Aug. 6 this year marked the 74th anniversary of the U.S. bombing of Hiroshima, Japan, followed three days later by the bombing of Nagasaki, which most historians say led to the end of World War II in the Pacific. In New Haven, Connecticut, the Greater New Haven Peace Council and the city’s peace commission held their annual commemoration of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings on the city’s Green.
Church bells pealed at 8:15 a.m., the exact time of the Hiroshima bombing. After a period of silence, speakers addressed both the historic occasion and more recent developments that have led to a new nuclear arms race. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists runs the so-called Doomsday Clock which has now been set at two minutes to midnight, signifying the publication’s alarm at what they believe to be the “reckless approaches toward nuclear weapons and a growing disregard for the expertise needed to address today’s biggest challenges, most importantly, climate change.”
Between The Lines’ Melinda Tuhus spoke with Henry Lowendorf, chairman of the New Haven Peace Council and member of the executive board of the U.S. Peace Council, about the actions taken by the last three American presidents that has fueled spending on nuclear weapons development, and President Trump’s recent official withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia that was signed by President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987.
HENRY LOWENDORF: The goal of the vigil is to remember what devastation was caused and to call on our government and the people of this country and the world to demand that nuclear weapons be abolished. What we face right now is the opposite of abolition: the U.S. leading an effort to upgrade, modernize, increase its nuclear weapon capacity and capabilities, and other countries that feel threatened by the U.S. following, so we have a new nuclear arms race.
In 2002, President George W. Bush backed out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, a treaty that was signed between the U.S. and the then-Soviet Union, to prevent the development of “Star Wars” – that is, the idea that you can use missiles to knock down missiles. The goal of the ABM was actually to stop a first-strike nuclear attack. And as a result of abolishing that treaty, the U.S. has stationed anti-ballistic missiles on the border of Russia, and the intent is to give the U.S. the ability to strike Russia, knock out most of its nuclear missiles, and those few missiles that remain would be taken out by these anti-missile forces. And that would allow the U.S. to devastate Russia and reign supreme over the whole world.
And then last year, President Trump backed out of the agreement with Iran; it was a multi-lateral agreement with Russia and China and many countries in Europe and the U.S. and Iran that allowed very severe restrictions on Iran’s nuclear development and ability to make a nuclear weapon, even though there was no indication it was trying to do so, this would prevent it in case it did try to. And Iran was abiding by the agreement based on all the evidence from the inspectors, and President Trump backed out of that agreement.
And then just a few days ago, he destroyed another agreement called the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Agreement that prevented Russia and Europe and the U.S. that were so close to the adversary that there would only be a few minutes to decide if you were under attack or if it was a mistake – that your radar, your intelligence, was mistaken. And under the conditions of the knocking out of that treaty and the other treaties, we have moved ever closer to – either by accident or by choice or mistake – a nuclear catastrophe.
BETWEEN THE LINES: Well, let me ask you about the president between those two. I believe President Obama was the one who initiated a multi-billion or – trillion-dollar refurbishment of existing nuclear weapons. I’m not sure about building new ones. Can you talk about that?
HENRY LOWENDORF: Yes. President Obama went to Prague, the Czech Republic, and spoke to a very enthusiastic crowd that we need to abolish nuclear weapons. And everyone in the world cheered that. Then he came home and he initiated a program to spend $1 trillion over 30 years to refurbish, upgrade and make new nuclear weapons for the U.S. So that was the beginning of the new nuclear arms race. I mean when George Bush abrogated the ABM treaty, that was really the beginning, but Obama accelerated it enormously by his decision to do that, and President Trump has accelerated it even more.
BETWEEN THE LINES: Henry Lowendorf, I understand there’s a bill in Congress that would address some of your concerns. Can you talk about that?
HENRY LOWENDORF: HR 302 would restrict the U.S. from launching a first strike, and from allowing the president to solely make a decision on using nuclear weapons. I think it’s a good bill. There’s much more that needs to be done, but we should be supporting that bill and we, in this state, should insist that two senators and our five representatives sign on to that bill – well, it’s a House bill, the five representatives should sign on, and the Senate should have a similar bill.
For more information, visit the US Peace Council at uspeacecouncil.org and Greater New Haven Peace Council at uspeacecouncil.org/
