Some people think that nuclear weapons are less of a danger now that the Cold War has ended. Actually, the danger persists and is getting worse! They are still on hair-trigger alert. The U.S. is building “more usable” nuclear weapons and is threatening to use them.
• After the Cold War ended, the public stopped paying attention. The numbers of nuclear weapons declined, but the U.S. still has a policy of willingness to begin a nuclear war (not merely retaliate), and the nuclear weapons are still on hair-trigger alert. Accidents, miscalculations, and – under Trump – moments of irrational anger can still destroy the world. And now the U.S. is actively provoking a new nuclear arms race!
• On January 26, 2017, Trump’s recklessness about nuclear weapons – and his denial of the climate crisis – caused atomic scientists to move “Doomsday Clock” to only 2 ½ minutes to midnight. The scientists’ statements said that for the first time in the clock’s 70-year history, “the board has decided to act, in part, based on the words of a single person: Donald Trump.” They cited reckless things Trump has been saying since he started campaigning – and also the actions he took during the first few days of his administration. See the article at www.tinyurl.com/h3bajrx One year later, on January 25, 2018, these atomic scientists moved the Doomsday Clock’s hands to only 2 minutes to midnight, the closest ever to global doomsday. See announcement at https://thebulletin.org/sites/default/files/2018%20Doomsday%20Clock%20Statement.pdf
• The article at this link – www.tinyurl.com/yacm3b49 – says, “Trump sees power as military strength – and nukes as the apex of that power.
• But Trump is only the latest (albeit the worst) cause of the bi-partisan post-Cold War nuclear danger. In the winter of 1989-1990 when East Germany collapsed and was going to be reunited with West Germany, the U.S. promised that the U.S.-dominated NATO would not expand “one inch eastward,” and Germany’s unification proceeded. However, the U.S. did indeed expand NATO by bringing many Eastern European nations into the anti-Russia alliance and pushed NATO’s military weapons all the way up to Russia’s border.
• Likewise, the U.S. has been escalating militarism toward China. President Obama’s “Pivot to Asia” is all about threatening China. The U.S. has been encircling both Russia and China with military weapons.
• The U.S. persists with a “first-strike” policy of willingness to begin a nuclear war, rather than merely respond in case we’re attacked. The U.S.’s weapons are designed specifically to aggressively start a nuclear war.
• The U.S. is planning to build ALL new nuclear weapons and ALL new delivery systems (missiles, bombers, submarines, etc.). This is provoking a horribly expensive new nuclear arms race – especially with Russia and China – but the government and news media have failed to adequately inform the public (and taxpayers).
• Some of the new nuclear weapons are being designed to be “more usable” – more likely to start nuclear war.
• Congress remains corrupted by campaign contributions and lobbying by giant corporations that build military weapons. They donate to campaigns and deliberately sub-contract and sub-sub-contract into many congressional districts in order to “buy” the support of Congress members who otherwise would have better sense than to waste money on weapons that can destroy the world.
Connect with the Olympia Coalition to Abolish Nuclear Weapons
We meet monthly to organize a good variety of strategically smart, useful activities.
We reach out to educate and mobilize the public, and we urge the government to abolish nuclear weapons.
Contact us at nuclearweapons@olympiafor.org (360) 705-2407 or (360) 491-9093.
See http://parallaxperspectives.org/category/nuclear-weapons
Our statewide coalition is Washington Against Nuclear Weapons, www.WANWcoalition.org (206) 547-2630.
