OMNI
NUCLEAR WEAPONS ABOLITION NEWSLETTER #23, JANUARY 15, 2017.
Compiled by Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace, Justice, and
Ecology
TICK TOCK
By Gerald Sloan (2017)
When I was born the doomsday clock
was set at seven before midnight.
As my grandchildren are being born
it has jumped five minutes ahead.
Five minutes. Five children.
Yet the heads of state
continue to behave as if
nuclear weapons are popguns.
In any psychological profile this
would be diagnosed as psychosis.
This really captures my feelings about the topic. Did you
hear of the Trump supporter in Washington State (I have forgotten his name) who
believes that nuclear warfare might actually be good for humankind?
Unbelieveable. Sensing the decision to use nuclear weapons may be in the
hands of an administration that is denying science at every turn, psychosis
sounds understated. Burnetta
#1 US FIRSTS
“…it was we ‘who first produced and tested’ the bomb, we
who were ‘the first to raise its destructiveness to a new level with the
hydrogen bomb…and we alone, so help us God, who have used the weapon in anger
against others, and against tens of thousands of helpless noncombatants at
that.’” Jonathan Schell, The Gift of Time: The Case for
Abolishing Nuclear Weapons Now. P. 26. A brilliant writer
Schell, now dead but his books against nuclear weapons provide bright light for
our struggle.
September witnesses important Days and the importance of the
United Nations to abolishing nuclear weapons:: 20th, UN Treaty on the Prohibition
of Nuclear Weapons opened for signatures. 21st, UN International Day of
Peace. 26th, UN Day for Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons.
CONTENTS: NUCLEAR WEAPONS
ABOLITION NEWSLETTER
Two Books on Nagasaki Nuclear Bombing
Stelson, Sachiko
Southard, Nagasaki
World War III
Michel
Chossudovsky. Towards a World War III Scenario. The Dangers of
Nuclear War.
2 012. US and
Israel v. Iran
Trump’s “Usable” Nucs
Anti-Nucs Movement 2017
Greenwood,
UN Ban Treaty
UN
Treaty to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons and Nobel Peace Prize
Awarded to ICAN
Lieu/Markey
Bill Barring U.S. president from starting a nuclear war
without a
declaration of war by Congress.
Eiger. Film. The
Nuns, the Priests, and the Bombs.
Pacific Life Community,
Disarm Now Plowshares v. Trident
Submarines at Strategic Weapons
Facility, Pacific, Bangor, Wash.
Symposium at University of
New Mexico
Organizations Against Nuclear Weapons
Harvey, American
Anti-Nuclear Activism, 1975-1990
Zac, Almighty, Three
Catholics break into the uranium-enrichment facility at Oak
Ridge
Analyses: Letters,
Articles, Books
Lichterman: Trump, Destroyer
Wittner,
Why So Little Public Protest
Krieger, Letter to Trump and Putin
Sprey and Spinney, US MICC Drumming Up
anti-Russian
hysterics.
Special Focus: Accidents
Nuclear Weapons Mishaps
Near Nuclear Disaster at Damascus, AR, Film and Book:
Command
and Control
Nuclear War, the Damascus Incident, and
the Illusion of Safety by Eric
Schlosser
Schlosser
US/SU
Nuclear Subs Collide, Nukewatch Quarterly (pub. by
the Progressive
Foundation).
Spring 2017.
Special Feature of MICC we don’t hear often
Graff, Raven Rock, Save the
Leaders
OMNI Opposition to Nuclear War
October 14, 2017, Celebrated UN Nuclear Ban Treaty and ICAN’s Nobel
Peace Prize
OMNI’s Long Opposition to Nuclear Weapons
Annual Remembrance each August
Newsletters
Related: Marshallese Education
Initiative (MEI) 3-4-17.
TEXTS
TWO BOOKS ON NAGASAKI
HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI NUCLEAR BOMBINGS
Susan
Southard. Nagasaki: Life After Nuclear War. 2016. https://www.amazon.com/Nagasaki-Life-After-Nuclear-War/dp/0143109421 Susan Southard.
For much of
the world, the United States’ 1945 atomic bombings of Japan represented an end
to a long and costly global war. But for tens of thousands of survivors who
barely escaped death beneath the mushroom cloud, their new lives as hibakusha (atomic
bomb–affected people) had just begun.
In the late
morning of August 9, 1945—three days after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima—the
people of Nagasaki moved through another day of hunger and wartime routine. At
11:02 a.m. a brilliant flash illuminated the sky, followed by an explosion
equal to 21,000 tons of TNT. With searing heat and an annihilating force that
defies imagination, the blast tore through factories, shops, and homes,
carrying unprecedented levels of radiation that penetrated the bodies of people
and animals. Approximately 74,000 people were killed, and another 75,000 were
wounded.
Nagasaki takes us on the
astonishing journeys of five survivors, all teenagers at the time of the
bombing. From 1945 to Nagasaki today, we watch them and hibakusha across
the city navigate an uncertain future with punishing injuries, acute and
late-onset radiation-related illnesses, and haunting fears that they would pass
on genetic disorders to their children and grandchildren. In a remarkable
demonstration of human resilience, a small number of hibakusha made
the very personal choice to speak out about their experiences, even as U.S.
policies kept their suffering hidden in both in their own country and across
the world. The survivors’ goal: To ensure that Nagasaki remains the last
atomic-bombed city in history.
Caren Stelson. Sachiko. a Nagasaki Bomb Survivor's Story. 2016
This striking work of narrative nonfiction tells the true story of
six-year-old Sachiko Yasui’s survival of the Nagasaki atomic bomb on August 9,
1945, and the heartbreaking and lifelong aftermath. Having conducted extensive
interviews with Sachiko Yasui, Caren Stelson chronicles Sachiko’s long journey
toward peace. This special book offers readers a remarkable new perspective on
the final moments of World War II, the fifty years that followed, and the
courage it took for one woman to tell her story of nuclear war and peace.
US AND ISRAEL PLANNED WWIII AGAINST
IRAN
Review of
Towards a World War III Scenario. The Dangers of Nuclear War. 2012.
U.S. plans to attack Iran with
a mix of nuclear and conventional weapons have been in readiness since June,
2005,
according to Michel Chossudovsky, a distinguished authority on international
affairs.
“Confirmed
by military documents as well as official statements, both the U.S. and Israel
contemplate the use of nuclear weapons directed against Iran,” writes professor
Chossudovsky, Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization in Montreal.
The
plans were formulated in 2004. The previous year, Congress gave the Pentagon the green light
to use thermo-nuclear weapons in conventional war theaters in the Middle East
and Central Asia, allocating $6 billion in 2004 alone to create the new
generation of “defensive” tactical nuclear weapons or “mini-nukes”.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/towards-a-world-war-iii-scenario-breaking-the.../5348384
Oct 12, 2017 - WW III has been
contemplated by the U.S. and its allies for well over ten years as revealed in
Michel Chossudovsky's 2012 best-seller: “Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers
of Nuclear War“. Excerpt below. The US has embarked on a military adventure,
“a long war”, which threatens the future….
TRUMP WANTS MORE USABLE NUCS
“Usable” nuclear weapons?! WIN WITHOUT WAR
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9:20 AM (8 hours ago)
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Dick,
Just leaked: Trump wants more usable nukes.
A leaked draft of the Trump administration’s nuclear weapons
policy calls for more nuclear weapons with a “small” enough blast radius to be
used in a targeted attack.
There is no such thing as a “small” nuclear bomb. The type of
new nuclear weapon Trump is after could kill 100,000 with a single detonation.
Even worse, there’s only one person who needs to give the approval to use these
shiny new nuclear weapons:
Donald “My Nuclear Button is Bigger than Yours” Trump.
Win Without War is pulling out all the stops to pass legislation
that would take away Trump’s ability to single-handedly launch nuclear weapons.
But we need your help.
Trump isn’t just collecting more nuclear weapons. He’s
speeding toward reasons to deploy them. Trump is goading North Korea
into a war that could turn nuclear in an instant. And he continues to threaten
to tear up the Iran nuclear deal — and destroy the historic progress toward
curbing a major nuclear threat.
More “usable” nukes. More reasons to use them. Dick, we are
staring down the barrel of nuclear war.
Every American needs to jump in to get Trump’s finger off the
nuclear button, stat. The future of our world is at stake. Will you step in with a $3 contribution today?
Thank you for working for peace,
Cassandra
ANTI-NUCS
HOPEFUL INTERNATIONAL ANTI-NUCLEAR WEAPONS EVENTS DURING 2017
|
Max
Greenwood
July 7, 2017 The Hill
The treaty
is intended to bar countries from developing, testing, manufacturing,
acquiring or even possessing any kind of nuclear weapon.
|
|
A majority of the world's countries
voted at the United Nations on Friday to adopt a global treaty
banning nuclear weapons.
The vote marks the first time in
history that a majority of countries moved to approve a binding instrument
prohibiting nuclear weapons. In all, 122 nations voted in favor of the
treaty, while only one, the Netherlands, voted against it. Singapore
abstained.
The treaty is intended to bar countries from
developing, testing, manufacturing, acquiring or even possessing any kind of
nuclear weapon.
Not part of the treaty negotiations,
however, were the world's nuclear powers, including the United States,
France, the United Kingdom and Russia — all permanent members of the
U.N. Security Council — who argued that the treaty was unrealistic and
that countries like North Korea would not cooperate.
"There is nothing I want more for
my family than a world with no nuclear weapons, but we have to be
realistic," U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haleysaid in March when negotiations
on the treaty began. "Is there anyone who thinks that North Korea would
ban nuclear weapons?”
The vote, however, was celebrated
by arms control groups, who said the treaty was a first real step toward eliminating
nuclear arms.
“By delegitimizing nuclear weapons and
raising awareness of the terrifying dangers that come from continued reliance
on them, the nuclear ban makes a valuable contribution to nonproliferation
and disarmament efforts," Meredith Horowski, the global campaign
director for the anti-nuclear weapons group Global Zero, said in a statement.
"There are many more steps to
come in order to secure a world without nuclear weapons, but today the world
took a step in the right direction," she continued.
Daryl Kimball, the executive director
of the Washington-based Arms Control Association, applauded the treaty as a
way to "delegitimize nuclear weapons and strengthen the legal and
political norm against their use."
But the prohibition passed at the U.N. on
Friday "should have been stronger," he said.
"In our view, and in the view of
many delegations, the final text of the Nuclear Weapons Prohibition Treaty
should have been stronger," Kimball said. "Key areas, particularly
Article 3, which outlines the requirements for safeguards against nuclear
weapons programs, could have been strengthened and improved."
|
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN)
is a coalition of non-governmental organizations in one hundred countries
promoting adherence to and implementation of the United Nations nuclear weapon ban treaty.
The UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons was adopted by
122 UN members on July 7, 2017. The “BAN Treaty” came into force when 50 nations ratified the Treaty.
Then on October 6th the Nobel Committee awarded the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize to the
International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) "for its work to
draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of
nuclear weapons and for its ground-breaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based
prohibition of such weapons."
Lieu/Markey Bill
From ROOTSACTION
As president of the United States, Donald Trump has supreme
authority to launch a nuclear strike, and literally no one can stop him.
We can change that. Click here to help.
Two members of Congress, Rep. Ted Lieu and Sen. Ed Markey, have proposed urgent legislation to prevent the U.S. president from starting a nuclear war without a declaration of war by Congress.
Trump exposes the terrifying power of a system built for speed and mass destruction at the president's sole discretion. From keeping the door open to using nuclear weapons in the Middle East to questioning why the U.S. builds nuclear weapons if it can’t use them, to proposing that it's good to be unpredictable, to allowing people at Trump's Florida resort to snap photos posing with and identifying the man who carries the nuclear launch information, Donald Trump has shown just how dangerous it is to let any one person have the unchecked power to destroy the entire world with the push of a button.
Sign the petition and call on Congress to keep us safe by making it illegal for President Trump, or any successor, to start a nuclear war.
Here's the petition:
To all U.S. Senators and Representatives:
We call on you to take action to ensure that no president can unilaterally launch a nuclear war.
U.S. nuclear launch procedures have been designed for speed, not for democratic decisions. The president (or his designee) is the only person who can order the use of nuclear weapons and there are no checks or balances on that authority. As President Richard Nixon observed in 1974, “I can go back into my office and pick up the telephone and in 25 minutes 70 million people will be dead.”
While it should be inconceivable that any American president would conduct a nuclear first strike, President Trump’s past statements and erratic behavior make it imperative that we put checks and balances on nuclear launch authority. Only Congress can declare war, and that authority should apply to a nuclear first strike as well. Please co-sponsor H.R. 669/S. 200 to make America and the world safer by prohibiting the president from unilaterally starting a nuclear war.
ADD YOUR NAME.
After signing the petition, please use the tools on the next webpage to share it with your friends.
This work is only possible with your financial support. Please chip in $3 now.
-- The RootsAction.org Team
Partners on this petition: American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Council for a Livable World, CREDO, Daily Kos, Global Zero, Just Foreign Policy, Peace Action, Ploughshares Fund, Progressive Congress Action Fund, Public Citizen, RootsAction.org, Union of Concerned Scientists, United for Peace and Justice, Watchdog.net, Win Without War, Women's Action for New Directions
P.S. RootsAction is an independent online force endorsed by Jim Hightower, Barbara Ehrenreich, Cornel West, Daniel Ellsberg, Glenn Greenwald, Naomi Klein, Bill Fletcher Jr., Laura Flanders, former U.S. Senator James Abourezk, Frances Fox Piven, Lila Garrett, Phil Donahue, Sonali Kolhatkar, and many others.
We can change that. Click here to help.
Two members of Congress, Rep. Ted Lieu and Sen. Ed Markey, have proposed urgent legislation to prevent the U.S. president from starting a nuclear war without a declaration of war by Congress.
Trump exposes the terrifying power of a system built for speed and mass destruction at the president's sole discretion. From keeping the door open to using nuclear weapons in the Middle East to questioning why the U.S. builds nuclear weapons if it can’t use them, to proposing that it's good to be unpredictable, to allowing people at Trump's Florida resort to snap photos posing with and identifying the man who carries the nuclear launch information, Donald Trump has shown just how dangerous it is to let any one person have the unchecked power to destroy the entire world with the push of a button.
Sign the petition and call on Congress to keep us safe by making it illegal for President Trump, or any successor, to start a nuclear war.
Here's the petition:
To all U.S. Senators and Representatives:
We call on you to take action to ensure that no president can unilaterally launch a nuclear war.
U.S. nuclear launch procedures have been designed for speed, not for democratic decisions. The president (or his designee) is the only person who can order the use of nuclear weapons and there are no checks or balances on that authority. As President Richard Nixon observed in 1974, “I can go back into my office and pick up the telephone and in 25 minutes 70 million people will be dead.”
While it should be inconceivable that any American president would conduct a nuclear first strike, President Trump’s past statements and erratic behavior make it imperative that we put checks and balances on nuclear launch authority. Only Congress can declare war, and that authority should apply to a nuclear first strike as well. Please co-sponsor H.R. 669/S. 200 to make America and the world safer by prohibiting the president from unilaterally starting a nuclear war.
ADD YOUR NAME.
After signing the petition, please use the tools on the next webpage to share it with your friends.
This work is only possible with your financial support. Please chip in $3 now.
-- The RootsAction.org Team
Partners on this petition: American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Council for a Livable World, CREDO, Daily Kos, Global Zero, Just Foreign Policy, Peace Action, Ploughshares Fund, Progressive Congress Action Fund, Public Citizen, RootsAction.org, Union of Concerned Scientists, United for Peace and Justice, Watchdog.net, Win Without War, Women's Action for New Directions
P.S. RootsAction is an independent online force endorsed by Jim Hightower, Barbara Ehrenreich, Cornel West, Daniel Ellsberg, Glenn Greenwald, Naomi Klein, Bill Fletcher Jr., Laura Flanders, former U.S. Senator James Abourezk, Frances Fox Piven, Lila Garrett, Phil Donahue, Sonali Kolhatkar, and many others.
Thirteen nuclear resisters arrested at Bangor Trident base
https://pacificlifecommunity.wordpress.com/
(Also published in The Nuclear Resister)
Photo by Fumi Tosu
The Pacific Life Community returned to Washington state for
its annual gathering, concluding with a blockade of the main gate into the
Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor. The base is the Pacific homeport of the Trident
nuclear ballistic missile submarine fleet.
A two-day program at a nearby retreat center built on the legacy
of now-retired Raymond Hunthausen. As Archbishop of Seattle in 1984, he
declared that “Trident is the Auschwitz of Puget Sound.” Hunthausen’s wages
were garnished when he publicly refused to pay the war tax percentage in
protest.
Snow and rain did not deter the demonstration at the Trident
base gate on March 7. More than 40 people joined together for prayer, reading
Hunthausen’s words before peacekeepers safely blocked the incoming traffic and
several banners were stretched across the road.
“War is Immoral” read one, and another read, “Abolish Nuclear
Weapons”.
Police soon moved in and arrested seven people who were blocking
the road on the state side of the line.
Ticketed and released for “pedestrian leaving the curb” were
Kelsey Chalmers, Susan Crane, Ed Ehmke, Allison McGillivray, Nick Mele, Mary
Jane Parrine and Sam Yergler.
Six others who crossed over the marked property line onto the
federal side read sections of the Nuremberg Principles out loud before being
arrested by military police. Alexandria Addesso, Karan Founds-Benton, Fr. Steve
Kelly, SJ, Betsy Lamb, Mary Mele and Charley Smith were charged with trespass
and received ban and bar letters before being released.
The Nuns, the Priests,
and the Bombs
New
Documentary on Plowshares Actions
By
Leonard Eiger. 2017
In the early
morning darkness of November 9, 2009 five friends slogged their way toward the
belly of the beast – the Strategic
Weapons Facility, Pacific (SWFPAC). Along with Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor, SWFPAC
represents the largest concentration of operational nuclear weapons in the
entire US arsenal – far more than enough nuclear destructive power to end
the human experiment. They arrived at the double-fenced perimeter of the
storage facility and set to work with bolt cutters, finally entering the
secured area, designated as “Deadly Force Authorized.” They lifted hammers
against the fences, scattered sunflower seeds and poured their own blood,
symbolizing the murderous potential of nuclear weapons. They carried banners
declaring: “Disarm Now!” They became known as the Disarm Now
Plowshares….continued here: http://www.gzcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/October-2017-newsletter-for-web-2.pdf)
Trailer: The Nuns, The Priests,
and The Bombs
Nuclear
disarmament activists, including Catholic nuns and priests, challenge the
security and legality of America's nuclear weapons when they break into the
"Fort Knox" of uranium and a Trident nuclear submarine base. Are they
criminals or prophets sending a wake-up call to the world?
Marcus Pegasus:
That's the
greatest expose of the power of Christ subverting the American Empire. We
hinted at it 2 years ago with: vimeo.com/115445555 from
CatholicWorker.biz . Thanx to Helen Young for bringing up this new explanation
of how to stop the nuclear powers from robbing the community treasury that
belongs to the masses...
SYMPOSIUM AT
U OF NEW MEXICO
Nov 10, 2017 - Local Anti-Nuke Group
Announces Symposium to “Dismantle the Nuclear Beast.” The Nuclear Issues
Study Group
will hold a unique and timely symposium at the University of New Mexico in
December to connect local activists with the national anti-nuclear movement. The Nuclear Issues Study Group
is an ... Dismantling the
Nuclear Beast: Connecting Local ... - World Beyond War
worldbeyondwar.org/.../dismantling-the-nuclear-beast-connecting-local-work-to-the-...
ORGANIZATIONS SEEKING INTERNATIONAL REGULATION OR ABOLITION OF
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
(these
could have appeared in the preceding section)
K. Harvey. American Anti-Nuclear Activism, 1975-1990:
The Challenge of Peace. (Palgrave Studies in the
History of Social Movements).
(Reviewed in Peace & Change)
Looking at
national peace organizations alongside lesser-known protest collectives, this
book argues that anti-nuclear activists encountered familiar challenges common
to other social movements of the late twentieth century. [This book should receive attention. You will organize a Forum? Or?]
Almighty: Courage, Resistance, and Existential Peril
in the Nuclear Age. Dan Zak.
Penguin/Blue Rider, 2016. Rev. Publisher’s Weekly.
This well-researched history from Washington Post reporter
Zak tells the riveting story of three nuclear weapons protestors and how, in
2012, they infiltrated the ultrasecure uranium-enrichment facility in Oak
Ridge, Tenn. Sister Megan Rice, Greg
Boertje-Obed, and Michael Walli took different paths to becoming activists
opposed to nuclear weapons, but they united on a breathtaking mission to
protest America’s ongoing nuclear program. Zak also dives into the history of
how the United States devoted enormous resources to the initial development of
the nuclear bomb. At one point, nuclear weapons accounted for 10% of the
country’s gross national product, and the Oak Ridge facility alone consumed
around 14% of the U.S.’s electricity. Zak shows how the country continues to
grapple with the tension between ensuring peace and maintaining weapons with
the power to cause our own extinction. Despite President Obama’s early
experience of antinuclear activism, his administration has continued to prolong
the life of the U.S. nuclear weapons program. Much of the antinuclear movement
is intertwined with Christian ethics and the Catholic Church, and it still uses as its central metaphor the
Biblical idea of turning swords into plowshares. Zak gracefully synthesizes the
stories of the politicians and bureaucrats controlling stockpiles of weapons
and those of the activists working to disarm them. Agent:
Lauren Clark, Kuhn Projects. (July)
DETAILS
Reviewed
on: 05/09/2016
Release date: 07/12/2016
Release date: 07/12/2016
NUKEWATCH QUARTERLY
Spring
2017 (published by the Progressive Foundation, an excellent organization, also
publishes The Progressive Magazine,
all needing and deserving your financial assistance)
Examples
from this number:
John
LaForge, “Fukushima: Six Years On.”
Remembers the 6th anniversary March 11 of the “world’s worst
nuclear reactor disaster: the 2011 meltdown of three large power reactors on
the Pacific Coast of Japan—Fukushima Daiichi….”
[LaForge is editor of NQ and a
scholar and historian of nuclear power and weapons. This article typifies his high level of
knowledge conveyed with strong moral direction and lucid prose.]
Bruce
Blair. “What Does It Mean to Have
Trump’s Finger on the Nuclear Button?”
He discusses various scenarios and presidential power, and concludes
that “The only real protection against nuclear disasters is total elimination
of nuclear weapons.” This is an excerpt
of a longer piece published in Politico,
which includes analyses of statements made by Trump.
“US and UK Cover-Up of Trident Missile
Failure.” Compiled by LaForge from
several sources on the “colossally expensive failure,” the military-industrial
complex, violations of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and more.
OMNI and
WAND in LR provide Arkansas with its only Nuclear Watch, including both nuclear
power and, particularly, nuclear weapons.
We have published information pertaining to nuclear power, illustrated
by LaForge’s article. We publish a
newsletter Nuclear Weapons Abolition and information and notices regarding UN
International Day Against Nuclear Tests, Global Network Against Nuclear
Weapons, Nuclear Free Independent Pacific, Nuclear Abolition Month August. And we are the Arkansas connection via the
Nuclear Age Peace Foundation for the Marshall Islands Nuclear Nations Law
Suits. For example see Nuclear Weapons
Abolition Newsletter #21 http://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2015/03/nuclear-weapons-abolition-newsletter-21.html
I invite you to help the Watch in any way
that interests you—perhaps reporting on one of the nuclear magazines like this
one.
ANALYSES: LETTERS, ESSAYS, BOOKS
Donald Trump, Destroyer of Worlds
FROM TIKKUN: THE NETWORK OF SPIRITUAL PROGRESSIVES. 11-26-17 Editor’s Note: Andrew
Lichterman’s analysis (below and online at http://www.tikkun.org/nextgen/donald-trump-destroyer-of-worlds. This is “an important review of why Trump's threats of nuclear war are illegal, and
why the underlying nationalism to which he appeals is destructive. Lichterman's
work is important to understand and circulate to others. [Outstanding essay. –Dick]
Yet there is a missing element here, namely that we need to
understand the legitimate fear Americans have about terrorism after 9/11 and
about other irresponsible leaders (including Trump) having access to nuclear
weapons.We’ve argued that the key to reducing the risk of nuclear war is not to
deny the possibility of threats from other nations (the young leader of North
Korea at times seems as much a delusional narcissist as Trump) but to
understand that we have to focus on the core beliefs about what will bring real
security. We have been arguing for the past thirty years that for both the US
and Israel the best path to achieve homeland security is to abandon the
failed strategy of domination over others as the best path to homeland security
and to replace that with the strtegy of generosity as manifested in Tikkun’s
proposed Global Marshall Plan (Tikkun ally Congressman Keith Ellison of
Minneapoli introduced House Resolution 87 to Congress in
February--supporting our reasoning for a Global Marshall Plan. Read our
proposal at: www.tikkun.org/gmp).
No matter how wise various appeals to law and rights and U.N.
Resolutions can be, It is Americans are unlikely to reject atomic weapons
until they fully understand that we will be less vulnerable when we reject the
strategy of "security through power over others" and replace it with
the “strategy of generosity.” Instead of trying to coerce other countries to
not develop the nuclear weapons that we already have and are held by many other
countries as well, Americans will be far safer when the U.S. is perceived to
be the most generous country in the world by virtue of its genuine caring
about the well being of everyone on the planet and not just the country with
the most destructive military capacity. And that strategy of generosity
would work for Israel too, for China, Russia, and most other countries of the
world as well.
The progressive world needs both the kind of thinking provided
by Andrew Lichterman below and the kind of thinking Tikkun provides as an
important supplement to the more narrowly focused specific projects of liberal
and progressive organizations and movements are providing. This is why Tikkun
and our interfaith and secular-humanist-and-atheist-welcoming Network of
Spiritual Progressives deserves your financial support with a
tax-deductible donate at www.tikkun.org/donate –because liberals
and progressives will never stop the growth of right-wing extremists until we
have a more persuasive alternative that recognizes rather than dismisses the
fears and needs that drive people to the Right. Those fears and needs have to
be answered by the kind of psycho-spiritual strategies that we’ve developed.
And if you’d like to join us in this, besides donating you could join our
Network of Spiritual Progressives (NSP) at www.spiritualprogressives.organd
sign up for the online training (you can take it anywhere in the world) which
focuses on being an effective activist in the Trump years. The next round
starts this Tuesday, Nov. 28th. Info at www.spiritualprogressives.org/training.
Donald Trump, Destroyer of Worlds
by Andrew Lichterman
Donald Trump’s first appearance at the United Nations was a
watershed moment. In an address notable for its belligerence, he marked his
place not only as a harbinger of the erosion of the post Cold-War international
legal order, but as an active agent of its destruction. Trump’s bald threat
that to defend the U.S. or its allies, the United States government would be
willing “to totally destroy North Korea” is alarming enough standing alone. In
the context of a rambling speech colored by Christian nationalist metaphors, in
which the world is divided between good and evil and parts of it are “going to
hell,” it evoked the forces that brought the terrible wars of the first four
decades of the 20th century, the very forces that the United
Nations was designed to reign in.
A threat to “totally destroy” a country and its people runs
contrary to both the letter and spirit of United Nations Charter. Adopted in
the wake of World War II and proclaiming the determination “to save succeeding
generations from the scourge of war,” the United Nations Charter established a
prohibition on the use of force to resolve disputes among states.[1] Article
II Section 3 requires all members to “settle their disputes by peaceful means
in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not
endangered.” Article II section 4 prohibits “the threat or use of force against
the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any
other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.” The Charter
contains two exceptions to the prohibition, authorizing the Security Council to
use force on behalf of the United Nations to maintain international peace and
security, and recognizing the right of self-defense against an armed attack.
Trump did couch his threat to destroy North Korea in terms of
defense of the United States and its allies. But this must be read in the
context of the very broad right to “self-defense” that the government of the
United States has claimed, encompassing not only armed response to an actual or
imminent attack but the right to wage “preventive war” whenever U.S. leaders
deem it necessary. In the 2002 National Security Strategy of the United States,
the U.S. government explicitly asserted the right to wage preventive war to
prevent adversaries from developing weapons of mass destruction, stating that
“as a matter of common sense and self-defense, America will act against such
emerging threats before they are fully formed.”[2] Shortly
thereafter, the Bush administration launched a hugely destructive war and
occupation of Iraq, unleashing a cycle of wars and violence in the region that
continues to this day. That war was launched without UN sanction, and on far
thinner evidence (much later proved false) that Iraq had active WMD programs.
The United States government never has repudiated the doctrine
of preventive war, and in fact has continued to conduct unilateral military
actions in a number of countries, less visible “small wars” employing drones,
special forces, air power, and occasionally small numbers of regular ground
forces. All of this goes well beyond any principle of “self defense” recognized
under international law, and has contributed to the slow erosion of what legal
checks there are on war-making that has brought us to this moment. And it
is apparent that the Trump administration is contemplating more than a defensive
response to armed attack by North Korea against the United States or its
allies, and is considering a unilateral preventive war against North Korea if,
in their view, sanctions and diplomacy have failed. The New York Times has
reported that a “pre-emptive military strike, while a last resort, is among the
options they have made available to the president.”[3] U.S.
Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Halley recently reinforced the threat of
preventive war, telling CNN that “We wanted to be responsible and go through
all diplomatic means to get their attention first…. If that doesn’t work,
[Secretary of Defense] General Mattis will take care of it.”[4]
Much MORE http://www.tikkun.org/nextgen/donald-trump-destroyer-of-worlds.
[*] Andrew
Lichterman is a lawyer and policy analyst at the Western States Legal
Foundation, based Oakland, California. He also is a member of the Coordinating
Committee of United for Peace and Justice, and of the boards of the
International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms and the Campaign for
Peace, Disarmament and Common Security. The opinions expressed in this piece
are his alone.N [30 Notes follow –D]
Lawrence Wittner. “Why So Little Protest Against Threats of
Nuclear War?” (Northwest Arkansas) Free Weekly (April 27, 2017). The essay is about Trump and Kim
threatening annihilation of the other.
Half of the essay describes the braggadocio of each and the responses of
the public and the peace and disarmament organizations. In part three he gives five reasons why the
public is passive: preoccupation, fatalism, complacency, nuclear arsenal, and
“perhaps most significantly,” denial.
His final paragraph offers lamentation.
See his excellent book, Confronting
the Bomb. This essay was widely
published, for example in
antiwar.com: http://original.antiwar.com/lawrence-wittner/2017/04/24/why-is-there-so-little-popular-protest-against-todays-threats-of-nuclear-war/ --Dick
An Open Letter to Trump and
Putin: The World Needs Nuclear Zero [A remarkably comprehensive appeal in few
words. D]
https://www.transcend.org/tms/2017/02/an-open-letter-to-trump-and-putin-the-world-needs-nuclear-zero/
16 Feb 2017 – This may be the most
dangerous time in human history.
In a dramatic recent decision, the Bulletin of the Atomic
Scientists has moved its iconic Doomsday Clock ahead from three minutes to only
two-and-a-half minutes to midnight.
Our focus here is on nuclear dangers, but we strongly encourage
you, Presidents Trump and Putin, to undertake in a spirit of urgency all
necessary steps to avert further global warming.
As the leaders of the United States and Russia, the two
countries with the largest nuclear arsenals, you have the grave responsibility
of assuring that nuclear weapons are not used — or their use overtly threatened
— during your period of leadership.
The most certain and reliable way to fulfill this responsibility
is to negotiate with each other, and the other governments of nuclear-armed
states, for their total elimination.
The U.S. and Russia are both obligated under Article VI of the
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to engage in such negotiations in good faith
for an end to the nuclear arms race and for complete nuclear disarmament. Your
success in this endeavor would make you heroes of the Nuclear Age.
Initiating a nuclear war, any nuclear war, would be an act of
insanity. Between nuclear weapons states, it would lead to the destruction of
the attacking nation as well as the nation attacked. Between the U.S. and
Russia, it would also destroy civilization and threaten the survival of humanity.
There are still nearly 15,000 nuclear weapons in the world, of
which the United States and Russia each possess some 7,000.
Approximately 1,000 of these weapons in each country remain on hair-trigger
alert — a catastrophe waiting to happen that could be prevented with the stroke
of a pen. MORE https://www.transcend.org/tms/2017/02/an-open-letter-to-trump-and-putin-the-world-needs-nuclear-zero/
David Krieger is founder and president
of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and a
member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment. He is a recipient of several awards and honors, including
the OMNI Center for Peace, Justice and Ecology Peace Writing Award for Poetry
(2010). He has a new collection of poems entitled Wake Up. For more visit the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation website: www.wagingpeace.org.
Sleepwalking into a Nuclear Arms
Race with Russia: WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION, 27 February
2017
Pierre M. Sprey and
Franklin “Chuck” Spinney – CounterPunch
https://www.transcend.org/tms/2017/02/sleepwalking-into-a-nuclear-arms-race-with-russia/
24 Feb 2017 – The Nuclear Question is
becoming increasingly obfuscated by spin and lobbying as the West sleepwalks into Cold War II — a walk made all the more
dangerous when the loose lips of the U.S. tweeter-in-chief announced that
another nuclear arms race is a great idea (see link and link).
Two Cold War II issues are central and almost never addressed: What will be the
Russians’ understanding of all the propaganda surrounding the Nuclear Question
and the looming American defense spendup? And how might they act on this
understanding? MORE [This excellent scholarly study protesting a
new Cold War, if read by a critical mass of citizens, might prevent its repetition, and the danger
of a first strike is worse today.
-- Dick] https://www.transcend.org/tms/2017/02/sleepwalking-into-a-nuclear-arms-race-with-russia/
[Here’s a quick look at their concluding paragraph]
Yet the mainstream media and the politicians of both parties in
thrall to our MICC are working day and night to pump up anti-Russian hysteria
and hype fear to ensure Americans remain completely oblivious to the powerful,
dangerous impact of our senseless Obama-Trump nuclear spend-up on the Russians
— or on anyone else, for that matter.
Chuck Spinney and Pierre Sprey, between
them, have over 75 years of Pentagon and industry experience in engineering
weapons as well as in analyzing military systems effectivness and defense
budgets. Sprey was one of the early whiz kids in the Office of the
Secretary of Defense (OSD) in the 1960s. Working in OSD in the 1980s, Spinney’s
critical analyses of the Pentagon’s defective planning and budgeting landed him
on the March 1983 cover of Time. Leaving the Pentagon in 2003, he
did an in-depth interview on the military-industrial-congressional complex with
Bill Moyers which resulted in a special Emmy Award winning edition of Bill
Moyers’ Now that aired on 1 August 2003.
SPECIAL FOCUS ON NEED TO ABOLISH NUCLEAR BOMBS BECAUSE OF
ACCIDENTS
Article on nuclear weapons
mishaps.
NEW FILM ON THE NEAR DISASTER AT
DAMASCUS, ARKANSAS
“Command
and Control” to Screen Across Arkansas October 7-9
9-19-16
|
8:33 PM (12 hours ago)
|
|
||
Writer and
director was at all 3 screenings! http://clintonschool.uasys.edu/2016/09/command-and-control-to-screen-across-arkansas-october-7-9/
How the U.S. Narrowly Avoided Nuclear Disaster at an Arkansas
Missile Complex. The Leonard Lopate Show interviews ERIC SCHLOSSER. https://player.fm/1gKbWS #nowplaying
http://player.fm/series/the-leonard-lopate-show-from-wnyc/how-the-us-narrowly-avoided-nuclear-disaster-at-an-arkansas-missile-complex
http://player.fm/series/the-leonard-lopate-show-from-wnyc/how-the-us-narrowly-avoided-nuclear-disaster-at-an-arkansas-missile-complex
BASED ON THE BOOK BY ERIC
SCHLOSSER
Command and Control:
NUCLEAR WEAPONS, THE DAMASCUS ACCIDENT, AND THE ILLUSION OF
SAFETY By ERIC
SCHLOSSER
READ AN EXCERPT http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/303337/command-and-control-by-eric-schlosser/9780143125785/
Look Inside | Enlarge Cover
Aug 26, 2014 | 656 Pages
**The
upcoming documentary Command and Control,
directed by Robert Kenner, finds its origins in Eric Schlosser’s book and
continues to explore the little-known history of the management and safety
concerns of America’s nuclear arsenal.**
A myth-shattering exposé of America’s
nuclear weapons
Famed investigative journalist Eric
Schlosser digs deep to uncover secrets about the management of America’s
nuclear arsenal. A groundbreaking account of accidents, near misses,
extraordinary heroism, and technological breakthroughs, Command and Control
explores the dilemma that has existed since the dawn of the nuclear age: How do
you deploy weapons of mass destruction without being destroyed by them? That
question has never been resolved—and Schlosser reveals how the combination of
human fallibility and technological complexity still poses a grave risk to
mankind. While the harms of global warming increasingly dominate the news, the
equally dangerous yet more immediate threat of nuclear weapons has been largely
forgotten.
PRAISE
The New Yorker
“An excellent journalistic
investigation of the efforts made since the first atomic bomb was exploded,
outside Alamogordo, New Mexico, on July 16, 1945, to put some kind of harness
on nuclear weaponry. By a miracle of information management, Schlosser has
synthesized a huge archive of material, including government reports,
scientific papers, and a substantial historical and polemical literature on
nukes, and transformed it into a crisp narrative covering more than fifty years
of scientific and political change. And he has interwoven that narrative with a
hair-raising, minute-by-minute account of an accident at a Titan II missile
silo in Arkansas, in 1980, which he renders in the manner of a
techno-thriller…Command and Control is how nonfiction should be written.”
(Louis Menand)
Review of Command and Control by Philip Martin, “Almost Armageddon,” NADG (October 7, 2016), 1E.
Keeping Nuclear Forces at Bay
|
9:26 AM (1 hour ago)
|
|
||
US/SU Nuclear Subs Collide
Matthew Weaver,
“Nuclear-Armed Submarine Collision Off Scotland Kept Secret for 43 Years.” Soviet and US subs near the US naval base at
Holy Loch west of Glasgow. Nukewatch Quarterly (Spring 2017).
MANY FEATURES OF THE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL-CONGRESSIONAL COMPLEX: SAVE THE LEADERS
Raven Rock: The Story of the U.S. Government’s Secret
Plan to Save Itself--While the Rest of Us Die. By Garrett M. Graff. Simon and Schuster, 2017.
The
eye-opening true story of the government’s secret plans to survive and rebuild
after a catastrophic attack on US soil—a narrative that spans from the dawn of
the nuclear age to today.
Every day in Washington, DC, the blue-and-gold 1st Helicopter Squadron, code-named “MUSSEL,” flies over the Potomac River. As obvious as the presidential motorcade, the squadron is assumed by most people to be a travel perk for VIPs. They’re only half right: while the helicopters do provide transport, the unit exists to evacuate high-ranking officials in the event of a terrorist or nuclear attack on the capital. In the event of an attack, select officials would be whisked by helicopters to a ring of secret bunkers around Washington, even as ordinary citizens are left to fend for themselves.
For sixty years, the US government has been developing secret Doomsday plans to protect itself, and the multibillion-dollar Continuity of Government (COG) program takes numerous forms—from its plans to evacuate the Liberty Bell from Philadelphia and our most precious documents from the National Archives to the plans to launch nuclear missiles from a Boeing 747 jet flying high over Nebraska.
In Raven Rock, Garrett Graff sheds light on the inner workings of the 650-acre compound (called Raven Rock) just miles from Camp David, as well as dozens of other bunkers the government built its top leaders during the Cold War, from the White House lawn to Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado to Palm Beach, Florida, and the secret plans that would have kicked in after a Cold War nuclear attack to round up foreigners and dissidents, and nationalize industries.
Equal parts a presidential, military, and political history, Raven Rock tracks the evolution of the government’s plans and the threats of global war from the dawn of the nuclear era through the present day. Relying upon thousands of pages of once-classified documents, as well as original interviews and visits to former and current COG facilities, Graff brings readers through the back channels of government to understand exactly what is at stake if our nation is attacked, and how we’re prepared to respond if it is.
Every day in Washington, DC, the blue-and-gold 1st Helicopter Squadron, code-named “MUSSEL,” flies over the Potomac River. As obvious as the presidential motorcade, the squadron is assumed by most people to be a travel perk for VIPs. They’re only half right: while the helicopters do provide transport, the unit exists to evacuate high-ranking officials in the event of a terrorist or nuclear attack on the capital. In the event of an attack, select officials would be whisked by helicopters to a ring of secret bunkers around Washington, even as ordinary citizens are left to fend for themselves.
For sixty years, the US government has been developing secret Doomsday plans to protect itself, and the multibillion-dollar Continuity of Government (COG) program takes numerous forms—from its plans to evacuate the Liberty Bell from Philadelphia and our most precious documents from the National Archives to the plans to launch nuclear missiles from a Boeing 747 jet flying high over Nebraska.
In Raven Rock, Garrett Graff sheds light on the inner workings of the 650-acre compound (called Raven Rock) just miles from Camp David, as well as dozens of other bunkers the government built its top leaders during the Cold War, from the White House lawn to Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado to Palm Beach, Florida, and the secret plans that would have kicked in after a Cold War nuclear attack to round up foreigners and dissidents, and nationalize industries.
Equal parts a presidential, military, and political history, Raven Rock tracks the evolution of the government’s plans and the threats of global war from the dawn of the nuclear era through the present day. Relying upon thousands of pages of once-classified documents, as well as original interviews and visits to former and current COG facilities, Graff brings readers through the back channels of government to understand exactly what is at stake if our nation is attacked, and how we’re prepared to respond if it is.
OMNI ACTIONS FOR NUCLEAR ABOLITION
OCTOBER 14, 2017, OMNI CELEBRATED THE UN
NUCLEAR BAN TREATY AND ICAN’S NOBEL PEACE PRIZE Arranged by Abel Tomlinson and Dick Bennett
Program at Fayetteville Town Center
Music by Still on the Hill
Talks by Abel Tomlinson, Bill Williams of Bella Vista, and Art
Hobson, Prof. Emer., Physics UAF.
OMNI AGAINST NUCLEAR WEAPONS, OMNI ABOLITION
ADVOCACY
OMNI Actions
Our oldest action, which long preceded the beginning
of OMNI: Annual August Hiroshima/Nagasaki Remembrance. In recent years we have assembled either at
the Fulbright Peace Fountain at UAF or at the Kaminsky Peace Planet at Town
Center.
Nuclear
Age Peace Foundation has been the international facilitator of the MARSHALL
ISLANDS NUCLEAR ZERO LAWSUITS COALITION, of which OMNI is a member. We have corresponded with NAPF, the local
Marshall Islands Consul, and other supporters of the lawsuit. Members of OMNI’s committee include Gladys
Tiffany, Lauren
Hawkins, Terry Michaels, David Orr, Grace Donoho, Karen Madison, Kelly
Mulhollan, Dick
Bennett coordinator
OMNI NEWSLETTERS vs. NUCLEAR WEAPONS
Hiroshima-Nagasaki
(August 6 or 9 and follow-up)
Nuclear
Weapons Abolition
North
Korea
Iran
UN
Nuclear Weapons Abolition Day (June 2)
UN
Nuclear Free Future Month (August)
UN
International Day against Nuclear Tests (Aug. 29)
UN Nuclear
Victims and Survivors Remembrance Day (formerly Nuclear Free and Independent
Pacific Day and Marshall Islands Nuclear Victims Day) (March 1)
AND MORE
RELATED LOCAL ACTIONS
Nuclear Forum / Nuclear Remembrance Day – March 4, 2017
MEI hosted a Nuclear Forum held in conjunction
with Nuclear Remembrance Day in Springdale at the Jones Center on Saturday,
March 4, beginning at 1:00 PM. Nuclear Remembrance Day was commemorated
following the forum at 4:00 PM. Contact albrown.mei@gmail.com for more
information. Marshallese Educational Initiative: Marshall Islands |
Springdale https://www.mei.ngo/
Contents: Nuclear Weapons Abolition Newsletter #22, October 10, 2017 http://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2017/10/nuclear-weapons-abolition-newsletter-22.html
Fayetteville Celebrates Two 2017
Nuclear Abolition Achievements!
United Nations General Assembly
Bans Nuclear Weapons
Slater, 122 Nations Vote Abolition
Gerson, Building the Treaty Globally
Loretz, Analyzes the Treaty
Veterans for Peace, Affirms the Treaty
NAPF, Stop Funding Nuclear Weapons
ICAN Wins Nobel Peace Prize
Celebration!
Jan Oberg, Thanks to the Nobel Committee
Richard Falk, Essay on the Award
Tara John, 5 Reasons Why It Won
Some History Leading to the Ban
Recent US Nuclear Aggression
$1Trillion Upgrade
Burst-height Super-fuze
Ginger, Precursor to Ban, World
Court 1998
Reform: No First Use
Just Foreign Policy
WAND
Organizations: From Reform to Abolition
Reform: Stop the $1 Trillion “Modernizing”
Proliferation
Global Zero
NAPF
CLW
Chomsky
END NUCLEAR WEAPONS ABOLITION NEWSLETTER #23, January 15, 2018
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