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Russian Congress of Intellectuals: An Open Letter to the Russian Leadership

Russian Congress of Intellectuals..An Open Letter to the Russian Leadership.  https://johnmenadue.com/russian-congress-of-intellectuals-an-open-letter-to-the-russian-leadership-february-4-2022/ February 4, 2022, By John Menadue, (letter, signed by a large number of individuals)

Our position is simple: Russia does not need a war with Ukraine and the West. Such a war is devoid of legitimacy and has no moral basis.

There is an ever-increasing flow of alarming news about a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine. Reports are emerging about stepped-up recruitment of mercenaries within Russia and the transfer of fuel and military equipment to Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions. In response, Ukraine is arming itself and NATO is sending additional forces into Eastern Europe. The tension is not abating, but rather mounting.

Russian citizens are becoming de facto hostages of a reckless adventurism that has come to typify Russia’s foreign policy. Not only must Russians live with the uncertainty of whether a large-scale war will begin, but they are also experiencing a sharp rise in prices and a devaluation of their currency. Is this the sort of policy Russians need? Do they want war—and are they ready to bear the brunt of it? Have they authorized the authorities to play with their lives in this way?

But no one asks Russian citizens for their opinion. There is no public debate. State television presents only a single viewpoint—that of the warmongers. Direct military threats, aggression and hatred are aimed at Ukraine, the US, and the West. But the most dangerous thing is that the war is being depicted not only as permissible, but as inevitable. This is an attempt to deceive the population, to impose upon them the idea of waging a crusade against the West, rather than investing in the country’s development and improving living standards. The cost of the conflict is never discussed, but the price—the huge, bloody price—will be paid by the common Russian people.

We, responsible citizens and patriots of Russia, appeal to Russia’s political leadership. We openly and publicly call out the Party of War that has been formed within the government.

We represent the viewpoint of those in Russian society who reject war, who consider unlawful the use of military threats and the deployment of a blackmailing style in foreign policy.

We reject war, whereas you, the Party of War, consider it acceptable. We stand for peace and prosperity for all Russian citizens, whereas you put our lives on the line for the sake of political games. You deceive and manipulate people, whereas we tell them the truth. You do not speak in the name of the Russian population—we do. For decades, the Russian people, who lost millions of lives in past wars, have lived by the saying: “if only there were no war.” Have you forgotten this?

Our position is quite simple. Russia does not need a war with Ukraine and the West. No one is threatening us, no one is attacking us. Policies based on the idea of such a war are immoral and irresponsible and must not be conducted in the name of the Russian people. Such a war is devoid of legitimacy and has no moral basis. Russian diplomacy should take no other position than a categorical rejection of such a war.

Not only does such a war not reflect Russia’s interests, but it also threatens the country’s very existence. The senseless actions of the country’s political leadership, which is pushing us in this direction, will inevitably lead to a mass anti-war movement in Russia. Each of us will naturally play a part in it.

We will do everything in our power to prevent this war, and if it begins, to stop it.

Signed,

Continue reading →

February 12, 2022 Posted by | Russia, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Furthest from Ukraine frontline, Washington is most eager for war

Washington intends to instigate wars, in a bid to increase the legitimacy of NATO’s existence and the bloc’s internal cohesion to tie Europe – which has shown some signs of departing from Washington – more tightly to the US. Some other analysts say the US can take the opportunity to sell arms – a reasonable suspicion based on history. 

Furthest from Ukraine frontline, Washington is most eager for war: Global Times editorial, By Global Times, Feb 07,   US President Joe Biden recently approved the deployment of 3,000 US troops to the eastern part of Europe. The first batch has arrived in Germany and Poland. This is an eye-offending move the US made after it withdrew its troops from Afghanistan and Iraq. The Pentagon previously announced that 8,500 US troops are placed on heightened alert to possibly deploy to Eastern Europe. In addition, NATO defense ministers will discuss further reinforcements at their next meeting on February 16 and 17. Although these troops are not deployed directly in Ukraine, the move has de facto made people think Eastern Europe is on the brink of war.

Washington, it must be noted, is furthest away from the Ukrainian frontline but it is most eager for a war, while both Russia and Ukraine have repeatedly announced they have no intention of going to war or solving their problems by force. Ukraine’s president and defense minister publicly stated that the situation is not as tense as the US has portrayed. But Washington, which is far away from the region, has been hyping that war is on the verge of breaking out. US media Bloomberg has even released fake news that “Live: Russia Invades Ukraine.” The US has not only fanned the flames of public opinion, but also provided arms to Ukraine and enhanced military deployment around the European country. The US’ intention is to urge Ukraine to “hold on” and not “fall behind” in its confrontation with Russia.

Washington intends to instigate wars, in a bid to increase the legitimacy of NATO’s existence and the bloc’s internal cohesion to tie Europe – which has shown some signs of departing from Washington – more tightly to the US. Some other analysts say the US can take the opportunity to sell arms – a reasonable suspicion based on history. 

In short, the US is trying to hit various birds with one stone, but it is playing an immoral and dangerous game. The New York Times reported that “even many reliably hawkish voices in both parties show no appetite for seeing US troops fight and potentially die for Ukraine.” The US is pushing Ukraine into the firing line, but it itself has jumped aside to avoid being implicated.

One of Washington’s aims is to make Russia feel uncomfortable, but Ukraine is very likely to become the victim. Anyone with a discerning eye can figure out that the last thing Ukraine really needs is arms. The US’ donating or selling weapons to Ukraine cannot change the military balance between Russia and Ukraine. What Ukraine does need is a peaceful and stable internal and external environment. The country has to focus on developing its economy, improving people’s livelihoods, and easing tensions with Russia. If the US “stands with Ukraine” as it has claimed, it should have provided Ukraine the necessary and substantial help in these fields. It needs to be underlined that the most difficult thing for Ukraine to withstand right now is to add fuel to the fire, but Washington has repeatedly “created” opportunities to escalate the situation between Russia and Ukraine.

……………. the China-Russia joint statement stated clearly: “Peace, development and cooperation lie at the core of the modern international system… and the international community is showing a growing demand for the leadership aiming at peaceful and gradual development.” 
Against this backdrop, Washington still intends to impair other countries and maintain its hegemony by instigating wars. This is a staggering geopolitical daydream. To wake up from such a pipe dream, the bunch of political elites in Washington should carefully read this joint statement and understand how to make the US conform to the trend of the times and become a truly responsible power. https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202202/1251577.shtml

February 12, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | 1 Comment

Amid Ukraine Tension, US Deploys Nuclear-Ready B-52 Bombers to UK

Amid Ukraine Tension, US Deploys Nuclear-Ready B-52 Bombers to UK “The West is trying to make a tragedy out of this,” said Russia’s foreign minister. Common Dreams, JULIA CONLEY February 11, 2022  Despite repeated warnings from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that the U.S. is  driving the rise of tensions at Ukraine’s eastern border, the U.S. Air Force has deployed four B-52 bombers with nuclear capabilities to the U.K., where one official acknowledged that the deployment is at least partially connected to Russia’s recent military activities.

Two B-52 Stratofortress aircrafts arrived at Royal Air Force Fairford on Thursday, with two more following. The bombers integrated with other NATO members’ forces en route to Fairford, according to the Air Force, including “British Typhoon aircraft and Portuguese F-16s currently assigned to NATO’s Icelandic Air Policing mission.”………

According to The Telegraph, a former British intelligence official noted that the Pentagon could launch air strikes from Fairford as it has before.

“From Fairford they could operate against a range of targets: troop concentrations in southern Russia and Belarus, Moscow/St. Petersburg, even the naval bases in the White Sea,” the former official told the outlet. “In 1991 they hit Baghdad from Fairford, flew on to Diego Garcia, refueled and rearmed, bombed Baghdad again on the way back, and returned to Fairford.”

The bombers sent from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota are capable of carrying precision-guided and nuclear weapons……………………………..   https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/02/11/amid-ukraine-tension-us-deploys-nuclear-ready-b-52-bombers-uk

February 12, 2022 Posted by | UK, weapons and war | 1 Comment

Comfortably numb — Beyond Nuclear International

When we will wake up to the real threat we face?

Comfortably numb — Beyond Nuclear International “Hello? (Hello? Hello? Hello?)
“Is there anybody in there?
Just nod if you can hear me
Is there anyone home?”

Those echoing opening lines of the Pink Floyd song, “Comfortably Numb” keep wafting through my psyche as I watch the US, Russia, and China, amass ever more sophisticated, deadly and downright evil nuclear weapons capabilities. What are they thinking?

Meanwhile, tensions continue to mount at the Ukraine-Russia border, as Putin moves more armaments and fleets around and the US flies its elite 82nd Airborne Division into standby mode in Poland, part of 3,000 US troops now deployed to the region. 

All of this has sent US nuclear hawks, sounding more and more like General ‘Buck’ Turgidson from Dr. Strangelove, chafing at the bit to justify the further escalation and acceleration of the so-called modernization of the entire US nuclear weapons complex.

Meanwhile, there is even speculation that maybe Ukraine should not have given up its nuclear weapons at the end of the Cold War as the Soviet Union collapsed. The Russian seizure of Crimea and the seemingly endless conflict on Ukraine’s eastern border has led some to urge a Ukraine nuclear rearmament. 

A nuclear-armed Ukraine, goes the logic, would allow it to “deter” a Russian invasion or, at least, any possible use of nuclear weapons by Russia in a grab for Ukraine.

But this thinking further exposes the hollow argument for deterrence. Nuclear weapons in Ukraine would have only one outcome — they would make the prospect of nuclear weapons being used in any current conflict more likely. (Then, of course, there is the ever-present danger of Ukraine’s 15 operating nuclear reactors — addressed in a January 30, 2022 article on these pages.)

The prospect that even a conventional conflict could break out in Ukraine is already horrific enough. But even the remotest possibility that this could progress to the use of nuclear weapons by any party, is positively nightmarish. 

If you don’t value sleep, then Ira Helfand’s article in The Nation lays all of this out in chilling detail. It’s like reading the script to an apocalyptical dystopian horror movie (the kind that sadly seems to be all too popular these days).

Helfand’s article, however, is the exception to most of the coverage, which discusses the prospect of accidental or deliberate nuclear war over the Ukraine situation in a mind-bogglingly impassive way, “comfortably numb” to the very real, horrific, humanitarian consequences were this actually to happen.

It’s as if, as IPPNW’s Chuck Johnson said to me during a recent phone call, “it’s all perfectly normal”. 

But to most of us regular folk, calmly anticipating the possibility of a nuclear war isn’t normal. It’s the definition of insanity. And it’s exasperating. Hello? Can you hear us? We have a climate crisis bearing down on us. A global emergency of, yes, apocalyptic proportions. 

It goes without saying that, as a species, we need to stop directing all our energies towards our collective extinction, both through our failure to act adequately and on time on climate, and by unnecessarily rattling nuclear sabres.

It goes without saying, but it needs saying. Again and again and really loudly. By all of us. Just nod if you can hear me.

Linda Pentz Gunter is the international specialist at Beyond Nuclear and writes for and curates Beyond Nuclear International.

February 10, 2022 Posted by | media, Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

UK’s nuclear submarine graveyard- but one is to be recycled – perhaps for Australia?

The first vessel that’s going to be recycled from the so-called ‘submarine graveyard’ in Devonport has been named – but there’s no word yet on when it’ll actually happen. The last one was decommissioned in 1980 – but thirteen of them remain tied up there. HMS Valiant will be the first to be recycled – but no date’s been set for that yet.  Planet Radio 9th Feb 2022

Planet Radio 9th Feb 2022

https://planetradio.co.uk/greatest-hits/devon/news/nuclear-submarine-recycled-devonport/

February 10, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

India’s Nuclear Weapons Could Kill Millions Of People- a matter of pride?

What’s a few million dead. compared to national pride?

India’s Nuclear Weapons Could Kill Millions Of People, Caleb Larson, 7 Feb 22, India might be the nuclear weapons state many military analysts forget about. Nonetheless, New Delhi could start a nuclear war within just mere minutes: India’s indigenously developed technology—and a lot of Russian hardware and help—all keep Pakistan and China at bay.

No First Use. An NFU policy essentially constitutes a promise, backed by a survivable nuclear arsenal, to only use nuclear weapons in response to a nuclear attack,” explained a Carnegie publication. “The logic is simple and effective: you don’t nuke me, and I won’t nuke you. India and China both have declared no-first-use policies, whereas Pakistan and the United States, among others, do not rule out the first use of nuclear weapons in a conflict.”

Despite India’s formidable nuclear arsenal, India had since 2003 maintained it will not use said weapons of mass destruction first, but strictly in a retaliatory manner for deterrence.

However, 2019, India called their no first use policy into question when Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said that “Till today, our nuclear policy is ‘no first use’. What happens in future depends on the circumstances.” This curious statement is perhaps an example of deliberate strategic ambiguity.

Triad

India maintains a nuclear triad—that is a three-pronged nuclear weapon delivery system that utilizes a diverse array of means for delivering nuclear payload on target. New Delhi has air-launched nuclear missiles, land-based nuclear missiles, and most recently submarine-launched missiles……………….  https://www.19fortyfive.com/2022/02/indias-nuclear-weapons-could-kill-millions-of-people/

February 8, 2022 Posted by | India, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Can Space Tourism Co-exist with Space being turned into a War Zone?

Can Space Tourism Co-exist with Space being turned into a War Zone?, By Karl Grossman, Space 4 Peace, Presented at the Space Tourism: Legal Dimensions Conference, 29 January 2022

The push to turn space into a war zone could spell goodbye to space tourism. The space tourism drive that is underway, led by billionaires Jeff Bezos with his Blue Origin company, Richard Branson and his Virgin Galactic, and Elon Musk and his SpaceX operation, is seen as only a start. As Dylan Taylor wrote in 2021 on www.space.com in an article headed “The Future of space tourism,” it’s a “a growing market expected to be worth at least $3 billion by 2030.” Space.com identified Taylor as an “entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist” and “cofounding patron of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation.” https://www.space.com/future-of-space-tourism-op-ed……………………………

Meanwhile, there’s the push, led by the United States, to turn space into a war zone—and this, despite the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 that sets space aside for peaceful purposes.

As then U.S. President Donald Trump declared in 2018 as he advocated for formation of a U.S. Space Force, “it is not enough to merely have an American presence in space. We must have American dominance in space.”  https://www.space.com/40921-trump-space-traffic-policy-american-leadership.html

The following year, he signed the National Defense Authorization Act of 2020 establishing the Space Force as the sixth branch of U.S. armed forces and said: “Space is the world’s newest warfighting domain.” The Space Force, Trump said, would “help” the U.S. “control the ultimate high ground.” https://www.space.com/trump-creates-space-force-2020-defense-bill.html

Then, at the unveiling of a Space Force flag at the White House, Trump said: “Space is going to be…the future, both in terms of defense and offense.” https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-unveils-space-force-flag-ceremony-says-space-future-n1208021

Trump’s successor, U.S. President Joe Biden, has not rolled back the U.S. Space Force………………….

As to the impacts of war in space, Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, in an interview in 2021 related the projection of the late Edgar Mitchell, in 1971 the sixth U.S. astronaut to walk on the moon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ow8c7LbPvuI&feature=youtu.be

Gagnon said:

In 1989 during one of our campaigns against NASA plutonium launches [NASA’s launching of plutonium-powered space probes], we had a rally at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and our keynote speaker that day was Apollo astronaut Edgar Mitchell, one of the moonwalkers. And he came and said if there is one war in space, it’ll be the one and the only. He said because we will create so much space debris or space junk from all the destroyed satellites and things like that in space that there would literally be a minefield encircling the planet – he called it a piranha-laced river—and we would not be able to get through. A rocket would not be able to get off this Earth through that minefield. So, it’s insane to think about having a war in space.

Gagnon has also spoken of how space warfare would “mean activity on Earth below would immediately shut down—cell phones, ATM machines, cable TV, traffic lights, weather prediction and more—all hooked up to satellites, would be lost. Modern society would go dark.” https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/12/18/the-very-bad-space-force-deal/

Also pointing to the generation of space debris resulting from warfare in space was Alexander Chanock in section titled “Problems With Weaponizing Space” in an article published in 2013 in Journal of Air Law and Commerce titled “The Problems and Potential Solutions Related to the Emergence of Space Weapons in the 2lst Century.” https://scholar.smu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1327&context=jalc

Chanock, then a candidate for a law degree, now a legislative counsel in the U.S. House of Representatives, wrote that a major problem “is the amount of space debris that space weapons would produce….The fear is that destroying in space could generate extremely dangerous debris with a long orbital life.”

Chanock quoted Dr. Joel Primack, professor of physics and astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and “one of the premier experts on space debris, noted Chanock, as saying “the weaponization of space would make the debris problem much worse, and even one war in space could encase the entire planet in a shell of whizzing debris that would thereafter make space near the Earth highly hazardous for peaceful as well as military purposes.”……………………

U.S. interest in war in space has deep roots: back to the former Nazi rocket scientists and engineers brought to the U.S. from Germany after World War II under the U.S.’s Operation Paperclip. They ended up at the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama—to use “their technological expertise to help create the U.S. space and weapons program,” wrote Jack Manno, a professor of environmental studies at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science & Forestry, in his 1984 book Arming the Heavens: The Hidden Military Agenda for Space, 1945-1995. https://www.abebooks.com/9780396082118/Arming-heavens-hidden-military-agenda-0396082114/plp

“Many of the early space war schemes were dreamt up by scientists working for the German military, scientists who brought their rockets and their ideas to America after the war,” he wrote. Many of these scientists and engineers “later rose to positions of power in the U.S. military, NASA, and the aerospace industry.” Among them were “Wernher von Braun and his V-2 colleagues” who began “working on rockets for the U.S. Army,” and at the Army’s Redstone Arsenal “were given the task of producing an intermediate range ballistic range missile to carry battlefield atomic weapons up to 200 miles. The Germans produced a modified V-2 renamed the Redstone….Huntsville became a major center of U.S. space military activities.”

Manno told the story of former German Major General Walter Dornberger, who had been in charge of the entire Nazi rocket program, and how he “in 1947 as a consultant to the U.S Air Force and adviser to the Department of Defense…wrote a planning paper for his new employers. He proposed a system of hundreds of nuclear-armed satellites all orbiting at different altitudes and angles, each capable or reentering the atmosphere on command from Earth to proceed to its target. The Air Force began early work on Dornberger’s idea under the acronym NABS (Nuclear Armed Bombardment Satellites).”……………………………………..

This is pessimistic forecast need not be. The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 was—and is—a visionary documentary. “Let Us Beat Our Swords Into Plowshares” is the title of a statue by Evgeniy Vutetich in the sculpture garden of the UN in New York. It is based on the Book of Isaiah and its call that nations “shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

War on Earth is terrible enough. It must not be brought up to the heavens.

This will take continued take political will and international pressure—to preserve and extend the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and its setting aside space for peaceful purposes. Especially in the United States, this will require action at the grassroots because the two major political parties in the U.S. have joined in a bellicose stance on space, supporting it becoming a war zone. Every year, the grassroots organization Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, founded in Washington, D.C. in 1991 and the leading group internationally challenging the weaponization of space, holds a “Keep Space For Peace Week” with actions around the world. Meanwhile, there are nations around the globe that have, unlike the U.S., adopted a peaceful stance—as reflected in their support for the proposed PAROS treaty.

We must, indeed, keep space for peace.

Can space tourism co-exist with space being turned into a war zone? The answer is no.

And with a shooting war in space, it will not only space tourism that would be kissed goodbye. http://space4peace.org/can-space-tourism-co-exist-with-space-being-turned-into-a-war-zone/

February 7, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, technology, weapons and war | Leave a comment

As Ukraine Crisis Raises Specter of Nuclear War, Veterans Call for Disarmament and Peace.

As Ukraine Crisis Raises Specter of Nuclear War, Veterans Call for Disarmament and Peace,  https://www.laprogressive.com/veterans-call-for-disarmament/    Gerry Condon, 5 Feb 22, The US/NATO showdown with Russia over Ukraine is a stark reminder of how close the world is to a possible nuclear war.  The one-sided reporting in the U.S. media, with little historical context, is what we see whenever the U.S. is getting ready to go to war.  The lack of any meaningful opposition in Congress, even from supposed progressive Democrats, is alarming.  Are there no adults in the room? 

Is President Biden a captive of the neocons and their patrons in the weapons-of-mass-destruction industry?  Is the tail wagging the dog?  No wonder the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists is maintaining its Doomsday Clock at only 100 seconds from midnight. 

We can hope that quiet diplomacy taking place in the background will overshadow the stubborn public refusal to acknowledge Russia’s understandable security concerns.  Can you imagine the U.S. response if Russia was positioning missile systems and troops in Canada or Mexico? 

Given that the U.S. and Russia possess the lion’s share of nuclear weapons – over 6,000 each – the world will breathe a collective sigh of relief if war is avoided. But how long before the next crisis? Is the world really safer with nuclear “deterrence” (aka “mutually assured destruction”)?

The Pentagon is currently putting its finishing touches on the Biden Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review.  Rumors are that it will not reflect President Biden’s stated goal of reducing the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. security defense strategy.  It will not call for the U.S. to adopt a policy of No First Use of nuclear weapons.  It will not call for the U.S. to sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. It will not call on the U.S. to adhere to its obligations under the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which require it to negotiate in good faith to reduce and eventual eliminate all nuclear weapons.

Veterans For Peace has therefore stepped up to provide its own Nuclear Posture Review, one that abandons the policy of full spectrum dominance and replaces it with full spectrum cooperation. 

“Veterans are all too familiar with the horrible costs of war,” says retired Marine Corps Major Ken Mayers, who serves on the Board of Veterans For Peace.  “It is appropriate that military veterans are standing up for nuclear disarmament and peace.”

The Veterans For Peace document reviews the U.S. posture toward each of the nuclear-armed states, plus Iran, which has no nuclear weapons.  The veterans call on the U.S. to take immediate steps to reduce the risk of accidental nuclear war, such as implementing a No First Use policy and taking nuclear missiles off hair trigger alert.  It calls on the U.S. to sign the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

“If the United States takes the first steps toward eliminating nuclear weapons, other nuclear-armed states will follow,” says Ken Mayers of Veterans For Peace. “This is the kind of leadership that the people of the world want to see today.”

The Veterans For Peace Nuclear Posture Review contains sixteen specific proposals for reducing the risk of nuclear war and building momentum for nuclear disarmament.  Veterans For Peace is sending it to President Biden, to Vice President Kamala Harris, and to every Member of Congress.

The current crisis over Ukraine demonstrates what a dangerously unstable world we are living in today. The elimination of nuclear weapons must go hand-in-hand with non-intervention in the internal affairs of other nations, as called for in the UN Charter.  If we prioritize mutual respect among all peoples, we can survive the current crisis and avoid a future war that could literally destroy human civilization.

February 7, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Kazakhstan calls on CANWFZ states parties to join Treaty on Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons 

Kazakhstan calls on CANWFZ states parties to join Treaty on Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons    https://www.inform.kz/en/kazakhstan-calls-on-canwfz-states-parties-to-join-treaty-on-prohibition-of-nuclear-weapons_a3895288  4 February 2022

NUR-SULTAN. KAZINFORM – The Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan, Akan Rakhmetullin, held a meeting with the ambassadors of the States Parties to the Treaty on a Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in Central Asia (CAWFZ Treaty), accredited in Nur-Sultan, Kazinform has learnt from the press service of the Kazakh Foreign Affairs Ministry.

During the meeting, the Kazakh diplomat, taking into account the existing relations of friendship and brotherhood, called on the partners from the Nuclear-Weapon-Free zone in Central Asia to become parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) and thereby make a significant contribution to strengthening international security.

Rakhmetullin noted that participants of Nuclear-Weapon-Free zones around the world are at the forefront of the nuclear disarmament process. He stressed that the main goals and objectives of establishing Nuclear-Weapon-Free zones are in line with the spirit and principles of the TPNW. Moreover, the obligations that a State Party to the TPNW must undertake are already being fulfilled by the participants in the CANWFZ. Thus, a State Party to the CANWFZ Treaty can join the TPNW without undertaking additional substantive obligations. This is evidenced by a comparative analysis prepared by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN).

Kazakhstan, as a staunch supporter of nuclear disarmament, took an active part in the United Nations conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination. Today, our country, together with other parties to the Treaty under the chairmanship of Austria, is preparing for the First Meeting of the States Parties to the TPNW in Vienna. At the initiative of Kazakhstan and Kiribati, as the countries most affected by nuclear tests, a working paper on positive obligations under the TPNW providing for measures to rehabilitate the population and the environment exposed to radiation contamination after nuclear tests was developed and supported by the presiding party.

On January 22, 2021, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) entered into force. On March 2, 2018, Kazakhstan signed the TPNW, becoming the 57th country to sign this historic document. On August 29, 2019, Kazakhstan handed over the instrument of ratification of the TPNW to the depositary – the UN Secretary General. Our country is the first and so far the only State Party of the CANWFZ that has joined the TPNW.

February 5, 2022 Posted by | Kazakhstan, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

 North Korea isn’t going to give up nuclear weapons, but that’s not a crisis


Dyer: North Korea isn’t going to give up nuclear weapons, but that’s not a crisis   https://lfpress.com/opinion/columnists/dyer-north-korea-isnt-going-to-give-up-nuclear-weapons-but-thats-not-a-crisis Gwynne Dyer  Postmedia News, Feb 04, 2022 “They want to have a deterrence system that is like a scorpion’s tail,” said Prof. Kim Dong Yup, a former South Korean naval commander. “North Korea’s main purpose is not to attack but to defend themselves.” They want a “diversified deterrent capability,” adds Kim — and who could blame them?

North Korea’s missile tests are a welcome distraction from the daily warnings of an imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine, and even less likely to end in a war. North Korea test-fired seven different missiles in a month, U.S. President Joe Biden retaliated with more sanctions against Kim Jong-un’s hermit state, and everybody got their war horses out for a brisk trot around the track.

The reality, however, is nobody in a position of authority is in the least excited by this little back-and-forth.

The media speculate about whether North Korea’s tests are meant to influence the upcoming South Korean elections or to lure Biden into a Trump-style summit, but the likeliest motive is just what Prof. Kim said it is: a desire to demonstrate the efficiency of North Korea’s missiles. You know, the ones that carry North Korea’s nuclear weapons.

Pyongyang hasn’t tested any nuclear weapons since 2017, but it is believed to have 50 to 60 warheads. Neither has it test-launched its intercontinental ballistic missiles (the ones that can reach anywhere in the United States) since then. The January tests were of hypersonic missiles, intermediate-range missiles, cruise missiles and similar hardware.

Most of those missiles can probably carry nuclear warheads, but only as far as South Korea or Japan, America’s local allies. It’s a formidable investment for a small, quite poor country, but it’s not that extravagant when you consider all these nukes are intended to deter the United States.

No American diplomat or military officer will admit publicly that North Korea’s fear of an American nuclear attack is justified, but the more intelligent ones realize the rules of nuclear deterrence are the same for democratic superpowers and dwarf tyrannies. If your enemy has nuclear weapons, then to be safe you must have them, too.

From the perspective of Pyongyang, American nuclear weapons are a mortal threat, and nobody can persuade the North Korean regime they would never be used against it unless it attacked first. Americans wouldn’t forgo nuclear weapons if China and Russia made such promises, nor would they take America’s word for it. Too much is at stake to take a chance.

This is the universal dilemma of nuclear weapons. North Korea has just as much right to worry about it as the United States, and it will never give its nukes up so long as the confrontation in the Korean peninsula persists (71 years and counting).

Any meetings between U.S. and North Korean diplomats or leaders will be driven by North Korea’s perpetual desire to end UN and U.S. trade sanctions and/or America’s futile quest to get Kim to agree to unilateral nuclear disarmament. Neither is going to happen, but there is no crisis either.

The North Korean regime is vicious, but it is not crazy. A reasonably stable cold peace has prevailed in the peninsula since the end of the Korean War in 1953, guaranteed since the first North Korean nuclear test in 2006 by mutual nuclear deterrence between the U.S. and North Korea. There’s no urgent need to fix it.

The United States cannot bring itself to publicly acknowledge this fact, but the Pentagon and the State Department privately accept it is the long established reality of the U.S.-N.K. relationship.

“They very much understand the significance of moving up the ladder on range,” a senior Biden administration official said on Sunday, implicitly recognizing the North Koreans had not tested any new missiles capable of striking the American homeland.

There really is a mutual understanding. They just can’t talk about it.

February 5, 2022 Posted by | politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

America’s military leaders reassure their staff ”We will win a nuclear war!”

US defense to its workforce: Nuclear war can be won, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, By Alan Kaptanoglu, Stewart Prager | February 2, 2022  Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev once said that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought,” and five major nuclear weapon states, including the United States, repeated this statement earlier this year. Yet many in the US defense establishment—the military, government, think tanks, and industry—promote the perception that a nuclear war can be won and fought.

Moreover, they do so in a voice that is influential, respected, well-funded, and treated with deference. The US defense leadership’s methodical messaging to its workforce helps shape the views of this massive, multi-sector constituency that includes advocates, future leaders, and decision makers. It advances a view of nuclear weapon policies that intensifies and accelerates the new nuclear arms race forming between the United States, China, and Russia.


The 23-chapter Guide to Nuclear Deterrence in the Age of Great Power Competition provides an excellent and representative case study for examining this critical messaging. This guide is published by the Louisiana Tech Research Institute, which provides support for the US Air Force Global Strike Command. It is written by nuclear arms experts for the approximately 30,000 members of the US Air Force Global Strike Command and the “700,000 total force airmen who engage in the profession of arms.”

All of the authors have direct or indirect connections with the nuclear weapons complex or associated think tanks, and several of the authors have held senior positions with the Air Force Global Strike Command, US Strategic Command, and other national security agencies in the US government. The guide’s messaging is comprehensive but dangerously skewed.

The guide centers around a new reality—the aggressive development of nuclear arms by Russia and China that is intensifying a new Cold War. Nuclear arms treaties—an important tool for limiting arms races—are brushed aside as functionally pointless since, according to the guide, Russia will cheat and China won’t come to the bargaining table.   In one passage, the guide claims “it is unlikely that these countries would be foolish enough to engage in a strategic arms race with the United States, and, if they do, they will lose.” Yet much of the remainder of the document analyzes all the ways in which China and Russia are advancing their capabilities beyond US capabilities. These threatening developments are then used to justify the rapid and expensive modernization of the US nuclear weapon complex, while many historic nuclear arms agreements wither away, including the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, and the Iran nuclear deal.

What follows are some of the misrepresentations, an omission, and a questionable policy in the guide:

Misrepresentation: A nuclear war can be fought and won. That the US military considers scenarios under which nuclear deterrence fails is unsurprising. But in the event of limited nuclear war, the United States has plans in place to “beat” its adversaries. …………………

Omission: The reality of nuclear war. In this more-than-400 page guide, only three pages are devoted to a rather anodyne description of the devastating harms of nuclear weapons. ………..

The guide does not mention the well-documented human toll of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The guide does not discuss the full horrors of the “day after” a nuclear exchange. Nor does it address the potentially civilization-ending effects of climate change and nuclear winter from the resulting firestorms. …………………

Misrepresentation: Nuclear weapons keep the peace. The guide credits nuclear weapons and US nuclear superiority with the era of “long peace”—the absence of major wars between superpowers since 1945. As such, it posits that, the more US nuclear weapons, the better……………… 

The guide does not note that the world came very close to a potentially catastrophic nuclear exchange during the Cuban Missile Crisis. It singularly portrays US nuclear weapons as a benefit for humankind.

Misrepresentation: Nuclear weapon mistakes and accidents never happen. Indeed, the guide does not mention the many well-documented false-alarms and close calls of nuclear detonation from technical or human error that could have led to catastrophe. It does not acknowledge the dangers posed by the imperfect humans who control the nuclear weapons and infrastructure. It does not mention that intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) crew members were caught cheating on exams or that the Joint Chiefs’ of Staff unanimously recommended an invasion of Cuba during the missile crisis. Nor is there mention of the harms caused by nuclear testing to many communities.

The guide portrays the United States as if it is in perfect control of its nuclear weapons operations.

Questionable policy: A nuclear triad is necessary. The guide argues strenuously that the United States would be less secure without all three legs of its nuclear triad consisting of warhead-equipped submarines, aircraft, and land-based missiles…………………

Lastly, this scenario assumes that NATO allies would not bother to use any of their several hundred nuclear warheads after an adversary destroys a significant portion of the US homeland.

The guide dismisses critiques of the ICBM force, including the accompanying launch-on-warning and use-them-or-lose-them postures that increase the danger of accidental nuclear war.

The authors seek perpetual US nuclear superiority. They dismiss the option of minimal deterrence—keeping only a minimal complement of nuclear weapons primarily to provide a second-strike capability—as not viable. According to the guide, the United States must not only possess a second-strike capability but the potential to fight and win a limited nuclear war against any adversary. ……………..

 To be clear, the authors are considering a scenario in which at least several hundred nuclear weapons have been used on both the US and adversary’s homeland. Hundreds of millions of people are likely dead, modern civilization might have collapsed, and nuclear winter might soon starve another few billion people. What exactly is worth bargaining for in this scenario?

Finally, the guide notes that “[t]he United States has never been content with a mere second-strike capability.” In this context, “[t]he United States” appears to refer primarily to US military and government institutions; the majority of the US public favors a minimal deterrence policy, and an overwhelming majority support the phasing out of ICBMs, according to a recent poll.

…………….  defense messaging justifies a vigorous and expanding nuclear arms force, exceptionalizes the United States, and blames downsides on Russia and China. If service members received more thoughtful messaging about nuclear deterrence and preparedness, their efforts to think critically might help them understand—in the profound ways that Reagan and Gorbachev once understood—that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.”  https://thebulletin.org/2022/02/us-defense-to-its-workforce-nuclear-war-can-be-won/

February 4, 2022 Posted by | spinbuster, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Raytheon and Lockheed Martin boast to investors that Ukraine-Russia crisis is a boon for their business

The statements come from leaders of an industry that exerts tremendous influence in Washington, employing an average of 700 lobbyists per year over the past five years, or more than one lobbyist per member of Congress, according to Brown University’s Costs of War project.

Everyone in D.C. knows that weapons manufacturers are helping skew U.S. policy towards militarism

WEAPONS COMPANIES BOAST UKRAINE-RUSSIA TENSIONS ARE BOON FOR BUSINESS ,  Popular Resistance, By Sarah Lazare, In These Times., January 31, 2022

In Calls With Investors, Raytheon And Lockheed Martin Boasted That The Worsening Conflict Is Helping Profits.As the United States weighs more involvement in the growing conflict between Ukraine and Russia, some of the largest weapons companies in the world — Raytheon and Lockheed Martin — are openly telling their investors that tensions between the countries are good for business. And General Dynamics, meanwhile, is boasting about the past returns the company has seen as a result of such disputes.

The statements come as the U.S. government escalates arms shipments to Ukraine, among them the Javelin missiles that are a joint venture between Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. House Democrats, meanwhile, are trying to quickly push through a bill that would significantly increase U.S. military assistance to Ukraine, and impose new sanctions on Russia.

Anti-war campaigners warn that U.S. escalation, amid renewed tensions between Ukraine and Russia, could bring dire consequences, and spill into a much larger and more protracted war. “As we are shipping advanced weaponry to the Ukrainian military, the Biden administration has signaled that U.S. military advisors will continue to stay in the country,” Cavan Kharrazian, progressive foreign policy campaigner for the advocacy organization Demand Progress, tells In These Times. “Who will most likely set up and teach the Ukrainian army how to use these weapons systems? The U.S. military.”

Among those openly discussing the boon to profits is Raytheon CEO Greg Hayes. During a January 25 appearance on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street,” he was asked, “Do we have anything that would make it so if you inserted 8,000 American soldiers into Ukraine, they can stop 103,000 Russian soldiers?”

In his reply, Hayes touted the role the company could play in arming U.S. allies. “Obviously we have some defensive weapons systems that we could supply which could be helpful, like the patriot missile system.” He went on to add, “We’ve got the technologies to help in these engagements, whether it’s patriot systems, some of the radar systems.”………

If it sounds like Hayes is using mounting tensions as an advertising opportunity for his company, this may not be far fetched. On a January 25 earnings call (which was noted on Twitter by Nick Cleveland-Stout of the Quincy Institute), Hayes included “tensions in Eastern Europe” among the factors that Raytheon stands to benefit from. He said: “We just have to look to last week where we saw the drone attack in the UAE, which have attacked some of their other facilities. And of course, the tensions in Eastern Europe, the tensions in the South China Sea, all of those things are putting pressure on some of the defense spending over there. So I fully expect we’re going to see some benefit from it.”

Raytheon isn’t alone in its projections. Among those noting the likely boost to profits is Jim Taiclet, the chairman, president and CEO of Lockheed Martin. In a January 25 earnings call, he told investors, “If you look at the evolving threat level and the approach that some countries are taking, including North Korea, Iran and through some of its proxies in Yemen and elsewhere, and especially Russia today, these days, and China, there’s renewed great power competition that does include national defense and threats to it.”

This “great power competition,” he suggested to investors, bodes more business for the company. Taiclet says, “And the history of the United States is when those environments evolve, that we do not sit by and just watch it happen. So I can’t talk to a number, but I do think, and I’m concerned personally that the threat is advancing, and we need to be able to meet it.” 

The statements come from leaders of an industry that exerts tremendous influence in Washington, employing an average of 700 lobbyists per year over the past five years, or more than one lobbyist per member of Congress, according to Brown University’s Costs of War project.

Everyone in D.C. knows that weapons manufacturers are helping skew U.S. policy towards militarism, but they usually try to be less obvious,” Erik Sperling, executive director of Just Foreign Policy, an anti-war organization, told In These Times. “They are cashing in on tensions over Ukraine as the U.S. pours weapons into the region.”……..

Everyone in D.C. knows that weapons manufacturers are helping skew U.S. policy towards militarism, but they usually try to be less obvious,” Erik Sperling, executive director of Just Foreign Policy, an anti-war organization, told In These Times. “They are cashing in on tensions over Ukraine as the U.S. pours weapons into the region.”

But Kharrazian warns, “While it may not be profitable for arms manufacturers, engagement in good-faith, realistic diplomacy is what will benefit the region as a whole and mitigate unnecessary and potentially catastrophic conflict.”    https://popularresistance.org/top-weapons-companies-boast-ukraine-russia-tensions-are-a-boon-for-business/

February 4, 2022 Posted by | business and costs, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Time to start stopping the wars: No war in Ukraine, then no war anywhere.

 United for Peace and Justice Jan 29, 2022 ,

The Ukraine crisis intensifies, with no clear path to resolution. A military confrontation between the United States and Russia, the world’s most heavily armed nuclear nations, could spell disaster.

It is time for the people of the world to cry Enough! No more war threats, no more War! The peace movement must be a global people’s movement, aligned with the policies of no government.

The governments of the United States and its allies bear responsibility for refusing to include the post-Soviet Russian government in security arrangements that would allow it to feel secure within its borders. After the Cold War, Russia’s government sought a European security order in which it could be a full participant. Russia also relied on assurances from the United States government and its allies that NATO would not be expanded to the East.

Instead, the government of the U.S. and its NATO allies pursued a far more confrontational course, expanding NATO to include former Soviet republics and Warsaw Pact countries, and leaving open the possibility of membership for Georgia and Ukraine, moves which would extend the alliance right up to Russia’s borders. It was against this background that the 2014 overthrow of Ukraine’s government occurred, leaving Russia with a government backed by Western powers on its doorstep. Followed swiftly by Russia’s occupation of Crimea and the revolt of two regions in Ukraine’s East, the crisis devolved into a complex proxy war in the breakaway regions, with forces supported by Russia facing a Ukraine military receiving varying degrees of support from the government of the United States and its NATO allies.

The people of Ukraine have borne the brunt of all this. In eight years of fighting, 14,000 Ukrainian soldiers and noncombatants have been killed, and over 1.5 million displaced.  Russia also likely has suffered combat casualties in Ukraine, although the numbers are unknown. The society and infrastructure of Ukraine’s East have been badly damaged by eight years of fighting.

And now the people of Ukraine find themselves at the center of a renewed and broader crisis, one that could draw the militaries of the United States, its NATO allies and Russia into direct conflict. The Russian government has deployed a significant part of its land forces towards Ukraine’s borders.  At the same time it is making demands for a sweeping renegotiation of Europe’s security arrangements, including a significant rollback of NATO. The United States and NATO have for the most part rejected those demands, offering instead negotiations on a narrower range of arms control and confidence-building measures, and refusing to place any limits on further NATO expansion.

The United States government and some of its NATO partners are increasing weapons shipments to Ukraine. The U.S. also is placing military forces on alert for rapid deployment to Europe. Russia, the United States, and NATO all are conducting significant naval exercises in the waters in and around Europe. It must be emphasized that Russia and the United States together hold over 90% of the world’s nuclear weapons, and a wider war in Europe could involve four out of the original five nuclear-armed states……………………

Immediately:

–We call on the government of the United States to be willing to negotiate with any and all states without conditions. Its “security” policies have played a significant role in bringing Europe, and the world, to the brink of disaster…………………………..

And then we call for:

— Reversal of NATO decisions to expand rapid reaction forces and supporting infrastructure in Eastern Europe.

–Termination of U.S. programs to deploy U.S. ballistic missile defenses in Europe.

–Removal of U.S. nuclear weapons from Europe………………………….. http://www.unitedforpeace.org/2022/01/29/time-to-start-stopping-the-wars-no-war-in-ukraine-then-no-war-anywhere/?link_id=3&can_id=4dd9fe2dc5f0ed4a2c5e977ca86d9acb&source=email-time-to-start-stopping-the-wars-no-war-in-ukraine-then-no-war-anywhere&email_referrer=email_1428162&email_subject=time-to-start-stopping-the-wars-no-war-in-ukraine-then-no-war-anywhere

February 4, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, weapons and war | Leave a comment

How giving AI bots control over nuclear weapons could spark World War III

 New York Post By Anthony Blair, The Sun, February 2, 2022

Giving artificial intelligence control over nuclear weapons could trigger an apocalyptic conflict, a leading expert has warned.

As AI takes a greater role in the control of devastating weaponry, so the chances of technology making a mistake and sparking World War III increase.

These include the USA’s B-21 nuclear bomber, China’s AI hypersonic missiles, and Russia’s Poseidon nuclear drone.

Writing for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, expert Zachary Kellenborn, a Policy Fellow at the Schar School of Policy and Government, warned: “If artificial intelligences controlled nuclear weapons, all of us could be dead.”

He went on: “Militaries are increasingly incorporating autonomous functions into weapons systems,” adding that “there is no guarantee that some military won’t put AI in charge of nuclear launches.”

Kellenborn, who describes himself as a US Army “Mad Scientist”, explained that “error” is the biggest problem with autonomous nuclear weapons.

He said: “In the real world, data may be biased or incomplete in all sorts of ways.”

Kellenborn added: “In a nuclear weapons context, a government may have little data about adversary military platforms; existing data may be structurally biased, by, for example, relying on satellite imagery; or data may not account for obvious, expected variations such as imagery taken during foggy, rainy, or overcast weather.”

Training a nuclear weapons AI program also poses a major challenge, as nukes have, thankfully, only been used twice in history in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, meaning any system would struggle to learn.

Despite these concerns, a number of AI military systems, including nuclear weapons, are already in place around the world.

Dead Hand

In recent years, Russia has also upgraded its so-called “Doomsday device”, known as “Dead Hand”.

This final line of defense in a nuclear war would fire every Russian nuke at once, guaranteeing total destruction of the enemy.

First developed during the Cold War, it is believed to have been given an AI upgrade over the past few years.

In 2018, nuclear disarmament expert Dr. Bruce Blair told the Daily Star Online he believes the system, known as “Perimeter”, is “vulnerable to cyber attack” which could prove catastrophic.

Dead hand systems are meant to provide a backup in case a state’s nuclear command authority is killed or otherwise disrupted.

US military experts Adam Lowther and Curtis McGuffin claimed in a 2019 article that the US should consider “an automated strategic response system based on artificial intelligence”.

Poseidon Nuclear Drone

In May 2018, Vladimir Putin launched Russia’s underwater nuclear drone, which experts warned could trigger 300ft tsunamis.

The Poseidon nuclear drone, due to be finished by 2027, is designed to wipe out enemy naval bases with two megatons of nuclear power.

Described by US Navy documents as an “Intercontinental Nuclear-Powered Nuclear-Armed Autonomous Torpedo”, or an “autonomous undersea vehicle” by the Congressional Research Service, it is intended to be used as a second-strike weapon in the event of a nuclear conflict.

The big unanswered question over Poseidon is; what can it do autonomously…………………..

B21 Bomber

The US has launched a $550 million remotely-piloted bomber that can fire nukes and hide from enemy missiles.

In 2020, the US Air Force’s B-21 stealth plane was unveiled, the first new US bomber in more than 30 years.

Not only can it be piloted remotely, but it can also fly itself using artificial intelligence to pick out targets and avoid detection with no human output.

Although the military insists a human operator will always make the final call on whether or not to hit a target, information about the aircraft has been slow at getting out.

AI fighter pilots & hypersonic missiles

Last year, China bragged its AI fighter pilots were “better than humans” and shot down their non-AI counterparts in simulated dogfights……..

Last year, China claimed its AI-controlled hypersonic missiles can hit targets with 10 times as much accuracy as a human-controlled missile.,,,,,,,

Checkmate AI warplane

In 2021, Russia unveiled a new AI stealth fighter jet – while also making a dig at the Royal Navy.

The 1,500mph aircraft called Checkmate was launched at a Russian airshow by a delighted Vladimir Putin.

One ad for the autonomous plane – which can hide from its enemies – featured a picture of the Royal Navy’s HMS Defender in the jet’s sights with the caption: “See You”.

The world has already come close to devastating nuclear war which was only prevented by human involvement.

On September 27, 1983, Soviet soldier Stanislav Petrov was an on-duty officer at a secret command center south of Moscow when a chilling alarm went off.

It signaled that the United States had launched intercontinental ballistic missiles carrying nuclear warheads.

Faced with an impossible choice – report the alarm and potentially start WWIII or bank on it being a false alarm – Petrov chose the latter.

He later said: “I categorically refused to be guilty of starting World War III.”

Kellenberg said that Petrov made a human choice not to trust the automated launch detection system, explaining: “The computer was wrong; Petrov was right. The false signals came from the early warning system mistaking the sun’s reflection off the clouds for missiles.


“But if Petrov had been a machine, programmed to respond automatically when confidence was sufficiently high, that error would have started a nuclear war.”

He added: “There is no guarantee that some military won’t put AI in charge of nuclear launches; international law doesn’t specify that there should always be a ‘Petrov’ guarding the button. That’s something that should change, soon.” https://nypost.com/2022/02/02/how-giving-ai-bots-control-over-nuclear-weapons-could-spark-world-war-iii/

February 3, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, technology, weapons and war | Leave a comment

UK preparing for ‘exo-atmospheric nuclear attack’ as greatest threat in space war, government report warns

UK preparing for ‘exo-atmospheric nuclear attack’ as greatest threat in space war, government report warns

Such an event would be a ‘permanent kill’ scenario worse than any electronic weapons or orbital anti-satellite weapons, a new report states, Adam Smith Independent 2 Feb 22,

The government says space will be a key future battlefield with the most dangerous threat being a “exo-atmospheric nuclear attack”.

In a report from the Ministry of Defence, the government body described such an event as a “permanent kill” scenario; this would be vastly more dangerous than either electronic warfare, laser dazzling, cyber attacks, or orbital ASATs (anti-satellite weapons)………… (registered readers only) https://www.independent.co.uk/space/atmospheric-nuclear-attack-space-war-government-b2005990.html

February 3, 2022 Posted by | space travel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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