019 military budget of $716 billion would be enough to fund 128,879 green infrastructure jobs instead.

    4. Military operations leave a toxic legacy in their wake. US military bases despoil the landscape, pollute the soil, and contaminate the drinking water. At the Kadena Base in Okinawa, the US Air Force has polluted local land and water with hazardous chemicals, including arsenic, lead, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), asbestos and dioxin.Here at home, the EPA has identified over 149 current or former military bases as SuperFund sites because Pentagon pollution has left local soil and groundwater highly dangerous to human, animal, and plant life. According to a 2017 government report, the Pentagon has already spent $11.5 billion on environmental cleanup of closed bases and estimates $3.4 billion more will be needed.

    5. Wars ravage fragile ecosystems that are crucial to sustaining human health and climate resiliency. Direct warfare inherently involves the destruction of the environment, through bombings and boots-on-the-ground invasions that destroy the land and infrastructure. In the Gaza Strip, an area that suffered three major Israeli military assaults between 2008 and 2014. Israel’s bombing campaigns targeted sewage treatment and power facilities, leaving 97% of Gaza’s freshwater contaminated by saline and sewage, and therefore unfit for human consumption. In Yemen, the Saudi-led bombing campaign has created a humanitarian and environmental catastrophe, with more than 2,000 cases of cholera now being reported each day. In Iraq, environmental toxins left behind by the Pentagon’s devastating 2003 invasion include depleted uranium, which has left children living near US bases with an increased risk of congenital heart disease, spinal deformities,  cancer, leukemia, cleft lip and missing or malformed and paralyzed limbs.

    6. Climate change is a “threat multiplier” that makes already dangerous social and political situations even worse. In Syria, the worst drought in 500 years led to crop failures that pushed farmers into cities, exacerbating the unemployment and political unrest that contributed to the uprising in 2011. Similar climate crises have triggered conflicts in other countries across the Middle East, from Yemen to Libya. As global temperatures continue to rise, there will be more ecological disasters, more mass migrations and more wars. There will also be more domestic armed clashes—including civil wars—that can spill beyond borders and destabilize entire regions. The areas most at risk are sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and South, Central and Southeast Asia.

    7. US sabotages international agreements addressing climate change and war. The US has deliberately and consistently undermined the world’s collective efforts to address the climate crisis by cutting greenhouse gas emissions and speeding the  transition to renewable energy. The US refused to join the 1997 Kyoto Protocol and the Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the 2015 Paris Climate Accord was the latest example of this flagrant disregard for nature, science, and the future. Similarly, the US refuses to join the International Criminal Court that investigates war crimes, violates international law with unilateral invasions and sanctions, and is withdrawing from nuclear agreements with Russia. By choosing to prioritize our military over diplomacy, the US sends the message that “might makes right” and makes it harder to find solutions to the climate crisis and military conflicts.

    8. Mass migration is fueled by both climate change and conflict, with migrants often facing militarized repression. A 2018 World Bank Group report estimates that the impacts of climate change in three of the world’s most densely populated developing regions—sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Latin America—could result in the displacement and internal migration of more than 140 million people before 2050. Already, millions of migrants from Central America to Africa to the Middle East are fleeing environmental disasters and conflict. At the US border, migrants are locked in cages and stranded in camps. In the Mediterranean, thousands of refugees have  died while attempting dangerous sea voyages. Meanwhile, the arms dealers fuelling the conflicts in these regions are profiting handsomely from selling arms and building detention facilities to secure the borders against the refugees.

    9. Militarized state violence is leveled against communities resisting corporate-led environmental destruction. Communities that fight to protect their lands and villages from oil drills, mining companies, ranchers, agribusiness, etc. are often met with state and paramilitary violence. We see this in the Amazon today, where indigenous people are murdered for trying to stop clear-cutting and incineration of their forests. We see it in Honduras, where activists like Berta Caceres have been gunned down for trying to preserve their rivers. In 2018, there were 164 documented cases of environmentalists murdered around the world. In the US, the indigenous communities protesting plans to build the Keystone oil pipeline in South Dakota were met by police who targeted the unarmed demonstrators with tear gas, bean-bag rounds, and water cannons—intentionally deployed in below-freezing temperatures. Governments around the world are expanding their state-of-emergency laws to encompass climate-related upheavals, perversely facilitating the repression of environmental activists who have been branded as “eco-terrorists” and who are subjected to counterinsurgency operations.

    10. Climate change and nuclear war are both existential threats to the planet. Catastrophic climate change and nuclear war are unique in the existential threat they pose to the very survival of human civilization. The creation of nuclear weapons—and their proliferation—was spurred by global militarism, yet nuclear weapons are rarely recognized as a threat to the future of life on this planet. Even a very “limited” nuclear war, involving less than 0.5% of the world’s nuclear weapons, would be enough to cause catastrophic global climate disruption and a worldwide famine, putting up to 2 billion people at risk. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has set its iconic Doomsday Clock to 2 minutes to midnight, showing the grave need for the ratification of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. The environmental movement and the anti-nuke movement need to work hand-in-hand to stop these threats to planetary survival.

    To free up billions of Pentagon dollars for investing in critical environmental projects and to eliminate the environmental havoc of war, movements for a livable, peaceful planet need to put “ending war” at the top of the “must do” list.

    Medea Benjamin is co-founder of CODEPINK and a member of the NAPF Advisory Council.

    This article was originally published by Common Dreams and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.

  • Nuclear Abolition: Q&A with Dr. David Krieger

    Nuclear Abolition: Q&A with Dr. David Krieger

    *The following is a special dialogue held at Nuclear Age Peace Foundation in Santa Barbara during our overseas fieldwork on February 1, 2019. This session was held between 13 Kansai Soka High School students and Dr. David Krieger, President of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.

    Dr. Krieger: In the discussion, you said that the reason for nuclear deterrence is that it protects a country against assault and possible assault. However, if you really think about it, deterrence cannot protect, not in the sense of physical protection, and that is the confusion about deterrence in most people’s minds. They think that nuclear deterrence actually protects, but deterrence is only a psychological concept, not a physical barrier. I think of deterrence as something like the Maginot Line in World War II. France built a strong wall and thought that it would protect them from Germans invading again. However, the Germans just went around the wall, attacked and occupied France. I think deterrence is misunderstood, and I don’t really think you can have a compromise between the people who support nuclear deterrence and those who do not.

    Emi Kuroda: Why do you think nuclear deterrence supporters cannot compromise with people who don’t support deterrence?

    Dr. Krieger: I think deterrence is a false premise. I don’t think deterrence can provide any protection. You mentioned in your slideshow that deterrence cannot provide 100% protection. I would say that deterrence cannot provide 50% protection or even 1% protection. Over time, deterrence will fail. If you do a statistical study and the level of chance where it can fail is 1%, you will have a failure over time. That is true. So I think you are right to come down on the side of abolition. I think you are right to look to ICAN, which we have supported from the beginning, as a partner organization. I think you are right to support the new treaty, which is a departure from deterrence, as it implicitly recognizes that deterrence cannot work over time. I think people who support deterrence actually have another agenda, and the other agenda is to give themselves an advantage over other countries and threaten them with the offensive use of nuclear weapons. So I would say that your presentation is very good, but I would be careful about thinking of nuclear deterrence as a way to add to the disarmament of nuclear weapons. Many countries believe in deterrence, but I believe it’s a magical fallacy.

    Rei Hagihara: I would like to ask a question. We think that we should find a common ground between the two sides (nuclear deterrence supporters & nuclear abolition supporters). Do you think we should find a common ground? If you do, what do you think is the common ground?

    Dr. Krieger: I’m very skeptical that you can find a common ground, because I think deterrence is based on a false assumption, which is that nuclear weapons can protect you. But the reality is they can’t protect you. I think people who have accepted the premise that deterrence can protect you believe in that. I don’t see them moving away from that to a common ground. I don’t know what the common ground would be. I think having a common ground is a nice idea, but I don’t see it working in the case of people who support nuclear deterrence.

    The second president of Soka Gakkai, Josei Toda, said nuclear weapons are an absolute evil. So how do you compromise with an absolute evil? Well, actually I have one idea of compromise. Sixty-six million years ago, a meteor hit the earth and caused mass extinction of most complex life at the time. It wiped out the dinosaurs, for example. It actually made it possible for our human ancestors to survive because they were so small. But possibly, if we eliminate the nuclear weapons down to one, two or three, and they are kept in international storage just in case the earth is threatened by a meteor, that is a kind of compromise. Although not really a compromise for deterrence, it is a compromise for those saying you might go to a very low number—on the way to zero—and decide that a meteor is a sufficient threat to maintain a couple of nuclear weapons under international control. But tell me how you think compromise is possible.

    Emi Kuroda: We think that a possible common ground is human rights because nuclear abolition supporters think that human rights of all human beings should be protected, but nuclear deterrence supporters think that human rights of their own country is a priority. But we don’t think we can make nuclear deterrence supporters compromise by using human rights.

    Dr. Krieger: Well, human rights include the right to life. That’s in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I think nuclear weapons pose a threat not only to individual lives but also a threat of mass extinction to humans and other complex life. So I agree with you that human rights is an important element—because of the right to life. I think the people who advocate for nuclear deterrence ironically think that protecting their country is more important than human lives and human rights.

    Let me say one more thing. There is such a widespread belief in nuclear deterrence that a lot needs to be done to challenge the logic of nuclear deterrence. That is a very important element. We had a symposium here on nuclear deterrence and created the Santa Barbara Declaration, which you might want to take a look at when thinking about nuclear deterrence. We also have a 4-minute video called “The Myth of Nuclear Deterrence.”

    Emi Kuroda: We gathered the opinions of nuclear deterrence supporters, and we originally thought that those opinions would help us understand the reality. But we struggled with how to deal with those opinions. What do you think the role of the opinions of nuclear deterrence supporters is? How do we use those opinions to promote nuclear abolition?

    Dr. Krieger: I think you need to educate people, starting with young people—and put a lot of emphasis on educating young people—because nuclear deterrence is a very common myth that nuclear weapons can protect a country. I just don’t think that is reality. I think you have to counter those opinions, and that’s why in the presentation we gave, we talked about malice, madness, mistake, miscalculation, and manipulation (hacking). So I think a dangerous aspect of nuclear weapons, going forward, is that skilled computer hackers will break into nuclear weapon systems. What if the systems are not that sophisticated? You only need to break into the weakest country’s system. What if a hacker could, for example, break into North Korea’s nuclear weapons? Probably North Korea doesn’t have the warheads connected to missiles right now, but it will eventually. What about Pakistan? What if a skilled hacker could break in and trigger the use of nuclear weapons by Pakistan against India? And India, instead of trying to figure it out, attacks Pakistan, and they will go back and forth. Experts in climatology predict that if 100 nuclear weapons are used, with 50 on each side between Pakistan and India, it could result in a cut in food supplies, leading to 2 billion deaths globally. So, how good is deterrence against a hacker? It’s not at all. How good is deterrence against madness? What if you have a leader who is crazy, mad? We may have one now, in the US. What if there is a mistake? There have been many mistakes in interpreting nuclear launches. Russians, thinking nuclear weapons were launched against them, found out that actually it was just geese reflected against the cloud cover. Nuclear deterrence has no value against mistakes, miscalculation, madness or hacking. Maybe deterrence could dissuade a country from using nuclear weapons out of malice, but that is only a possibility. There is no assurance that it would work.

    Emi Kuroda: Yesterday, during our presentation in Los Angeles, we said that deterrence doesn’t work because terrorists can use nuclear weapons. But yesterday we heard that it is really difficult for terrorists to have nuclear weapons. Is it true that it is almost impossible for terrorists to get nuclear weapons?

    Dr. Krieger: A Christian nun and two anti-nuclear activists went to a nuclear weapons site in Oakridge, Tennessee. I think it was called the Y-12 National Security Complex. They cut through the outer fence, they hiked a quarter mile to the place where nuclear weapons were kept. They painted on the bunkers where the nuclear weapons were stored. The nun was 82 years old. So can terrorists get nuclear weapons? I don’t know, but I wouldn’t rule it out. And that’s in the United States, which supposedly has a good system of protection. What if there is a coup d’état in Turkey, where the US keeps 50 nuclear weapons? What if there’s a coup d’état in Pakistan?

    Over time, I think the chances are more likely that terrorists can get nuclear weapons; the probability is not zero. We don’t know what the probability is, but over time, terrorists are a worry. That’s why it’s so important to be all in for abolition. That’s why it’s important to understand that abolition is the answer. It has got to be a negotiated abolition, a phased abolition and a verified abolition. It will take time, but the starting point is negotiations. Maybe that is a common ground—starting negotiations. People who don’t believe in deterrence could invite people who do believe in deterrence, to try to educate them on the importance of moving from deterrence to abolition. Terrorism could take the form of hacking.

    Hiromi Hashide: I’d like to ask how you developed your sense of poetry. I have read the dialogue between yourself and Dr. Ikeda, and I was able to understand the importance of a sense of poetry. I think those who understand the importance of poetry can also understand the dignity of life, and I’d like more people to have a sense of poetry, including myself.

    Dr. Krieger: Thank you. That’s a really good question. The more I work in the area of nuclear weapons abolition and peace and war, the more I think that the most important things in life are truth, beauty, love, family, and nature; those are all subjects of poetry. Maybe poets pay more attention to those concepts than ordinary people. I think when you study nuclear weapons and work for their abolition, it can be a very dark place, thinking about the devastation that is possible. So, for myself, I tend to rely on reason and logic, and I realized that reason and logic may not be enough to change people’s minds, so I began writing poetry as a way of reaching out more directly to a person’s heart. We have the faculties of our mind and faculties of our heart. I think that a mind, no matter how reasonable and logical one is, cannot really tackle fully issues like the danger of nuclear weapons, the danger of climate change, or the danger of destroying the environment. So, for me, poetry is a means of sharing my heart, which I hope has more effectiveness than my logic. Does that answer your question? Do you have another question?

    Hiromi Hashide: Yes. How did you develop your poetry skills?

    Dr. Krieger: By writing poetry. And also by reading poetry.

    Kaz: Do you have a favorite poet?

    Dr. Krieger: I have some favorite poets, whom I mentioned at the time when I was writing a book with Dr. Ikeda. I like Pablo Neruda. He was an Ambassador of Chile, and Chile has a nice tradition of inviting poets to be ambassadors. I like Denise Levertov, and I like Lawrence Ferlinghetti, who turned 100 this year. Actually, there are a number of poets I like, but I especially like poets who pay attention to peace, and I try, in my poetry, to pay attention to peace. My advice to you, if you want to be a poet, is to sit down and write poems, and read a wide variety of poets and find your style because there are so many different styles of poetry; so experiment with styles that you are interested in.

    Kaz Iguchi: Any other questions?

    Ayumi Otsuji: Thank you for this wonderful opportunity. When I imagine a “peaceful world,” I imagine that everyone is smiling. If you imagine a peaceful world that you want to achieve, what would you imagine?

    Dr. Krieger: I would not imagine everybody smiling. I would imagine that, in a peaceful world, you would still have conflicts, but the conflicts would be resolved peacefully, non-violently. Everyone would accept the idea that life is sacred, and nobody would try to injure or destroy. But it wouldn’t be a world where people didn’t have disagreements. Having disagreements, I think, is a valuable part of life. I mean, you learn from disagreements, you grow from disagreements, but you don’t try to settle disagreements with your fists or with guns. You start with respect for other human beings and you then have a sense of belonging. I think, in a peaceful world, your sense of belonging to the world and to humanity has to be greater than your sense of belonging to one nation or one group. You can still belong to different groups; you can be Japanese, I can be American, but we should not fight and destroy each other because our common humanity is greater than our individual sense of identity. That’s what I think.

    Ayumi Otsuji: Thank you so much.

    Dr. Krieger: But smiles are good. Everybody should smile more. You can experiment, walking down the street, just smile. And I think other people who see you will smile too.

    Yuichi Matsuna: Thank you very much. I read Choose Hope, and I was impressed with the idea that “recovery of imagination” is important for nuclear abolition. Why should people have an imagination for the abolition of nuclear weapons?

    Dr. Krieger: Why should people use their imaginations for the abolition of nuclear weapons? Well, there is a lot of ignorance and apathy around nuclear weapons. In your school, perhaps, if you say to someone that we should abolish nuclear weapons, maybe they will say “well, that’s a good idea, but I haven’t thought about it,” or “I’m too busy,” or something like that—expressing different kinds of reasons not to be involved. I think imagination is limitless, knowledge has boundaries. We don’t know certain very important things: we don’t know where we come from, or why we were born; we don’t know where we go when we die; we don’t know what is in the rest of the universe, or even in our own galaxy. But imagination can take you anywhere, and it’s an opportunity to try to figure out some puzzles. Einstein was a big advocate of imagination, and I think he was correct in thinking that “imagination is a great gift.” So how do you apply imagination to nuclear weapons’ abolition? Think outside the bomb, come up with new ideas. Peace Literacy is a new movement. I encourage you to look into the Peace Literacy idea. As Sarah said, Paul Chappell, who went to the US military academy, and was trained as an officer in a military, is now trying to apply the same principles of waging war to waging peace. I think that’s a great application of imagination, to take the principles of waging war and turn them to waging peace. Do you have anything to add, Sarah?

    Sarah:  Thank you for asking. On Paul, I think something that is very significant about what he argues is that we have spent so much time and effort thinking about how to wage war; so as Dr. Krieger was saying, Why haven’t we spent as much time and effort—or have as many people—thinking about how to build peace instead? And so I think that’s a part of where Paul’s mind-set came from. Instead of spending all the time and effort to figure out how to better wage war, let’s figure out how to better wage peace. That’s using imagination.

    Ryoma Masutani: Thank you very much. I’d like to ask about nuclear abolition. I think, even if all nuclear weapons are abolished, the knowledge or technique of creating nuclear weapons will still remain. So what is true nuclear abolition? And how can we achieve this?

    Dr. Krieger: I think you are right. We can’t get rid of the knowledge of how to make nuclear weapons, and probably the materials too. But I think abolition is when we have no nuclear weapons. I think we have to understand that even with no nuclear weapons, they could come back because people understand now the physics of making nuclear weapons. And I think the way to deal with that is through verification. So, first of all, abolition will be negotiated; secondly, it would be done in phases, increments, and with each increment, you will build support, and build confidence that the system is working. Verifications could be spot inspections. So if the United States says that it was down to 500 nuclear weapons, and Russia says “we want to verify that,” the United States, as part of the agreement, will have to let Russian inspectors go wherever they want to, and whenever they want, to check whether the United States is doing what it claims, and vice versa. I think negotiations, verification, inspections, phased reductions to build confidence—all those things will help in going to zero nuclear weapons, trusting that it will lead to zero nuclear weapons. You have to trust. Ronald Reagan, one of our most conservative US presidents, said “trust, but verify.” Verification is extremely important. Okay?

    Ryoma Masutani: Yes.

    Dr. Krieger: Do you have another question?

    Takuma Furukawa: Thank you. Many countries have nuclear weapons, and one of them is North Korea. The United Nations decided to give North Korea an economic penalty, but I think the situation in North Korea will become worse. The people in North Korea will suffer more because of it. Could you please share your opinions about how developed countries should deal with North Korea?

    Dr. Krieger: There have been times when there have been agreements with North Korea to end sanctions. I think about 20 or 25 years ago, we were close to an agreement with North Korea to give them nuclear power plants, and give them something in exchange for them doing away with developing nuclear weapons. But the US never followed through, and it has tried to deal with North Korea with sanctions; and now maybe it is too late to change North Korea’s nuclear power with sanctions. Really, I’m not sure if there are any more reasons for North Korea to disarm its nuclear arsenal. I mean, if any country that has nuclear weapons can argue that deterrence works, I would say the country would be North Korea. But I don’t believe in deterrence, as I said, so I’m not supporting that. But I do think we should use our imaginations and try to get all countries to abolish nuclear weapons, not just North Korea, which is in a very precarious situation from which to go for abolition. I don’t know what the practical argument is for North Korea to abolish its nuclear weapons, while the United States, Russia and other countries that have them shouldn’t also do so. If they want North Korea to abolish its nuclear weapons, the rest of the world has to be ready to abolish their nuclear weapons. That’s my belief. Does it make sense to you?

    Takuma Furukawa: Yes, thank you.

    Takuto Yoshii: Thank you for giving us this opportunity to talk to you. My name is Takuto Yoshii. My question is, as you said, each country will try to protect itself. As I have read in Choose Hope, each country has to be altruistic to realize a sustainable and peaceful world, and I learned that people need to change their hearts, and have thoughtfulness towards others. I think it is very difficult for people to think that way. So how do you think people can learn how to think altruistically? What kind of education do you think is necessary?

    Dr. Krieger: That is a great question. Altruism is very important. I think we have to learn it. This may sound silly, but I think we have to learn to love each other. I think the way we practice that is by smiling, by acts of kindness, by empathy, where you feel for other people’s difficult situations. I think that question requires a lot of imagination. How do you put altruism, kindness, and empathy into the learning that you do in school, for example? Most religions make a claim to teach those things, but I’m not sure if they really do. I’m not sure if schools are really prepared to teach altruism, kindness, and empathy. One way they could do so would be to teach about the lives of great peace leaders, such as the life of Gandhi, the life of Martin Luther King, Junior, the life of Nelson Mandela, and many more. There are so many lessons to be learned in those lives which are dedicated to peace and nonviolence. We give an award every year for distinguished peace leadership, and we have given an award for world citizenship from time to time. I am happy to say we gave the world citizenship award to Dr. Ikeda one year. He is one of our distinguished awardees. I think SGI does something similar, where it gives awards. So, that’s another way you can learn about altruism and empathy—through people who have lived distinguished lives, in which they have given and sacrificed in the pursuit of peace and world citizenship. From there, I think you can use your imaginations to think of other ways to instill altruism.

    One other way that I can think of right now, and it has already been done, but it can be done even more, is to videotape the thoughts of such people, including the Hibakusha. So many Hibakusha have impressed me by the suffering that they’ve gone through, and the kindness in the lives that they have led. One of the poems that I wrote is called “The Deep Bow of a Hibakusha,” and it is about a particular Hibakusha whose name is Miyoko Matsubara. She came here to Santa Barbara to study English so that she could share her experience with young people in the United States. I think that’s very altruistic. Most of the Hibakusha that I have met don’t have any feelings of hostility, or revenge; they are all kind. And what they want to say is, “don’t let what happened to me happen to anybody else.” So that’s another thought: meeting with and interviewing Hibakusha. But you can interview many other people, and you might choose to interview somebody who you think is very altruistic, like a parent, an uncle or aunt, or a grandparent, someone not widely known to the world. Those are my thoughts on altruism. It is a fertile area to continue to develop and think about and practice. Small acts of kindness take you so far. There’s a movie called “Pay it Forward,” about doing something kind for somebody, and not expecting to get paid back, but rather expecting the recipient of the kindness to do something kind for another person. It’s a good movie. I recommend it.

    Atsushi Saitou: I think everyone understands the danger of nuclear weapons, but maybe that is not enough to make people really understand that we don’t need nuclear weapons. So rather than just saying nuclear weapons are bad, because everybody understands that, is there another more powerful way to reach out to people to stop nuclear weapons?

    Dr. Krieger: I don’t agree with the assumption that people know that nuclear weapons are bad. It’s not enough to spread the knowledge of the dangers. I think it is only when enough people understand and take seriously the dangers of nuclear weapons, will it make a difference. Nuclear weapons have got to go. Right now, we are educating people about these dangers, but they have to be taken seriously enough to become a political project. Here in the United States, virtually no one who is running for the presidency talks about doing something about nuclear weapons. Most are believers in nuclear deterrence. Nuclear weapons are a danger, and understanding that they are a danger is a starting point, but it’s not enough. We have to keep using our imaginations and building the number of people who think that nuclear weapons are a serious danger. We have to do that to the point that it makes a difference politically. Right now, people’s priority here and in most other places—probably in Japan as well—puts greater emphasis on the economy, the environment, social issues, and education. Those are all important, and I don’t disagree that they are important. But nuclear weapons could end civilization in an afternoon, and I think that’s something that should make an impact in people’s minds. In a certain way, working for nuclear abolition is an act of faith, because we don’t see the results immediately, so we have to believe that enough people will catch on before nuclear weapons are used—not after—to make a difference. A lot of movies are about post-apocalyptic societies, and I think it would be a great failure of imagination if we end up in a post-apocalyptic world because we can’t use our imaginations to see that such a world is a real possibility if we don’t act. So it is as an act of faith and an act of hope that we do this work, and we do this work on behalf of not only schools and organizations, but on behalf of all humanity. Humanity has been at risk from nuclear weapons for almost 75 years. That is not a very long time. We haven’t had a nuclear war for almost 74 years, which is good, but it shouldn’t give us confidence that a nuclear war, nuclear accident, or nuclear terrorism couldn’t begin anytime.

    Emi Kuroda: How can we encourage people around us to have confidence that they have the power to achieve nuclear abolition?

    Dr. Krieger: I think we have to recognize the power that each of us has. Any person on this planet has power. I would like to talk about the power of one. One person can make quite a difference in the world, and we’ve seen that in the lives of many people, including Dr. Daisaku Ikeda. I think, though, with nuclear weapons, it’s not going to be the power of one, it’s going to be the power of many, or many ones. When we build a movement that’s strong enough, that movement can take many shapes: it can take the form of petitioning, it can take the form of educating, or it can take the form of protesting. It can take a lot of different shapes. But I don’t think we can convince people that they have that power. We can only say that unless you join us, and add your power, it is unlikely that we will ever build a movement large enough and strong enough to abolish nuclear weapons. By not participating, by not joining such a movement, you are actually creating a self-fulfilling prophecy, because we need a big movement, and we need people to care. Abolishing nuclear weapons may sound negative because it’s getting rid of something, but it’s really very positive because we are getting rid of something that is evil, something that could destroy us. So I would tell people that nuclear weapons are the ultimate human rights issue. Nuclear weapons are the ultimate environmental issue. Nuclear weapons are the ultimate altruism issue. And we need you. If each of you would join us and use your imagination, we will be one person closer to a nuclear weapons free world. That’s what I think.

    Sarah: Do you know about this old Japanese saying that goes, “if all of us cross the street in front of the red light, it isn’t scary”? Are you familiar with this saying?

    Dr. Krieger: I’m not familiar with that saying. I thought you were going to say the Japanese proverb, “if you fall down seven times get up eight.” I think that is good advice. “Seven times down, eight times up.” It’s not going to be easy to abolish nuclear weapons. Nothing important is going to be done just like that. You are going to be challenged if you work for any great goal.

    Sometimes I think of the medieval people who built cathedrals in Europe. When you build a cathedral, it is usually not done in one lifetime. It has to go through many generations. I don’t know if we have that capacity to last through generations on nuclear weapons, but I do think that each generation should do its part, and I know the kind of education all of you have had makes you prime prospects for doing something really worthwhile in the world. And I hope that you will make working towards the abolition of nuclear weapons one of those goals that you seek to achieve, no matter how difficult. Join with others. Join with the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. Join with ICAN. SGI is already doing a lot. So, I think you have great opportunities. Don’t be disheartened. Choose hope, and get up that last time, even if you get knocked down. Get up and come up, struggling altruistically, non-violently.

    Students: Thank you.

    Dr. Krieger: All right, you had great questions. I’m very impressed.

    Kaz Iguchi: Lastly, would you like to give a message to those students in Japan, as well as Dr. Ikeda, that we can bring back home?

    Dr. Krieger: In my message for the students, I would say this: Your fellow students have represented Kansai Soka High School very well. I’m impressed by the students who came here. I hope that they will share with you the questions and answers, and what we talked about in Santa Barbara. I hope all of you will do something great in your lives. Please use your imaginations to set your goals high and then do what’s in your power to create a better world and never give up, never give up.

    And to Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, I would say:  You are an amazing leader, and I’m so proud to know you and to be your friend. I know you have just celebrated your 91st birthday, and yet your ideals are as high and strong as ever. I know your message of peace focuses again on young people, and I share very much your desire to see young people pick up the baton from all of us older people and finish the job that we have worked so hard on. I admire you greatly for your courage, your compassion, and your commitment to creating a world free of nuclear weapons and at peace.

  • Principles for Global Sustainability

    Principles for Global Sustainability

    1. Responsibility to allocate resources so that greed of the few does not eclipse need of the many. (Survival Principle; Democracy Principle)
    2. Responsibility to preserve the planet and its resources for future generations. (Intergenerational Equity Principle)
    3. Responsibility to do no irreparable harm to the planet and its inhabitants. (Precautionary Principle)
    4. Responsibility to foster diversity of species and ideas. (Anti-Monopoly Principle)
    5. Responsibility to make war a last resort, not a first resort of the powerful. (Nonviolence Priority Principle)
    6. Responsibility to hold accountable the perpetrators of crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, including genocide. (Nuremberg Principles; International Criminal Court)
    7. Responsibility to guarantee basic human rights for all individuals. (Human Rights Principle: Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Torture Convention, etc.)
    8. Responsibility to cooperate across national borders to achieve these ends. (State Cooperation Principle: Global problems are incapable of solution by any single state, no matter how powerful.)
    9. Responsibility to choose hope over despair. (Hope Principle; Perseverance Principle)
    10. Responsibility to leave the planet a better place than you found it. (Individual Action Principle; Horace Mann Principle: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.”)
    11. Responsibility to educate for global sustainability. (Education Principle; Critical Thinking Principle)

    In sum, I would encourage you to seek to advance global sustainability by adopting a planetary perspective, doing no harm, engaging in doing good for the planet and its present and future inhabitants, choosing hope, and persevering. If we accept these responsibilities as individuals and work to implement them in our national and international policies, we can turn Earth Day into a year-round commitment to creating a planet we can be proud to pass on to future generations.

  • A Conversation with David Krieger

    A Conversation with David Krieger

    A short version of this interview appears in the 2018 Annual Report

    Why did you choose to go to Hiroshima just after college? Was there any one person who touched you the most? You’ve talked about above and below the bomb. What other feelings did you have? Did you have an awareness at the time that the visit would change your life?

    David KriegerI went to Japan when I was just out of college because I was interested in learning more about Japanese culture.  I didn’t go specifically to see Hiroshima or Nagasaki.  I did, however, visit both atom-bombed cities during my stay in Japan and became more deeply aware of the destructive and inhumane power of the atomic bomb.  In school in the U.S., I learned the lesson that the creation of the atomic bomb was a great technological achievement.  In Japan, I was moved strongly by the pain, suffering and death caused by the atomic bombs.  I came to realize that the U.S. technological perspective was from above the mushroom cloud, while the Japanese perspective was a reaction from beneath the mushroom cloud and was a far more humane perspective.  Over the years, I’ve met many hibakusha, survivors of the atomic bombings, and I’ve found them to be compassionate, forgiving and committed to assuring that nuclear weapons are abolished so that no one in the future experiences the horrors that they did.

    One emotion that I experienced in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was fear – fear for the future of humanity and all life.  I also felt great empathy for the people beneath the bombs and admiration for their forgiveness of those who used the weapons on them.  In viewing the damage done in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I felt that I came face to face with evil, but I had no idea at the time that seeking the abolition of nuclear weapons would become the central focus of my life’s work.

    Tell us a little about becoming a conscientious objector. What led to that decision and how did it impact your life?

    When I left for Japan in the summer of 1963, the draft age for the military was 23 and I was 21.  When I returned from Japan about a year later, I was 22 and so was the draft age.  I was on the verge of being drafted, but managed to get into a reserve unit as an alternative.  At the time I was naïve and didn’t consider being a conscientious objector.   It was only some years later when I was called to active duty in 1968 that I realized that I could not fight, or lead others to fight, in what I saw as an illegal and immoral war based on lies by our government.  In early 1969, I filed for conscientious objector status.  My application was initially denied, and I sued the U.S. Army in federal court.  I lost in the lower court, but that decision was reversed and remanded by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  I was one of the first officers in the Vietnam War to file for conscientious objector status. I am proud of taking that personal stand against the Vietnam War.  I was fortunate to have a wife who stood by me as I struggled against the military, and to have had a great lawyer, Brook Hart, who was dedicated to the anti-war cause.

    Tell us about your decision to found NAPF. Was your family supportive of the decision? How did you choose the name?

    Shortly before founding NAPF, I worked for a wonderful Dutch Foundation called the RIO Foundation.  RIO stood for Reshaping the International Order.  The Foundation was led by Jan Tinbergen, the first Nobel Laureate in Economics, and was a spinoff of the Club of Rome.  The RIO Foundation was dependent on the Dutch government for its funding, and when the government changed in 1981, the Foundation lost its funding.  Suddenly, I was without a job, which was extremely worrisome since we had three children still at home.  By this time, I knew that what I really wanted to do was address the issues of global peace and nuclear weapons abolition.  I prepared a pamphlet on these subjects titled “Peace Now,” and began talking with a few people about the idea of creating a new organization to address these critical issues.  One of the people I spoke with was Frank Kelly, who had been a vice president of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions when I worked there.  Frank was interested.  Eventually we were joined by three other individuals – Wally Drew, a former executive with Revlon; Charles Jamison, a Harvard-trained lawyer; and Kent Ferguson, an innovative educator and headmaster of Santa Barbara Middle School.  We met weekly for about a year and decided to create the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.  Frank, Wally and Charles were all World War II veterans.  They had seen enough of war and recognized the dangers of the Nuclear Age.  Kent was younger, but passionate about peace and education.

    Charles Jamison did the legal work to establish the new non-profit corporation, the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.  I was the founding president.  The problem we confronted was that we had no resources to start with, so there was considerable risk that we wouldn’t survive.  To begin, I volunteered my time, as did everyone else.  I had to work at other jobs to keep food on the table at home.  For a while, I was working at two jobs, going to law school in the evenings and trying to build the Foundation.  Somehow we were able to keep the Foundation alive and moving forward.

    We began with three beliefs: first, peace is an imperative of the Nuclear Age; second, we must abolish nuclear weapons before they abolish us; and third, it will require extraordinary ordinary people to lead their leaders.  The name of the Foundation reflects the first of those beliefs.  Our principal goals were to build a thriving institution that would realize our dreams of creating a peaceful world, free of nuclear weapons, an organization that would grow and speak to people everywhere and win their trust and support.

    Were there many different phases at the Foundation?  Did you ever consider closing? Did you ever consider an office in D.C.?

    From the beginning, the Foundation has been an experiment in institution building.  We were very fortunate to have found a donor, Ethel Wells, who believed in our goals, and was generous in helping the Foundation to grow and take on new projects.

    Our work is intangible.  It is education and advocacy.  It has to do with waking people up to the dangers of the Nuclear Age and convincing them that they can play a role in achieving a more peaceful and secure future.  Our very first project was to start a Waging Peace series of booklets.  The first booklet in the series, written by Charles Jamison, was called “Can We Change Our Thinking?”  It was a reflection on Einstein’s famous quotation, “The splitting of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.”  Soon after that publication, we had our first Evening for Peace, honoring Senator Claiborne Pell as our first Distinguished Peace Leader.  Over the years we’ve honored a stellar group of Distinguished Peace Leaders, including Desmond Tutu, the XIVth Dalai Lama, Jody Williams, Mairead Corrigan Maguire, Helen Caldicott, Jacques Cousteau, Dan Ellsberg and Noam Chomsky.  Many more projects would follow.

    We’ve never actually considered closing our doors.  We’ve been fortunate to have been able to keep them open for 37 years and I hope there will be many more years to follow.  We did have an office in Washington, D.C for a few years, but we felt it limited our vision to the politically possible rather than the necessary, and decided to close it.

    What are some of your most favorite career memories?

    David Krieger presented Noam Chomsky with the World Citizenship Award in 2014.

    High on my list of favorite career memories are the enthusiasm with which we created the Foundation; the $50,000 prize we were able to offer for the best proposal for science and peace and our role in creating the International Network of Engineers and Scientists for Global Responsibility; lobbying at the 1995 Non-Proliferation Treaty Review and Extension Conference and at many other international meetings; creating Abolition 2000; inspiring the youth of Soka Gakkai to gather more than 13 million signatures on the Abolition 2000 petition and delivering these to the president of the 2000 NPT Review Conference; engaging in a dialogue with SGI President Daisaku Ikeda, published in Japanese, English and Italian as Choose Hope: Your Role in Waging Peace in the Nuclear Age; engaging in a dialogue with Princeton professor emeritus Richard Falk, published as The Path to Zero: Dialogues on Nuclear Dangers; working with my friend and the Foreign Minister of the Marshall Islands on suing the nine nuclear-armed countries to fulfill their nuclear disarmament obligations; building a strong team of younger people to carry on the work of the Foundation.

    Tell us about some of the people who were part of your journey.

    I’ve been struck by what extraordinary people I’ve met on the path to peace.  There are too many of these to mention, but a few of the people I view as heroes include Desmond Tutu, Jacques Cousteau, Joseph Rotblat, A.N.R. Robinson, Daniel Ellsberg, Yehudi Menuhin, Mairead Corrigan Maguire and Carl Sagan.

    Who were the biggest influences on your life? Is there any one particular person who stands out as the most influential person?

    There were many people who exerted influence on my life, but three women stand out:  my mother, my wife and the woman I worked for and with at the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions.  My mother believed that I could do whatever I set my mind on doing, and she made possible my first trip to Japan.  My wife, Carolee, stood by me through the uncertainty of my refusing to participate in the Vietnam War and the uncertainty of creating and developing the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation.  Elisabeth Mann Borgese showed me the possibility of following one’s dreams to create a better world.  In her case, it was the dream of peace through harmonizing the functional uses of the oceans in a much needed new law of the sea.  She saw the oceans as the “common heritage of mankind,” and believed that just as life began in the oceans and then came onto the land, a new law of the seas would spark a new international law for humankind.

    How soon after founding NAPF did you revisit Hiroshima? Can you describe the feelings you had, after you’d learned so much more about what happened there? Have you revisited Hiroshima and Nagasaki numerous times over the years? Do you still find yourself impacted by what happened there?

    We founded NAPF in 1982 and it wasn’t until 1997 that I returned to Japan at the invitation of Daisaku Ikeda, the president of Soka Gakkai International (SGI).  On that occasion I spoke to a SGI youth group about nuclear weapons abolition and told them about a new Abolition 2000 International Petition, which called for ending the nuclear threat, signing a new nuclear abolition treaty, and reallocating resources from nuclear weapons to meeting human needs.  Led by the youth of Hiroshima, the SGI young people gathered more than 13 million signatures on the petition.  It was remarkable.  The next year I was invited back to Japan to receive the petitions, which would be symbolically presented to the United Nations.  On that trip in 1998, which I called “A Journey of Hope,” I again visited Hiroshima and Nagasaki as well as Tokyo and Okinawa.  Since then I’ve revisited Hiroshima and Nagasaki many times, including being a speaker five times in Nagasaki Global Citizens’ Assemblies for the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons.  On these occasions, I have always been moved by the tragedies that occurred in these cities and the forgiveness and strong spirits of the survivors of these tragedies.

    What have you learned from the Hibakusha you’ve spoken with over the years? What is the lesson that we need to learn from them and pass on to the next generation?

    I’ve learned from the hibakusha I’ve met the power of humility, forgiveness, and deep concern for humanity’s future.  The lesson we need to learn from them and pass on to future generations is that nuclear weapons are just the opposite of the hibakusha.  Nuclear weapons reflect arrogance, are unforgiving and put humanity’s future at risk.   These weapons are also omnicidal.  Their effects cannot be restricted in time or space.  And they can destroy everything we love and cherish.

    What do you believe are the most critical issues that stand in the way of getting to nuclear zero?

    The most critical obstacles that stand in the way of getting to nuclear zero are what I call ACID: apathy, conformity, ignorance and denial.  These four obstacles stand in the way of citizens awakening to the very real dangers nuclear weapons pose to humanity, but they can be overcome by education and advocacy.  We need to move from apathy to empathy; from conformity to critical thinking; from ignorance to wisdom (knowledge isn’t enough); and from denial to recognition of the danger.  People everywhere must awaken and confront nuclear dangers as citizens of their countries and of the world.  And they must do so on behalf of their children and all future generations.

    What is the single most important information you think would motivate young people to take action to abolish nuclear weapons?

    It would motivate young people to understand that it is their very future that is at stake.  A nuclear war could occur due to mistake, miscalculation, madness, malice or manipulation (hacking).  The risks are too great and they are real.  These weapons do not provide physical protection to their possessors, only the possibility of vengeance.  It’s time to wake up to the dangers posed by nuclear weapons, even – or perhaps especially – those possessed by one’s own country.

    The U.S. was responsible for 67 nuclear weapons tests in the Marshall Islands between 1946 and 1958. This is a fact most Americans are unaware of, nor do they understand the consequences of this testing on the Marshallese people. Can you tell us what you think every American citizen should know regarding these horrific nuclear tests and how it should affect the current U.S. nuclear weapons policy?

    The 67 U.S. nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands were the equivalent power of detonating one Hiroshima bomb daily for 12 years.  Many of the people of the Marshall Islands lost their homes and their health.  All of this happened while the U.S. was the United Nations trustee for the Marshall Islands, making the nuclear testing there an act of extreme bad faith and arrogance.  To make it even worse, the U.S. treated the Marshall Islanders like human guinea pigs to study the effects of radiation on the human body.  Adequate compensation cannot give the Marshall Islanders back their homes or health, but it would be an excellent starting point.

    The U.S. has plans to spend over $1.7 trillion modernizing its nuclear arsenal over the next 30 years. Tell us why this insane amount of spending is immoral, what we could be doing with that money and what NAPF is doing about this issue.

    There are so many actual human needs not being met, starting with hunger and health care.  In addition, there is the need to protect the environment to assure clean air, clean water and a general healthy environment.  We also need to make the switch to renewable energy sources more rapidly to protect against the adverse effects of climate change.  In addition, there is the need to replace failing infrastructure.  With all these actual needs going unmet, it should be considered a crime against humanity to be throwing substantial resources at revamping our nuclear arsenal and engaging in a new nuclear arms race.  NAPF has been trying to draw attention for many years to the utter waste of throwing much-needed resources at “modernizing” our nuclear arsenal.  The U.S. should be leading the way toward achieving nuclear zero rather than continuing to bolster and make more usable its nuclear forces.

    You have written many wonderful poetry books. Tell us what drew you to writing poetry? What does writing poetry mean to you? Do you have a favorite among your poems? Do you feel it’s an effective way of teaching people about this critical and complex issue?

    I have been drawn to poetry as a means of connecting more directly with the hearts of my readers.  I felt that it was not enough to connect only through the mind and intellect, but it would be even more powerful to connect emotionally on the issues of war, peace and nuclear dangers.  I want to engage people in the work of peace, and I see poetry as a means of doing so.  Among my favorite of my own poems are: “To an Iraqi Child,” “The Deep Bow of a Hibakusha,” “August Mornings,” and “I Refuse.”  To the extent that poetry can cut through the chaff and get to the heart of an issue and is capable of reaching people on an emotional level, I do find it an effective means of teaching.  Poetry can strengthen a message and make it more memorable.

    There are other nuclear abolition organizations in the U.S. and internationally. Can you characterize how NAPF is different than others? Have you carved out a particular niche or philosophy for the Foundation that makes it unique? Is this something that has helped guide the Foundation over the years and do you see it as key to the future of the Foundation?

    We share elements in common with other organizations working for nuclear weapons abolition.  One area in which we may differ is in our perspective on U.S. policy and our willingness to challenge that policy.  We are also essentially a grassroots organization and we are trying to build support for abolition from below, that is, from common people who will lead their leaders.  We are also an organization located far from the seat of U.S.  power, and I believe that gives us a broader perspective than organizations located in or near Washington, D.C., which tend to be  pulled into the D.C. vortex.

    We are also unique in being a peace organization and recognizing the importance of peace to nuclear weapons abolition.  From the beginning we have put an emphasis on peace leadership.  We’ve honored peace leaders and tried to develop new peace leaders.  I think we have a very unique program in Peace Literacy, headed up by Paul K. Chappell, a graduate of West Point.  Our Peace Literacy Program is taking root nationally and internationally.

    Further, we have been willing to take a strong stand against nuclear power, given its relationship to nuclear proliferation and potentially to nuclear terrorism.  Finally, we pursue both education and advocacy, and in our advocacy we’ve been willing to include the arts, particularly poetry.  Because there is no clear approach that has been consistently successful, we’ve been willing to experiment with different approaches.  One of these that stands out in my mind was our consulting relationship with the Marshall Islands in their lawsuits against the nuclear-armed countries in the International Court of Justice and in U.S. federal court.

    Philosophically, what has set us apart are our willingness to be flexible, to take bold action, and to persevere in our commitment to create a more decent world for future generations.  So long as we can raise sufficient funding to support our great staff, I think these qualities will serve us well going forward.

    Anything you would have done differently? 

    Looking back, I’m reasonably satisfied with what we’ve been able to accomplish in an area that has proven to be very difficult.  Now, I just hope the Foundation will be energized by a new generation of peace leaders and will be able to build on the progress we’ve made and develop it further.

    Describe your own belief system/life philosophy – words that you live by?

    The words I try to live by are these: “Be kinder than necessary.”  I’ve not always succeeded, but I’ve tried.  I’ve also tried to persevere in the focused pursuit of peace and a nuclear free world.

    How have you taken to social media? What challenges does it present to you?  What opportunities?

    I’ve occasionally used social media, particularly Twitter, but actually I mostly find it not worth the effort.  I also find it unsettling to see how hard an organization like NAPF has to work to develop followers and how large the followings are of celebrities.

    Give us a few thoughts on our current President? How has his character (or lack thereof) and his policies effected the work of the Foundation?

    Trump is a racist, a bigot and an authoritarian, who has a very poor relationship with truth.  He frightens and disgusts me.  He certainly undermines the decency of the country.  With Trump in office, I am constantly reminded about how close we are to the precipice of nuclear war.  He has the sole authority to order the use of U.S. nuclear weapons, and one has to seriously question his rationality, prudence and sanity.

    Do you believe we are closer than ever to a nuclear war?

    So long as nuclear weapons exist and remain on hair-trigger alert we will be close to a nuclear war.  The threat is in the weapons themselves.  Trump only adds to that threat.  So does the Indian-Pakistani conflict over Kashmir. So does the U.S. withdrawal from the INF Treaty, and the new arms race between the U.S. and Russia.  There are too many factors that keep us close to the nuclear precipice, so we continue to live precariously.

    What is your view on the relationship between peace and justice?

    You cannot have peace without justice.  It is too unstable, too precarious.  If we want peace, we must work for justice.  Peace without justice is a war by other means and a true war waiting to occur.

    What new projects are you looking forward to?

    I’m looking forward to spending more time with my grandchildren, working in the garden, and doing some new writing projects.

    Finally, what gives you hope today in these dangerous times?

    There is not much on the political horizon to give me hope, but that could change abruptly.  I am a proponent of choosing hope, because it gives rise to action; and it’s circular: action also gives rise to hope.  In addition, young people give me hope.  They seem to recognize that our planet and its myriad life forms are worth saving.

  • The Technological Imperative for Ethical Evolution

    The Technological Imperative for Ethical Evolution

    As a winner of the top prize in computer science (the ACM Turing Award), Stanford Prof. Martin Hellman was invited to give an address to the annual meeting of Nobel Laureates in Lindau Germany. While his talk had the serious-sounding title of “The Technological Imperative for Ethical Evolution,” Prof. Hellman told us that it consists largely of stories in which he later realized he had behaved unethically or where he had difficulty ensuring that he did. Lessons he learned the hard way are spelled out to aid others in avoiding the same pitfalls. A link to Hellman’s full paper follows the introduction below.

    Introduction

    Almost overnight, the Manhattan Project transformed ethical decision making from a purely moral concern into one that is essential for the survival of civilization. In the words of Albert Einstein, “The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.” [Nathan and Norden 1981]

    Environmental crises such as climate change, along with recent technological breakthroughs in genetic engineering, AI, and cyber-technology are adding to the technological imperative for accelerating humanity’s ethical evolution.

    This paper presents eight lessons for accelerating that process, often using examples where I either failed to behave ethically or encountered great difficulty in doing so. I hope it thereby adds, however meagerly, to humanity’s odds of avoiding Einstein’s “unparalleled catastrophe” and, instead, building a world that we can be proud to pass on to future generations. No one person can solve this problem, but if enough of us move things a little, all together we can succeed.

    To read Professor Hellman’s full paper in PDF format, click here.

    A video of Prof. Hellman’s Heidelberg Lecture is here.

    *Photo: Heidelberg Lecture delivered by Martin E. Hellman at the 69th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting, 03.07.2019, Lindau, Germany
    Picture/Credit: Julia Nimke/Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings

  • US Setting the Stage for War with Iran

    US Setting the Stage for War with Iran

    The past two weeks have been dominated by an extraordinary amount of pressure due to the increased tensions within the US-Iran relationship, almost culminating in an attack against Iran by the US, which could be viewed, under international law, as an act of war.

    On June 20, 2019, in the early morning hours, Iran shot a US-owned drone, the RQ-4A Global Hawk, just above the Strait of Hormuz, accusing the US of crossing a ‘red line,’ and conducting covert operations on Iranian land and sea. The United States Central Command, just a few hours after the attack, claimed that the drone was flying in international airspace and supported calls for military retaliation to be directed at Iranian radars and missile batteries, which was scheduled for the night of the same day. The attack was called off last minute by President Trump who stated, through a series of tweets, that the attack was ‘not proportionate’ to shooting down an unmanned drone and had the capacity to kill 150 people, at least.  He followed up his decision by threatening increased sanctions on Iran, without elaborating further on the point.

    The downing of the US drone followed an attack on two oil tankers that occurred on June 13, 2019. On this occasion the Norwegian–owned Front Altair, shipping naphta from the United Arab Emirates to Taiwan, and Japanese Kokuka Courageous, shipping methanol from Saudi Arabia to Singapore, were attacked forty-five minutes apart from each other in international water in the Gulf of Oman, after passing the Strait of Hormuz, a geopolitically significant area because much of the world’s oil supply flows through it.

    These episodes, which left no casualties, set into motion powerful forces within the Trump administration that have the apparent intention to wage war against Iran whilst lacking the support of provable hard evidence.

    In fact, after the attack on the two oil tankers, on June 17, the Pentagon authorized the deployment of an additional 1,000 troops to the Middle East, an order that was verified by the release of images showing them bringing surveillance assets, missiles batteries and fighter jets described as ‘deterrence capabilities.’

    The US response came in retaliation to the decision by Iran to breach a key element of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), when it announced it would produce and stock within ten days more low-enriched uranium than allowed by the deal. That threat became a reality on July 1st, when the Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif announced that Iran had committed its first significant breach of its nuclear deal with world powers. International inspectors have, in fact, confirmed that Iran breached a limit on its uranium stockpile of a few kilograms of uranium. While the move is of modest quantity, this step could well lead to a bigger leap out of the 2015 nuclear deal.

    The US attempt to build international consensus for an attack against Iran fueled its decision to enlarge its uranium enrichment limits, bringing with it higher chances that Iran could revive its program to develop atomic weapons. The sensitivity of this matter lies in the fact that the area of nuclear proliferation prevention is the central issue of the current US-Iran animosity. In this regard, in relation to the currently evolving unstable situation between the US and Iran, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed that this, in turn, could take the US, Iran and the international community as a whole to the brink of war.

    It is despicable that much of what is going on is infused with lies and a provocative and aggressive rhetoric adopted as a strategy by the US, whose aim is to exacerbate an already unstable relationship and manufacture a reason to go to war, a tactic we have dramatically witnessed 16 years ago.

    In fact, in the immediate aftermath of the incident concerning the explosion of part of the two oil tankers, the US put forward a narrative depicting Iranians as ‘evil-doers’ – George Bush’s favorite exploited expression in the run-up to the war against Iraq in 2003. In doing so, the administration released a grainy black-and-white video showing faceless Iranians acting suspiciously around the Kokuka Courageous, personnel who were believed by US analysts to be removing a limpet mine from the ship. These images were indeed used by the US administration to give ‘official proof of nefarious intent’ by Iran, and speculation over Iran’s responsibility in unison with the governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Israel. The US Secretary of State, Michael Pompeo, has defined these attacks as ‘a clear threat to international peace and security,’ harkening back to when US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, lied about evidence of the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq at the United Nations Security Council, and obtained the support the US needed to pave the way to war against it.

    Another similarity with the US bellicose past that was introduced to sustain the race to war, was the historic parallel with the Gulf of Tonkin incidents in 1964 that were manipulated to justify Lyndon Johnson’s escalation of the war in Vietnam.

    Also reprehensible is that, on the European stage, strong support of the US video dossier came from the UK, alongside the unquestioned belief by German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, of the proof of Iran’s responsibility for the incidents involving the oil tankers.

    Some Western media, particularly in the US, provide an uncritical platform for the Trump administration, failing to question the basic premises of the US’s accusations, taking their statements at face value, looking for more evidence of Iranian involvement in the explosion of the oil tankers, thus normalizing the US demonizing narrative against Iran and magnifying unfounded accusations.

    Predominantly, Iran’s decision to breach the 2015 deal was defined by the US administration as ‘nuclear blackmail’—incorrectly so, considering that Iran does not possess an atomic bomb and, therefore, cannot use one, a point that was not raised when this statement was issued.  Also, there has been no questioning of what legal or constitutional basis the US has to retaliate through military strikes over the attack of Japanese and Norwegian ships.

    Moreover, no context had been given of more than forty years of tensions between Iran and the US, with total absence from the discourse of why the US is legitimized to possess nuclear weapons while Iran is not. The current crisis represents another missed chance to add more pressure on the US and, eventually, delegitimize the narrative that justifies the possession of its nuclear arsenal, at home and abroad.

    The same idea that opposing escalation, or questioning unsupported evidence, equates to supporting an evil, despotic theocracy is observable now as it was on the occasion of the 9/11 attacks and of the run-up to the 2003 war in Iraq. Very similarly to Colin Powell’s successful maneuver to manufacture a connection between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein at the time of the Iraq war, quite remarkably, Michael Pompeo in 2019 has been willing to claim that Shia Islamist Iran is connected to Sunni Islamist al Qaeda. In doing so, he has been left unchallenged by the media in falsely portraying Iran as a threat to the United States.

    Some positive aspects within this current scenario are nonetheless present and worthy to be pointed out. Some of the most critical media have questioned the provocative and aggressive rhetoric adopted by the Trump administration. It has also been highlighted that most of the European countries, alongside Russia, China, Turkey and most of the Gulf states, do not support Trump’s race to war. A recent survey by Reuters/Ipsos shows that 49% of the US public disapprove Trump’s handling of Iran; 53% see Iran as a serious threat but 60% amongst them do not support military strikes on Iranian military. This opposition to war is consistent with the opposition to the war in Iraq in 2003.

    The US rhetorical move to accuse Iran of attacking the oil tankers with a mine also was not supported by the testimonies of the crew of the Kokucha, some of whom reported that the ship was hit by a ‘flying object,’ declarations that were reported by some media, fortunately.

    The increase of tensions between the US and Iran has marked a further setback to the possibility of resorting to international cooperation while dealing with interstate disputes rather than through international confrontation. It also is emblematic of the predominant bellicose attitude and arrogance displayed by the US, in seeking to affirm itself as an unsurpassed world power, as well as by Iran, capable of raising support from the Gulf region, Gaza, and from the Israeli-Syria and Saudi-Yemeni border, and throwing a good portion of the Middle East into a devastating war with unimaginable consequences. What’s at stake at the moment, however, is not only the threat of war, but also the most compelling need to prevent another country on this planet from actualizing its nuclear ambitions and undermining once again the very existence of the world’s population.

    Silvia De Michelis is a PhD researcher at the Division of Peace Studies and International Development at the University of Bradford in the UK. Her research project focuses on the role of media within the Responsibility to Protect framework, with particular regard to how the media discourse informs the understanding of ‘humanitarian interventions’.

  • D-Day + 75: Time to Repay an Overdue Debt of Gratitude

    This article was originally published at Defusing the Nuclear Threat on June 5, 2014. .

    [Note from June 5, 2019 update by Martin Hellman: My friend and D-Day veteran Bill Kays died on September 9, 2018. One of the best ways we can pay tribute to his memory and his sacrifices is to work toward building a more peaceful world so no one ever has to face the horror that he did on Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944. Today’s Russian-American relations are even worse than when this post was first written five years ago and, as Bill notes below in his letter to President Obama, “Humiliating Germany after the First World War played a key role in Hitler’s rise to power. Humiliating Russia today increases tensions which can lead to confrontation – possibly even a Third World War.” With that update, here’s the original post:]

    On this 70th anniversary of D-Day, I am devoting this blog to a letter from a D-Day veteran to President Obama. In it, he asked the president to “make a long overdue payment on the debt of gratitude we owe the Russians,” and noted, “I probably owe my life to the Russians’ heroic actions in weakening Nazi Germany prior to our opening the Western Front. … As bad as [the enemy fire trying to repel the landing] was, it would have been far worse if our Russian allies hadn’t kept most of the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front. Imagine how Omaha Beach would have been with two to three times the number of defending Germans!”

    This letter was written by my friend and colleague, former Dean of Stanford’s Engineering School Bill Kays, who landed on Omaha Beach in one of the first waves. I’ve included some background information on Bill at the end of this post.

    Our nation – indeed the entire world – owes a debt of gratitude to Bill and his comrades-in-arms who bravely waded assure in the early morning hours seventy years ago. But it is typical of Bill that, rather than glorying in our adulation, he wants to share the credit with an overlooked ally.

    When Bill sent this letter last December there was hope that President Obama might use today’s D-Day ceremonies as a way to further his attempted “reset” of Russian-American relations. The Ukrainian crisis has made that a non-starter. There is no way the president can say anything nice about the Russians, no matter how true it might be. That is not only sad, but also dangerous for reasons Bill brings out in his letter.

    Martin Hellman

    BILL’S LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA

    December 10, 2013

    President Barack Obama
    The White House
    1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
    Washington, DC 20500

    Dear President Obama:

    As a D-Day veteran, I am writing to ask that your commemoration speech at its 70th anniversary next June make a long overdue payment on the debt of gratitude we owe the Russians. I probably owe my life to the Russians’ heroic actions in weakening Nazi Germany prior to our opening the Western Front. It is a mistake to celebrate D-Day as the battle which turned the tide of war without fully recognizing the role the Soviet Union played. It belittles their millions of dead. Stalingrad, Moscow, and Leningrad turned the tide of war every bit as much as D-Day, and did so earlier. I ask that you recognize this important fact in your commemoration speech.

    On June 6, 1944, I waded ashore on Omaha Beach as a First Lieutenant of the First Engineer Combat Battalion, First Infantry Division – “The Big Red One.” We had been told that our pre-invasion bombardment would knock out most enemy defenses before our landing craft hit the shore. So my heart sank as we approached the beach and I saw deadly enemy fire, seemingly everywhere. I also saw dead and drowning soldiers, and machine gun fire was bouncing off our boat. It seemed like Hell on Earth, and the 23rd Psalm raced through my head, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil.”

    As bad as it was, it would have been far worse if our Russian allies hadn’t kept most of the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front. Imagine how Omaha Beach would have been with two to three times the number of defending Germans! Our invasion might well have failed, and my unit probably would have been mauled as badly as my friends in “E” Company, which suffered a 2/3 casualty rate, half of those dead.

    My request to honor the Russians’ sacrifices in no way diminishes the gratitude the world owes my comrades-in-arms who stormed the Normandy beaches on D-Day, especially those less lucky than I who gave their lives or were grievously wounded. Rather, it is intended to shine a spotlight on similar sacrifices which we too often overlook.

    Your 2009 speech on D-Day’s 65th anniversary made a step in the right direction when you noted that the Russians “sustained some of the war’s heaviest casualties on the Eastern Front.” Even though it was just a dozen words out of more than 2,100, Moscow Top News noticed:

    Not a single word was said by Sarkozy, Brown or Harper about the decisive role in the victory of the Soviet Union, which took the hardest blows from Hitler’s army and sustained the heaviest casualties … Only U.S. President Barack Obama mentioned the Soviet Union’s contribution to defeating fascism and its horrendous losses at the ceremony to mark the 65th anniversary of the landings … Full marks to President Obama for bothering to mention the Soviet contribution towards defeating Hitler and his Nazis.

    Imagine what would happen if we gave the Russians the full credit they deserve! It could be a small, but important first step toward your goal, expressed in 2009 in Prague, “to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.”

    Humiliating Germany after the First World War played a key role in Hitler’s rise to power. Humiliating Russia today increases tensions which can lead to confrontation – possibly even a Third World War. Conversely, if your speech at the 70th anniversary commemoration fully recognized Russia’s contribution to the defeat of Nazism, it would open the possibility of a desperately needed “reset” in Russian-American relations.

    Sincerely,
    William M. Kays

    BACKGROUND ON BILL

    I came to know Bill Kays when he served as Dean of Engineering at Stanford from 1972 to 1984. Whenever I came to his office, there on his wall was that iconic picture of the D-Day landing, taken by Life magazine photographer Robert Capa.


     Robert Capa Pic

    I knew that Bill had landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day, but only recently did I learn that he is in that picture! He, his radioman (Doyle), and his runner (Fitzwater) are indicated in the marked version of the photo on the next page.

    Robert Capa Pic marked

    I learned this when I found out that Bill had written a book for his family, based on 123 letters that his mother had saved as he fought his way through Tunisia, Sicily, France, Belgium, and Germany. The book is now available from Amazon, so I bought a copy and learned a lot more about my friend and colleague. The next few pages are excerpts which explain how Bill came to be in that picture, and what he experienced on that momentous day.

    Excerpts from Letters From a Soldier, by William M. Kays, pages 167-176

    At about H+1 hour (one hour after the initial landing) two companies of the 1st Battalion, to which I was attached, were to land, followed a few minutes later by the remainder of the 1st Battalion. … It was an attack in very great depth, which of course provided little comfort to those [of us] in the first waves. … I was in a boat with the 1st Battalion Headquarters … I found myself standing next to Life magazine photographer, Robert Capa, who had taken my picture the night before [on the troop transport]. …

    Suddenly I heard machine-gun fire, very loud. Bullets were bouncing off our boat. … what really caught my eye in that brief instant were men (and the bodies of men) lying on the shingle bank just beyond the water’s edge. In a flash I knew this was the front line. The initial assault had failed!

    … we saw men apparently drowning in the water next to us and my radio operator, Doyle, panicked. He was carrying a heavy radio on his back and he and Fitzwater, my runner, took off the radio and decided to carry it between them rather than on Doyle’s back. The ramp dropped and we all rushed out into about two or three feet of water and headed for the beach. [Doyle and Fitzwater, carrying the radio, were right behind me as we went ashore.] … Capa’s pictures seem to show that he must have stopped on the ramp and shot two or three pictures. …

    I saw men and bodies … I ran to the right and then headed towards a tank about 50 yards ahead. I don’t recall the noise, but at that moment I saw the splashes of machine gun bullets hitting the water immediately in front of me. …

    My overwhelming feeling at the time was that this whole enormous national effort was ending in an incredible disaster. …

    At about that time I became aware of little splashes and puffs of black smoke near me every now and then. They were lobbing rifle grenades onto us, probably trying to hit the tank that I was crouching behind. There were apparently a lot of Germans up there somewhere on that bluff and they were shooting with everything they had. … artillery and mortar shells were coming in here and there as they attempted to get at the men on the shingle bank. …

    [Running to take cover behind another tank just ahead of my previous position] I saw at the water’s edge, a few feet ahead, one of our mine-detector boxes standing perfectly upright … On either side of the box lay a dead soldier, both pitched forward with their faces in the gravel. …

    [After running another 100 yards,] I saw the beach and all its horror, dead men, wounded men, some mangled by artillery shells, others running out in little teams into the water to rescue men, and also to pull in wheeled carts of ammunition. …

    “E” Company … suffered 51 dead and 54 wounded that day (out of 150), but [Lieutenant] Spalding’s boat section [had landed in an unexpected soft spot in the German defenses and] … had only two dead and 8 wounded out of about 30. The other four boat sections of “E” had been decimated by the murderous fire from the enemy E3 strong point to Spalding’s left. “F” Company still further to the left suffered a similar fate. Captain John Finke, CO of “F,” said that all his officers were killed … Finke himself was wounded around noon and at the end of the day the remnants of “F” were commanded by a sergeant.

    I believe [Spalding’s salient] was the first significant penetration inland from Omaha Beach; I had been lucky enough to have landed close by. …

    [Battalion Commander Colonel Ed] Driscoll, while still on the shingle bank, had evidently seen Americans moving up the ravine [following Spalding], and that is why he led us to the spot beside the house foundations. …

    Machine gun bullets chipped dust and brick fragments from a foot above our heads in our temporary haven on the left side of the foundation wall, but I don’t recall worrying at all. Driscoll had lost his radio operator and asked to use my radio to contact his companies. … [but my radioman] Doyle jerked the handset out of the radio container and broke a connecting wire, so my radio didn’t work (at least we found later that this was the problem.) …

    Soon Driscoll and his staff moved up the bluff and onto the plateau and headed up the road toward Coleville. I followed.

    At this point I felt that the battle for the beach was over and that I should think about making contact with Murphy and our “A” Company. It was now apparent that we had landed about 500 yards to the left of where we should have … I got the idiotic idea that I should take off to the right through the hedgerows … I wasn’t thinking very clearly and evidently completely forgot that there was an enemy. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I was so traumatized by the beach experience that I apparently thought I was immortal.

    The fact is that for the first, and undoubtedly the last time during the war, I had reached a mental state where I was oblivious to bullets and shells. …

    The scene below me on the beach was appalling. There was wreckage of boats and vehicles as far as you could see in both directions, and many fires and much smoke. Artillery shells were still coming in and hitting boats. I watched an LCT loaded with anti-aircraft guns turn sideways and come in broadside and hit a mine on one of the beach obstacles. Virtually all of the tanks in the little group where I had landed were still there but were now burning. They were being picked off one by one by anti-tank guns …

    Today the Normandy American Cemetery and monument is located at the spot where I was now standing. In fact, the main path from the cemetery to the beach, which is now paved, follows the line of the trail we came up. …

    So what had I contributed on D-day? Actually not much. I provided one additional target for the Germans to shoot at, but that was about it. [This was a result of Bill’s have been landed 500 yards from where they should have been, so they could not rendezvous with “A” Company as planned. Also, as noted above, Bill’s radio failed when Battalion Commander Ed Driscoll needed it after losing his own radio operator.]

  • Martin Luther King and the Bomb

    Martin Luther King and the Bomb

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    David KriegerMartin Luther King, Jr. was one of the world’s great peace leaders.  Like Gandhi before him, he was a firm advocate of nonviolence.  In 1955, at the age of 26, he became the leader of the Montgomery bus boycott and two years later he was elected the leader of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.  Within a decade he would receive the Nobel Peace Prize at the age of 35.  It came two years after he witnessed the terrifying prospects of nuclear war during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.

    King’s Nobel Lecture, delivered in December 1964, is worth reviewing.  He compared mankind’s technological advancement with our spiritual progress and found us failing to keep pace spiritually.  He said, “There is a sort of poverty of the spirit which stands in glaring contrast to our scientific and technological abundance.  The richer we have become materially, the poorer we have become morally and spiritually.  We have learned to fly the air like birds and swim the sea like fish, but we have not learned the simple act of living together as brothers.”

    The yawning gap between mankind’s technological advancement and spiritual poverty led King to draw this conclusion: “If we are to survive today, our moral and spiritual ‘lag’ must be eliminated.  Enlarged material powers spell enlarged peril if there is not proportionate growth of the soul.  When the ‘without’ of man’s nature subjugates the ‘within,’ dark storm clouds begin to form in the world.”  He found that mankind’s spiritual “lag” expressed itself in three interrelated problems: racial injustice, poverty and war.

    When King elaborated on war, he spoke of “the ever-present threat of annihilation,” clearly referring to the dangers of nuclear weapons.  Recognizing the dangers of denial, or “rejection” of the truth about the nuclear predicament, he went on, “A world war – God forbid! – will leave only smoldering ashes as a mute testimony of a human race whose folly led inexorably to ultimate death.  So if modern man continues to flirt unhesitatingly with war, he will transform his earthly habitat into an inferno such as even the mind of Dante could not imagine.”

    King came to the following realization: “Somehow we must transform the dynamics of the world power struggle from the negative nuclear arms race which no one can win to a positive contest to harness man’s creative genius for the purpose of making peace and prosperity a reality for all of the nations of the world.  In short, we must shift the arms race into a ‘peace race.’  If we have the will and determination to mount such a  peace offensive, we will unlock hitherto tightly sealed doors and transform our imminent cosmic elegy into a psalm of creative fulfillment.”

    One year to the day prior to his assassination on April 4, 1968, King gave a speech at the Riverside Church in New York City that was highly critical of the war in Vietnam.  Many of his close advisors urged him not to speak out and to instead keep his focus on the civil rights movement, but he felt the time had come when silence is betrayal and chose to state his position.  He put the Vietnam War squarely within his moral vision and spoke against it to the great displeasure of Lyndon Johnson and many other American political leaders. In addition to speaking his mind on the war, he also said that nuclear weapons would never defeat communism and called for reordering our priorities to pursue peace rather than war.  He argued, “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.”

    Were he still with us, there can be little doubt that King would be highly critical of America’s continuing wars since Vietnam, and its plan to spend $1 trillion on modernizing its nuclear arsenal.  Since his death, the gap between our technological prowess and our spiritual/moral values has continued to widen.   We would do well to listen to King’s insights and follow his vision if we are to have any chance of pulling out of the descending spiral leading to the nation’s “spiritual death.”

    David Krieger is a founder of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (www.wagingpeace.org), and has served as its president since 1982.

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  • Why Green New Deal Advocates Must Address Militarism

    Why Green New Deal Advocates Must Address Militarism

    In the spirit of a new year and a new Congress, 2019 may well be our best and last opportunity to steer our ship of state away from the twin planetary perils of environmental chaos and militarism, charting a course towards an earth-affirming 21st century.   

    The environmental crisis was laid bare by the sobering December report of the UN Climate panel: If the world fails to mobilize within the next 12 years on the level of a moon shot, and gear up to change our energy usage from toxic fossil, nuclear and industrial biomass fuels to the already known solutions for employing solar, wind, hydro, geothermal energy and efficiency, we will destroy all life on earth as we know it. The existential question is whether our elected officials, with the reins of power, are going to sit by helplessly as our planet experiences more devastating fires, floods, droughts, and rising seas or will they seize this moment and take monumental action as we did when the United States abolished slavery, gave women the vote, ended the great depression, and eliminated legal segregation.

    Some members of Congress are already showing their historic mettle by supporting a Green New Deal. This would not only start to reverse the damage we have inflicted on our collective home, but it would create hundreds of thousands of good jobs that cannot be shipped overseas to low wage countries.

    Even those congresspeople who want to seriously address the climate crisis, however, fail to grapple with the simultaneous crisis of militarism. The war on terror unleashed in the wake of the 911 terrorist attack has led to almost two decades of unchecked militarism. We are spending more money on our military than at any time in history. Endless wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Syria and elsewhere are still raging, costing us trillions of dollars and creating humanitarian disasters. Old treaties to control nuclear arms are unraveling at the same time that conflicts with the major powers of Russia and China are heating up.

    Where is the call for the New Peace Deal that would free up hundreds of billions from the overblown military budget to invest in green infrastructure? Where is the call to close a majority of our nation’s over 800 military bases overseas, bases that are relics of World War II and are basically useless for military purposes? Where is the call for seriously addressing the existential threat posed by nuclear weapons?

    With the crumbling phenomenon of outdated nuclear arms control treaties, it is unconscionable not to support the recently negotiated UN treaty, signed by 122 nations, to prohibit and ban nuclear weapons just as the world has done for chemical and biological weapons. The US Congress should not be authorizing the expenditures of one trillion dollars for new nuclear weapons, bowing to corporate paymasters who seek a larger arms race with Russia and other nuclear-armed countries to the detriment of our own people and the rest of the world. Instead, Congress should take the lead in supporting this treaty and promoting it among the other nuclear weapons states.

    Environmentalists need to contest the Pentagon’s staggering global footprint. The US military is the world’s largest institutional consumer of fossil fuels and the largest source of greenhouse gasses, contributing about 5 percent of global warming emissions. Almost 900 of the EPA’s 1,300 Superfund sites are abandoned military bases, weapons-production facilities or weapons-testing sites. The former Hanford nuclear weapons facility in Washington state alone will cost over $100 billion to clean up.

    If climate change is not addressed rapidly by a Green New Deal, global militarism will ramp up in response to increases in climate refugees and civil destabilization, which will feed climate change and seal a vicious cycle fed by the twin evils militarism and climate disruption. That’s why a New Peace Deal and a Green New Deal should go hand in hand. We cannot afford to waste our time, resources and intellectual capital on weapons and war when climate change is barreling down on all of humankind.  If the nuclear weapons don’t destroy us than the pressing urgency of catastrophic climate will.

    Moving from an economic system that relies on fossil fuels and violence would enable us to make a just transition to a clean, green, life-supporting energy economy.  This would be the quickest and most positive way to deal a death knell to the military-industrial complex that President Eisenhower warned about so many years ago.

    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License