Just say ‘no’ to nukes

Good grief! Donald Trump wants to increase U.S. reliance on nuclear weapons and expand the opportunities to use them (The Olympian, Jan. 17). His administration's proposed Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) calls for more “usable” low-yield nuclear weapons that will serve as a credible deterrent against non-nuclear attacks. The official language around nuclear weapons is slippery and euphemistic. “Low yield” suggests a softer sort of weaponry, until you realize that the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were technically low-yield weapons. Any future use of nuclear weapons will no doubt involve more than two low-yield bombs and create mass casualties.

The proposed NPR is appalling. It reverses decades of U.S. and international policy to move away from relying on nuclear weapons and to develop structures for controlling their potential threat. While nuclear arsenals are sharply reduced from Cold War levels, the remaining arsenal is far more than adequate to cause widespread death and destruction, if not end life on earth as we know it.

Almost 40 years ago, Ronald Regan had similar ideas about using nuclear weapons. In response, millions of Americans and people around the world organized to demand a nuclear freeze. Within six years, Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev met to seriously discuss the possibility of eliminating all nuclear weapons.

That same kind of grassroots organizing can work again. You can learn more about these issues from Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility (wpsr.org) and connect with other Washingtonians to reject Trump's ill-advised fascination with nuclear weapons.

This story was originally published January 26, 2018 at 3:31 PM with the headline "Just say ‘no’ to nukes."