LLAW’s All Things Nuclear #698, Sunday, (07/21/2024)

“End Nuclear Insanity Before Nuclear Insanity Ends Humanity”

LLOYD A. WILLIAMS-PENDERGRAFT

JUL 21, 2024

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If Not Now, When?

Donald Trump doesn’t have the character to be president ~ Kamala Harris

LLAW’s NUCLEAR ISSUES & COMMENTS, Sunday, (07/21/2024)

Of course the news today is all about Biden’s withdrawal from his campaign to seek another term as President, and his likely replacement candidate, Kamala Harris, so I leave my comments to wishing her well, and I do believe she can defeat Donald Trump for the job. On her behalf I offer this from my Facebook page on July 7th:

My only words were:

Maybe this is the one?

May be an image of 1 person

As for the nuclear world, the last person on earth to have as our American President would be Donald Trump, and I offer this interesting and well-documented story from yesterday by Lawrence S Wittner for the “Daily Kos”.

About Us

Donald Trump’s Reckless Infatuation with Nuclear Weapons

Lawrence S Wittner, author

by Lawrence S Wittner

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Saturday, July 20, 2024 at 1:15:48p PDT


Over the past decade and more, nuclear war has grown increasingly likely.  Most nuclear arms control and disarmament agreements of the past have been discarded by the nuclear powers or will expire soon.  Moreover, there are no nuclear arms control negotiations underway.  Instead, all nine nuclear nations (Russia, the United States, China, Britain, France, India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea) have begun a new nuclear arms race, qualitatively improving the 12,121 nuclear weapons in existence or building new, much faster, and deadlier ones.  Furthermore, the cautious, diplomatic statements about international relations that characterized an earlier era have given way to public threats of nuclear war, issued by top officials in Russia, the United States, and North Korea

This June, UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned that, given the heightened risk of nuclear annihilation, “humanity is on a knife’s edge.”

This menacing situation owes a great deal to Donald Trump.

As President of the United States, Trump sabotaged key nuclear arms control agreements of the past and the future.  He single-handedly destroyed the INF Treaty, the Iran nuclear agreement, and the Open Skies Treaty by withdrawing the United States from them.  In addition, as the expiration date for the New START Treaty approached in February 2021, he refused to accept a simple extension of the agreement—action quickly countermanded by the incoming Biden administration.  Not surprisingly, Trump was horrified by the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons―a UN-negotiated agreement that banned nuclear weapons, thereby providing the framework for a nuclear-free world.  In 2017, when this vanguard nuclear disarmament treaty was passed by an overwhelming majority of the world’s nations, the Trump administration  proclaimed that the United States would never sign it.

In fact, Trump was far less interested in arms control and disarmament than in entering―and winning―a new nuclear arms race with other nations.  “Let it be an arms race,” he declared in December 2016, shortly after his election victory.  “We will outmatch them at every pass.”  In February 2018, he boasted that his administration was “creating a brand-new nuclear force.  We’re gonna be so far ahead of everybody else in nuclear like you’ve never seen before.”  And, indeed, Trump’s U.S. nuclear “modernization” program―involving the replacement of every Cold War era submarine, bomber, missile, and warhead with an entirely new generation of the deadliest weapons ever invented―acquired enormous momentum during his presidency, with cost estimates running as high as $2 trillion.

Eager to facilitate this nuclear buildup, the Trump administration began to explore a return to U.S. nuclear weapons testing.  Consequently, it announced in 2018 that, although the U.S. government had ended its nuclear tests in 1992 and President Bill Clinton had negotiated and signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1996, Trump would oppose U.S. Senate ratification of the treaty.  The administration also dramatically reduced the time necessary to prepare for nuclear weapons test explosions.  In 2020, senior Trump administration officials reportedly conducted a serious discussion of U.S. government resumption of nuclear testing, leading the House of Representatives, then under Democratic control, to block funding for it.

Though many Americans assumed that a powerful U.S. nuclear arsenal would prevent an outbreak of nuclear war, Trump undermined this wishful thinking by revealing himself perfectly ready to launch a nuclear attack.  During his 2016 presidential campaign, the Republican nominee reportedly asked a foreign policy advisor three times why, if the U.S. government possessed nuclear weapons, it should be reluctant to use them.  The following year, Trump told the governor of Puerto Rico that, “if nuclear war happens, we won’t be second in line pressing the button.”

Indeed, Trump came remarkably close to lunching a nuclear war against North Korea.  In August 2017, responding to provocative comments by Kim Jong Un, Trump warned that further North Korean threats would “be met with fire, fury and frankly power the likes of which this world has never seen before.” 

Trump’s threat of a nuclear attack triggered a rapid escalation of tensions between the two nations.  In a speech before the UN General Assembly that September, Trump vowed to “totally destroy North Korea” if Kim, whom he derisively labeled “Rocket Man,” continued his provocative rhetoric.  Meanwhile, the White House chief of staff, General John Kelly, was appalled by indications that Trump really wanted war and, especially, by the president’s suggestion of using a nuclear weapon against North Korea and, then, blaming the action on someone else.  According to Kelly, the military’s objection that the war would―in the words of Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis “incinerate a couple million people”―had no impact on Trump.  In early 2018, the U.S. president merely upped the ante by publicly boasting that he had a “Nuclear Button” that was “much bigger & more powerful” than Kim’s.

What finally headed off a nuclear war, Kelly recalled, was his appeal to Trump’s “narcissism.”  If Trump could forge a friendly diplomatic relationship with North Korea, the general suggested, the U.S. president would emerge as the “greatest salesman in the world.” And, indeed, Trump did reverse course and embark on a flamboyant campaign to pacify and denuclearize North Korea, remarking that May that “everyone” thought he deserved the Nobel Peace Prize.  Eventually, however, the U.S.-North Korean negotiations, including a much-heralded “summit” between Trump and Kim, resulted in little more than handshakes, North Korea’s continued development of nuclear weapons, and Trump’s return to public threats of nuclear war―this time against Iran.

Given this record, as well as Trump’s all-too-evident mental instability, we have been fortunate that, in a world bristling with nuclear weapons, the world survived his four years in office.

But our good fortune might not last much longer, for Trump’s return to power in 2025 or the recklessness of some other leader of a nuclear-armed nation could unleash unprecedented catastrophe upon the world.

Ultimately, the only long-term security for humanity lies in the global abolition of nuclear weapons and the development of a united world community.

Lawrence S. Wittner (

https://www.lawrenceswittner.com

) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

This article was originally published by The Hill (https://thehill.com/opinion/4755721-trump-nuclear-arms-race/).


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There are 7 categories, with the latest (#7) being a Friday weekly roundup of IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) global nuclear news stories. Also included is a bonus non-nuclear category for news about the Yellowstone caldera and other volcanic and caldera activity around the world that play an important role in humanity’s lives. The feature categories provide articles and information about ‘all things nuclear’ for you to pick from, usually with up to 3 links with headlines concerning the most important media stories in each category, but sometimes fewer and occasionally even none (especially so with the Yellowstone Caldera). The Categories are listed below in their usual order:

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TODAY’S NUCLEAR WORLD’S NEWS, Sunday, (07/21/2024)

All Things Nuclear

NEWS

Iran making strides on aspect of nuclear weapons, US asserts

Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

— Iran is talking more about getting a nuclear bomb and has made … all or any part thereof or for any damages arising from any of the ..

US says Iran moving forward on a key aspect of developing a nuclear bomb

The Economic Times

Two senior Biden administration officials stated on Friday that Iran has been increasingly vocal about acquiring a nuclear bomb and has advanced …

Korea Edges Ahead of Rivals to Build Europe’s Nuclear Reactors – Bloomberg News

Bloomberg News

“Now a bridgehead has been established for us to export nuclear plants to Europe,” Korea’s Trade, Industry and Energy Minister Ahn Duk-geun declared …

Nuclear Power

NEWS

Port Augusta residents weigh in on proposed nuclear power plant | ABC News – YouTube

YouTube

Until recently, nuclear power had been off the table in Australia. However, many communities across the country are now grappling with the …

Korea Edges Ahead of Rivals to Build Europe’s Nuclear Reactors – Energy Connects

Energy Connects

Cooling towers stand at the Dukovany nuclear power plant operated by CEZ AS in Dukovany, Czech Republic, on Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2014. The next …

Safety warnings as cracks rise at Torness nuclear plant – The Ferret

The Ferret

The number of cracks in a nuclear reactor at Torness has risen to 46, prompting warnings that prolonging its operation would be “gambling with …

Nuclear War

NEWS

U.S. ‘Admits’ Having Nearly 2000 Less Nuclear Warheads Than Russia Amid Wars | Report

YouTube

The US declassified its nuclear stockpile data, revealing 3748 active and inactive warheads as of September 2023, slightly down from 2020.

Nato’s road to nuclear annihilation is paved with platitudes of ‘peace’ – Morning Star

Morning Star

BEYOND the fine words about “peace,” “democracy” and “shared values,” what did the recent Nato and European Political Community summits really …

Boeing ‘fighting through challenges’ in building new Air Force One planes | Reuters

Reuters

The head of Boeing’s defense unit said Sunday the planemaker is still “fighting through challenges” in building two delayed U.S. presidential …

Nuclear War Threats

NEWS

Donald Trump’s Reckless Infatuation with Nuclear Weapons – Daily Kos

Daily Kos

Trump’s threat of a nuclear attack triggered a rapid escalation of tensions between the two nations. In a speech before the UN General Assembly that …

The USA is preparing to deploy systems for jamming satellites of the Russian Federation and China

Online.ua

The Pentagon is actively expanding its space warfare capabilities due to the threat posed by Chinese and Russian satellites to American military …

Russia’s Putin orders nuclear weapons drills near Ukraine – MSN

MSN

… threat during the offensive in Ukraine, with Putin frequently invoking Russia’s nuclear doctrine. Non-strategic nuclear weapons, also known as ..

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