The sea of death
US nuclear testing in the Pacific spread radioactive contamination far and wide.
The US conducted 105 atmospheric and underwater tests at its Pacific Ocean proving ground from 1946-1962. Massive amounts of radioactive fallout from those tests spread across the Pacific, causing severe health effects that have continued to this day.
One of the best-known incidents from this reckless and shameful history was the fate of the Japanese fishing boat the Lucky Dragon. Read more…
Watch out world: peace may be breaking out!!
Guest Opinion
by Alice Slater
Less than a week or so before Donald Trump’s groundbreaking meeting planned with Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, to take place after the NATO summit in mid-July, the new Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons celebrated its first birthday on July 7 when 122 nations voted a year ago in the UN General Assembly to ban the bomb, just as we have banned biological and chemical weapons. The new ban treaty shattered the establishment consensus that the proper way to avoid nuclear catastrophe was to follow the endless step by step path of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, now 50 years old this month, which has only led to nuclear weapons forever. Read more…
Getting ready for nuclear war
Although many people have criticized the bizarre nature of Donald Trump’s diplomacy with North Korea, his recent lovefest with Kim Jong Un does have the potential to reduce the dangers posed by nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula.
Even so, buried far below the mass media coverage of the summit spectacle, the reality is that Trump―assisted by his military and civilian advisers―is busy getting the United States ready for nuclear war. Read more…
What we can learn from the North Korea nuclear story
The North Korea – USA nuclear crisis should teach us several lessons regarding nuclear weapons:
- Nuclear weapons do not prevent nuclear proliferation.
The nuclear weapon states accepted in 1970 in the Nuclear Non-proliferation treaty, NPT. In this treaty these states agree to negotiate the complete disarmament of their nuclear weapons. They have completely disregarded this pledge and insist that they must retain nuclear weapons in order to prevent other countries from acquiring them. The North Korea example shows us that this does not work. Read more…
[The national affiliates of IPPNW in France, Germany, and the UK, and IPPNW’s international leadership, have appealed to officials in the three governments to stand by the agreement that they made with Iran on their nuclear program. In a letter to President Macron, Chancellor Merkel, and Prime Minister May, reprinted here, IPPNW has urged the leaders to continue working closely with Iran’s government to ensure the obligations of the agreement continue to be met by all remaining parties to it.]by James Muller and John Pastore
North Korea’s UN ambassador for American affairs, his aide, and the two of us sat around a small circular table at the Mennonite office in New York. Our book on the medical consequences of nuclear war, with its cover picture of a devastated Hiroshima, sat between us. The United Nations building loomed in the background, and the East River beyond it.
We discussed what would happen if a single nuclear bomb exploded over our location in Manhattan: a massive blast and firestorm engulfing most of the city, the crush, the fire, the radiation injuries that would afflict hundreds of thousands, the destruction of the hospitals and deaths of healthcare workers. Read more…
Confessions of a nuclear war planner
It’s not every day that an insider tells us how preparations for nuclear war have been proceeding. So, when one does, it’s worth sitting up and taking notice.
Although Daniel Ellsberg is best-known for his 1971 role in delivering the Pentagon Papers (the Top Secret Defense Department study of U.S. involvement in Vietnam) to the American people, he spent much of his 13-year career as a military analyst at the highest levels of the U.S. national security apparatus grappling with issues of nuclear war. Read more…
Korean sanctions are a humanitarian disaster
[Dr. Mary-Wynne Ashford, a former co-president of IPPNW and Honorary Board Member of Canadian Voice of Women for Peace, gave the following talk in Seoul in May 2018, as part of the event Women Cross the DMZ.]
by Mary-Wynne Ashford
“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times”. Charles Dickens wrote about Paris and London in the French Revolution, but his words echo today for North and South Korea. It is the best of times because there is finally hope for the peaceful reunification of the Korean Peninsula, and hope for an end to sixty-five years of war. Read more…
Peace prospects in Korea
by Mary-Wynne Ashford
Dr. Ashford, third from left, marches with women at the DMZ
In spite of plans for a summit between US President Trump and North Korean Chairman Kim lurching forward and back, in Korea there is a great sense of hope for peace between North and South. In fact two historic events unfolded in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) on May 26th. Read more…
The end of nuclear weapons…or the end of us?
In an important new article published today by the New England Journal of Medicine (The 2017 Nobel Peace Prize and the Doomsday Clock—The End of Nuclear Weapons or the End of Us?), former IPPNW executive director Lachlan Forrow, co-president Tilman Ruff, and Hiroshima survivor Setsuko Thurlow warn that “a nuclear strike remains only a computer malfunction, other human or technical error, or military escalation away.” Read more…
Bimal Khadka
Bjorn Hilt
Charles K. Johnson
Gunnar Westberg
IPPNW
John Loretz
Lawrence Wittner
Maria Valenti
mollymcgint
Sue Wareham
Tilman Ruff
Tim Wright
Xanthe Hall
IPPNW peace and health blog 