Disarmament

Wisdom from First-hand Experience       Proliferation of Arms -- Costly and Dangerous       Military Buildup and Strike-first Policy       Efforts to Change Priorities       Action Alerts!

Wisdom from First-hand Experience

From the early 1950s to the present day, those closest to the military system have spoken loud and clear about its dangers and costs --

President Dwight Eisenhower Supreme Commander, Integrated European Defense Forces, World War II -- From his "cross of iron" speech before the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953 --

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.

The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than thirty cities.... We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than eight thousand people.... This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under a cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."

General George Lee Butler Former Commander-in-Chief of the United States Strategic Air Command -- From his March, 1999 Peace Award Acceptance Speech --

"I recall the words of a wonderful American novelist of the Deep South, Flannery O'Connor, who once put this delicious line in the mouth of one of her characters. "You should know the truth and the truth shall make you odd." ....Truth, in my own case, took me almost 40 years to grasp.... It required 30 years simply to reach the point in my career where I had the responsibilities and, most importantly, the access to information and the exposure to activities and operations that profoundly deepened my grasp of what this business of nuclear capability is all about.

What I have come to believe is that much of what I took on faith was either wrong, enormously simplistic, extraordinarily fragile, or simply morally intolerable.... The amassing of nuclear capability to the level of such grotesque excess as we witnessed between the United States and the Soviet Union over the period of the 50 years of the Cold War was as much a product of fear, and ignorance and greed, and ego and power, and turf and dollars, as it was about the seemingly elegant theories of deterrence."

President Jimmy Carter Former U.S. President and Chairman of the Carter Center -- From "A Nuclear Crisis," The Washington Post, Editorials and Opinions Section, February 23, 2000.

"Now is the time for the 30-year old NPT [nuclear proliferation treaty] to be reviewed (in April, by an international assembly at the United Nations), and, sad to say, the current state of affairs with regard to nuclear proliferation is not good. In fact, I think it can be said that the world is facing a nuclear crisis. Unfortunately, U.S. policy has had a good deal to do with creating it....

Instead of moving away from reliance on nuclear arsenals since the end of the Cold War, both the United States and NATO have sent disturbing signals to other nations by declaring that these weapons are still the cornerstone of Western security, and both have emphasized that they will not comply with a 'no first-use' policy...."

Proliferation of Arms -- Costly and Dangerous

These Presidents' and Generals' quotes allude to some of the grave costs and dangers associated with arms proliferation:

Military Buildup and Strike-first Policy

Military Buildup Even though the U.S. has more to fear from planes becoming bombs and from chemical and biological warfare than from nuclear weapons, President Bush continues to expand a missile defense system (MDS), commonly referred to as Star Wars -- despite analysis that the technology will not work. Worldwide, the United States has the largest military budget. Almost half of the U.S. federal budget is earmarked for current and past defense expenses.

All other discretionary programs -- such as health care, housing, and environmental protection are held to rates below the level of inflation.

Strike-first Policy On September 20, 2002, President Bush declared in an aggressive new national security strategy that the United States will stop any adversary challenging the United States' military superiority and adopt a strike-first policy against terrorist threats. The 35-page document, entitled "The National Security Strategy of the United States of America," marks the end to the deterrent, military strategy that dominated the Cold War and officially shifts the country to a pre-emptive policy.

While pledging to promote democracy and economic openness and to champion human dignity worldwide, the document also states unequivocally that the United States has a right to act on its own. The Bush administration initiated this pre-emptive war against Iraq because of false intelligence about weapons of mass destruction being developed in Iraq.

By ignoring the structures and rules of international law, the United States invites their disintegration. Attacking Iraq further destabilized the Middle East, alienated our allies, and isolated the United States and Britain around the world.

Efforts to Change Priorities

Organizations Numerous voices and campaigns have stepped up efforts to raise the awareness and interest of the U.S. public to the social political, and environmental ramifications of the arms buildup (for example, a dangerous loss of civil liberties) and of a dominant, go-it-alone, superpower approach to world affairs.

United for Peace and Justice, a coalition of groups working for peace, is focused on ending the pre-emptive war against Iraq. Foreign Policy in Focus, an up-to-date "think tank without walls," is "working to make the U.S. a more responsible global leader and global partner."

The National Priorities Project (NPP) "offers citizen and community groups tools and resources to shape federal budget and policy priorities which promote social and economic justice."

David Krieger of Nuclear Age Peace Foundation identifies the nuclear crisis the "most important moral issue of our time." Abolition 2000 is a global network to eliminate nuclear weapons and to stop plans for national defense systems in space.

Action Alerts!

Ways to participate in a disarmament movement are to:

1. Urge Congress to oppose HCR 362, The Ahmadinejad Protection and Promotion Act of 2008. (Talking points about this legislation.)
2. Stop the CIA program of "enhanced interrogation techniques."
3. Lobby Congress to create a U.S. Department of Peace (70 cosponsors as of July 31, 2008).
4. Study (and share with others) War Resister's income tax pie chart and the National Priorities Project's cost of the Iraq war.
5. For in-depth analysis, read Stockholm International Peace Research Institute's 2005 yearbook entitled Armaments, Disarmament and International Security.
6. Reflect on Peacemaking. Read the disarming stories of Thomas E. Trimmer, Rajiv Vora, of Christian Peacemaker Team members, and of Carol Gilbert, OP, and Ardeth Platte, OP.
7. Use and celebrate rituals to disarm your heart and to reflect on peacemaking, trust in God, and the interconnectedness of all of life.
8. Help build a secure world, free of nuclear weapons:
   • Reflect on "At the Crossroads."
   • Ask your members of Congress to support a U.S. ban on landmines

Acknowledgements
Gratitude to General Butler for permission to use his picture and quotes from his speech
and to the following groups for use of their graphics:
Nuclear Age Peace Foundation: General Butler.

Modified August 1, 2008.