tagged w/ Nukes
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How will nuking of Iran affect the Indian sub-continent and the world?
(NEW DELHI) - The US, NATO and Israel Defense Forces are ready to attack Iran with nuclear weapons. Covert wars had already started during Libyan attacks.
The US scientists have warned the US government
The Union of Concerned Scientists recently have warned that, should the USA use nuclear weapons in Iran, of say 1 megaton yield, it would kill 3 million people in Iran and another 35 million will die of radiation fallout in Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. [The video animation is enclosed][1]
A simple representation of the computer simulation below shows how radioactive wind will blow first 48 hours. Hot, dry air, blowing from arid-plains of Iran, Afghanistan will carry radioactive dust into the Indian sub-continent, and blow right across the northern Gangetic plains.
A group of thirteen top physicists, including five Nobel laureates, in the United States had warned President George W Bush not to use nuclear weapon in Iran. [The URL of the letter given below] [2]
The warning initiated by Jorge Hirsch, a professor of physics at the University of California at San Diego, was signed by more than 1,800 physicists who categorically rejected the new U.S. nuclear weapons policy of preemptive use of the nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states, aggressor or non-aggressor, alike.
Scientists are generally a-political. They follow a philosophy that their discipline seeks welfare for the humankind and, therefore, they seldom directly get involved in politics of science or technology. What is unprecedented here is that a group had come out against Bush administration’s policy of (a) using nuclear weapons, (b) using the weapons preemptively, i.e. without any overt or covert threat of aggression, and (c) against nations that are non-nuclear, and who are defenseless against the aggression of the United States of America.
The mainstream media, globally, has been complicit in the incessant western warmongering. It has failed to warn the people of the dangers inherent in such illegal and irresponsible acts of the past and present US administration, the British administration and the French administration. Nothing unusual or unprecedented, though.
Hence the actions of the Union of Concerned Scientists and the group of physicists in taking the extraordinary step of directly communicating with the people and with the administration is not merely commendable, it is an indictment of western democratic institutions.
How will nuking of Iran affect the Indian sub-continent and the world?
Since I am an Indian, one of my main concerns since 9/11 has been the impact of US policies on the survival and sustainability of West Asia and the Indian sub-continent. The people of the sub-continent have millennia-old history of trade and commerce with West-Asia. Interaction with Europe is merely three centuries old…and that interaction has led to death, destruction, mayhem, misery, exploitation, devastation……and now utter decimation stares us in our face.
There are many ways warm air blows from West-Asian region into the sub-continent. Strong surface winds from West-Asia, picking up sand and dust, blow right across Northern India, including India’s capital New Delhi. This is normal warm air current as winter ends, spring crawls up and summer begins, but just before the Monsoon winds arrive from the South. During winter we have bone-chilling, strong surface winds in northern India coming from the West-Asian region. There are currents that blow across the dry west-Asian region and enter the Himalayas via the Karakorum Range. Particles of dust picked up by these winds are rained out or snowed and these flow through the hundreds of perennial rivers originating in the Himalayas. Worth noting is the fact air currents from this region also blows across Europe.
When Iran is nuked, these winds will suck up radioactive dust and deposit them right across Northern India, including the Himalayas.
Since the US started its unprovoked aggressions in West-Asia, post 9/11, depleted uranium nano particles carried by these winds have already contaminated vast regions of Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. It is the geography, and history is never far behind; they are not coming to Asia on a humanitarian mission. They need our resources and want to eliminate each one of us.
Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq amount to two nuclear attacks on Indian people by two elected US Presidents in less than ten years. The third one is not far behind. Since Depleted Uranium particles were traced at Aldermaston, UK, by Dr Chris Busby, effectively the entire Europe has also been dosed with ionizing radiation from Iraq Wars, and hence the US and NATO forces have attacked their own civilians too. Attacks by NATO forces on European civilians amounts to treason.
21 countries in West and South Asia affected from radiation contamination can say the something more serious: the civilians in these 21 countries have been attacked by the US and NATO forces without their respective governments being an aggressor. It is a demented extension of “the right of preemptive action” by an utterly depraved US, British and French administrations, an outright policy of genocide, or omnicide, choose your own term. But none of these people ever raised a finger against the US or any western nation; majority still believes that Americans are civilized. Does it matter now?
If you are an American, don’t ever forget that the United States of America has been directly committing war crimes since 1991. Each political leader since 1991 is directly or indirectly involved. Every military commander is involved. Every soldier is involved. Using the Nuremberg principles, a trial would result in millions of indictments for genocide.
(click on the link for the whole article and to access the in-text links)How will nuking of Iran affect the Indian sub-continent and the world?
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Though it has been decades since the Cold War came to a close, the United States government spends more money on nuclear warheads now than it did during its stand-off with the Soviet Union.
As the US vows to cut down its arsenal of nuclear weapons, the cost the country spends annually on maintaining its supply is much more than America invested each year during the Cold War. Estimates suggest that currently the US puts around $55 billion annually into its nuclear weapons program, reports Mother Jones; by comparison, the cost of the nuke complex for the country during the Cold War ran at an average of only $35 billion each year.
Only three months into his presidency, Barack Obama said in April 2009 that he envisioned an Earth in the future fee of nuclear weapons. Just two years later, however, America’s arsenal of those warheads amounts to roughly 2,500 nukes ready to be deployed.
It was only less than two weeks ago that the United States finally dismantled its largest atomic bomb, the B53, which was said to be 600 times more powerful than the nuke that was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan towards the finale of the Second World War. As that nuke was dismantled, Deputy Secretary of Energy Dan Poneman told NPR that the bomb was a “Cold War relic” and showed the direction of dismantling that the United States was heading towards.
Even if the country is cutting back on its nukes, the United States has a backup stash larger than the active bombs, allowing for the country to in total have 5,113 nuclear warheads in its position. The surplus of not-quite-ready nukes is at 2,600, and though they cannot be deployed at a drop of a hat like the others, they can be reanimated as full-fledged warheads.
Peter Fedewa of the pro-disarmament Ploughshares Fund says that those nukes “could be 'raised from the dead' and brought back into deployment with relative ease."
Under the START treaty that the US signed with Russia last year, both countries vow to soon enough limit their stash of active warheads to only 1,500. The document does not, however, say how many back-up nukes either country can have. In the interim, Mother Jones reports that the Pantex plant near Amarillo, Texas holds around 3,000 warheads that are on the schedule to be dismantled, something America used to do at a pace of around 1,300 per year. Last year, however, both Congress and the White House said that the country would cut back on the cost of dismantling the warheads and instead now invest the money on the upkeep of already dead nukes.
At the country’s current rate, dismantling the thousands of atomic nukes would take longer than a decade Joe Cirincione, a longtime analyst of nuclear weapons policy, tells NPR. Currently, only around 250 warheads are dismantled at Pantex each year.
It doesn’t help that the country is more interested in revamping the retired nukes than pulling the plug on them entirely, either.
In 2012, the country will spend $4.1 billion on the “refurbishment” of retired nukes, while only a fraction of that — $57 million — will be invested in dismantling them. That figure accounts for less than one percent of the country’s total budget for the nuclear program. In all, America’s nuclear program operates at a cost of around $55 billion, which is spread across the Departments of Defense, Energy and Homeland Security. Despite Obama’s instance on curbing the program, the tally of funding is believed to have gone up by around $3 billion since only 2008, which at the time accounted for five times the budget of the Department of State — or 14 times what the Energy Department spends on everything else.
"The same facilities that dismantle U.S. nuclear warheads are also refurbishing US warheads," Cirincione adds to NPR. "And right now a decision has been made to prioritize refurbishment. So we're actually building more nuclear weapons than we're dismantling. That didn't use to be the case, but it is now."
When weapons are dismantled and the current snail’s pace, the risks in place are of immense danger as well. "There are very strict manuals on exactly what you have to do," Hans Kristensen, spokesman for the Federation of American Scientists, tells MSNBC. "How much pressure can you apply to each screw, what kind of glue holds the chemical high explosives together around the spear of highly enriched uranium."
Both Russia and America have agreed to have an arsenal of only 1,550 deployed nukes come 2018, only a fraction of the 22,000-plus on hand at the end of the Cold War. Obama told an audience in Prague in 2009 he aimed "To put an end to Cold War thinking," adding that America "will reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy, and urge others to do the same." As the country is investing more money in rebuilding nukes than kicking them to the curb, however, will the president follow through with his plea or will it be added to the list of other promises gone unfulfilled?
http://rt.com/usa/news/cold-war-nuclear-warheads-961/Though it has been decades since the Cold War came to a close, the United States... more
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The New York Times...
May 30, 2011
In Japan, a Culture That Promotes Nuclear Dependency
By MARTIN FACKLER and NORIMITSU ONISHI
PART ONE...
KASHIMA, Japan — When the Shimane nuclear plant was first proposed here more than 40 years ago, this rural port town put up such fierce resistance that the plant’s would-be operator, Chugoku Electric, almost scrapped the project. Angry fishermen vowed to defend areas where they had fished and harvested seaweed for generations.
Two decades later, when Chugoku Electric was considering whether to expand the plant with a third reactor, Kashima once again swung into action: this time, to rally in favor. Prodded by the local fishing cooperative, the town assembly voted 15 to 2 to make a public appeal for construction of the $4 billion reactor.
Kashima’s reversal is a common story in Japan, and one that helps explain what is, so far, this nation’s unwavering pursuit of nuclear power: a lack of widespread grass-roots opposition in the communities around its 54 nuclear reactors. This has held true even after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami generated a nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi station that has raised serious questions about whether this quake-prone nation has adequately ensured the safety of its plants. So far, it has spurred only muted public questioning in towns like this.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan has, at least temporarily, shelved plans to expand Japan’s use of nuclear power — plans promoted by the country’s powerful nuclear establishment. Communities appear willing to fight fiercely for nuclear power, despite concerns about safety that many residents refrain from voicing publicly.
To understand Kashima’s about-face, one need look no further than the Fukada Sports Park, which serves the 7,500 mostly older residents here with a baseball diamond, lighted tennis courts, a soccer field and a $35 million gymnasium with indoor pool and Olympic-size volleyball arena. The gym is just one of several big public works projects paid for with the hundreds of millions of dollars this community is receiving for accepting the No. 3 reactor, which is still under construction.
As Kashima’s story suggests, Tokyo has been able to essentially buy the support, or at least the silent acquiescence, of communities by showering them with generous subsidies, payouts and jobs. In 2009 alone, Tokyo gave $1.15 billion for public works projects to communities that have electric plants, according to the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. Experts say the majority of that money goes to communities near nuclear plants.
And that is just the tip of the iceberg, experts say, as the communities also receive a host of subsidies, property and income tax revenues, compensation to individuals and even “anonymous” donations to local treasuries that are widely believed to come from plant operators.
Unquestionably, the aid has enriched rural communities that were rapidly losing jobs and people to the cities. With no substantial reserves of oil or coal, Japan relies on nuclear power for the energy needed to drive its economic machine. But critics contend that the largess has also made communities dependent on central government spending — and thus unwilling to rock the boat by pushing for robust safety measures.
In a process that critics have likened to drug addiction, the flow of easy money and higher-paying jobs quickly replaces the communities’ original economic basis, usually farming or fishing.
Nor did planners offer alternatives to public works projects like nuclear plants. Keeping the spending spigots open became the only way to maintain newly elevated living standards.
Experts and some residents say this dependency helps explain why, despite the legacy of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the accidents at the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl nuclear plants, Japan never faced the levels of popular opposition to nuclear power seen in the United States and Europe — and is less likely than the United States to stop building new plants. Towns become enmeshed in the same circle — which includes politicians, bureaucrats, judges and nuclear industry executives — that has relentlessly promoted the expansion of nuclear power over safety concerns.
“This structure of dependency makes it impossible for communities to speak out against the plants or nuclear power,” said Shuji Shimizu, a professor of public finance at Fukushima University.
CONTINUED...
PHOTO:
Ko Sasaki for The New York Times
The Chugoku Electric nuclear power plant in Kashima. A third reactor is currently under construction.The New York Times...
May 30, 2011
In Japan, a Culture That Promotes Nuclear... more
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It keeps getting worse and worse.
Japan has finally found and admitted to seafood contamination. The price of flounder has plummeted.It keeps getting worse and worse.
Japan has finally found and admitted to seafood... more
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Melanson said Bartlett Nuclear had been approached by sub-contractors linked to the General Electric-Hitachi nuclear joint venture. GE designed the Fukushima reactors.
"At first, we had no details about the duration of the job or the positions needed. The only requirement was that you have a valid passport," Melanson said.
But as the job details came in, Bartlett managers scoured the list of volunteers and selected several engineers and technicians "we knew would perform well for us over there."
So just what type of person would go into a damaged nuclear plant that is throwing out dangerous levels of radiation?
NOT ROUGHNECKS
Melanson said these are not roughnecks prepared to risk their health for a quick paycheck but senior technicians and engineers who have come up through the ranks.
(sorry I just had to post this before some neo-con did and said" LOOK here's those jobs," also the sick irony the horrible Reality is some plant workers are gona be desperate enough i laughed then gagged my tongue swelling in my own throat terrible times where this is the Job reform ecological disasters caused by corporate irressponsibility, so need a job? Americans desperate yet what a april fool with the worst kind of punch-line its for real people!)Melanson said Bartlett Nuclear had been approached by sub-contractors linked to the... more
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Local news in San Diego on February 9, 2011 broadcast down below chilling interview with San Diego Assistant Port Director.
I-Team reporter speaks to assistant port director Al Hallor about what they find during port of entry inspections..answering to the question Al Hallor Assistant Port Director said they had found the weapon of mass destruction in San Diego.
http://www.ufo-blogger.com/2011/02/san-diego-nuke-wmd-dirty-bomb-weapon-of.htmlLocal news in San Diego on February 9, 2011 broadcast down below chilling interview... more
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Nondescript 18-wheelers are secretly transporting nearly 1,000 of the U.S. Navy’s 100-kiloton W76 nuclear warheads from a submarine base near Seattle to a plant in Texas. Worse news? It’s by an agency recently investigated for problems with alcohol abuse.Nondescript 18-wheelers are secretly transporting nearly 1,000 of the U.S.... more
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I recently came across this image while wasting time at work. While I believe that nuclear non proliferation is a worth while cause it is striking to put the nuclear arsenal of the world into perspective.
Current squashed the image so here is the link to the source.
http://nerdnirvana.org/2010/01/21/how-many-nukes-will-destroy-the-world/I recently came across this image while wasting time at work. While I believe that... more
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Explores the proliferation of nuclear weapons, groups seeking them, and what we can do to rid the world of them.
'The goodwill of men is the only thing standing between us and the devil.' Those words were spoken by Kenny O'Donnell, JFK's political advisor in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. And here we still sit on the precipice of nuclear war.
So it begs the question, how can we eliminate all nuclear weapons when war and distrust are still part of the human condition? Do leaders like Obama really mean it when they say they want to diisarm, or is it just used as a political ploy?Explores the proliferation of nuclear weapons, groups seeking them, and what we can do... more
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This week, the last piece fell into place. The National Research Council, part of the National Academy of Science, heavy on politics and light on science, announced that America was no longer able to track nukes threatening our shores. Their report titled Nuclear Forensics: A Capability at Risk, released last week, outlines the details of a secret study requested by the Departments of Homeland Security, Defense and Energy, specifically the National Nuclear Security Administration. The gist of the story is easy, if a nuke goes off in America, dirty nuke in Times Square, one in a container at a port, anywhere, America won’t be able to tell who made it. Not a word of the report is true. It is wild speculation and disinformation written in broad language with no hard science, written for a reason.
A powerful group within the United States, one with influence over the press and the ability to derail an investigation as was done with 9/11, has been “tasked” with laying the groundwork for a terrorist attack on America, one using nuclear material. This report, unneeded, and highly inaccurate was printed in the New York Times to provide “cover.” It isn’t just this report, the pieces are falling together around the world. The Wiki-Leaks story, pre staging Pakistan’s ISI as a terrorist organization, a story built out of almost no information but fleshed out with massive speculation by “operatives” in the press is part of the process.
The Defense Authorization Act of 2006 allows, “in case of a terrorist attack” for the president to declare marshal law, disband congress and rule by executive decree. With the suspension of habeas corpus by the Military Commissions act, also in 2006, America as we know it officially comes to an end the second a weapon of mass destruction in used. Only then will America learn who has been pulling the strings all along, who is scripting Wolf Blitzer and Glen Beck.
British Prime Minister David Cameron’s attacks on Pakistan, made from New Delhi last week, seen by most as a serious political blunder, are part of the narrative. We will get to more background on a younger David Cameron later.
Another piece of the puzzle involved a federal task force, Defense, Energy, FBI, descending on a warehouse in Greenfield, Indiana under the guise of a “records search.” This “Waco style” assault on a facility storing furniture for college dorm rooms was much more than it seemed. No case, criminal or civil, provided any underlying reason for the search.
Further, the bizarre tale of rumored missing nukes, illegally transported on a B-52 from Minot AFB to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana, a major Defense Department scandal, is meant to create, not only fear and doubt, but “plausible deniability” if a weapon is exploded inside the US. These, however, are not, by far, the only missing nuclear weapons America has to fear as we will get into later.
More at the Link..........
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2010/08/02/gordon-duff-false-flag-nuke-attack-on-u-s-justified-king-torah/This week, the last piece fell into place. The National Research Council, part of the... more
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Release Date: May 2010
Genre: Documentary
Cast: Graham Allison, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Tony Blair, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ahmed Rashid
Director: Lucy Walker
Studio: Magnolia Pictures
Plot:
A documentary about the escalating nuclear arms race.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mn-1LuLhrw&feature=relatedRelease Date: May 2010
Genre: Documentary
Cast: Graham Allison, Zbigniew... more
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KSirys
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Every tactic that BP has tried so far to stop the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has failed. Now, experts are saying forget all those cleverly named solutions, and let’s just nuke the thing. The idea has been floating around for awhile and apparently was successfully used by the Soviet Union decades ago to stop a gushing oil well. But the US is saying “no way.” Never mind the destruction that a nuclear blast could cause to the already ravaged Gulf of Mexico and the radiation it would spew into the atmosphere, it turns out this tactic is also against international law.
http://inhabitat.com/2010/06/03/experts-suggest-nuking-the-gulf-oil-leak-us-says-heck-no/Every tactic that BP has tried so far to stop the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has... more
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Erikvl
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President Obama turned from the domestic third-rail issue of health care to the international radioactive subject of dirty-bomb terrorism by hosting a nuclear summit in D.C., convincing the leaders of 47 countries to attend -- presidents and prime ministers and kings and queens and a couple of expendable pawns.President Obama turned from the domestic third-rail issue of health care to the... more
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IRAN celebrates its own NUKE DAY during the Obama Nuclear Security Summit 2010 because they weren’t invited to the PARTY!
-IRAN celebrates its own NUKE DAY during the Obama Nuclear Security Summit 2010 because... more
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Obama Nuclear Security Summit 2010 Agenda: IS IT SAFE? The White House meets today in Washington D.C. with the heads of world leaders. IS IT SAFE?
Obama hopes to use the largest gathering of world leaders hosted by a U.S. president in 65 years to focus on the most serious nuclear proliferation threats and question of our time: IS IT SAFE?Obama Nuclear Security Summit 2010 Agenda: IS IT SAFE? The White House meets today in... more
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There are few things I love more than finding a big long Seymour Hersh piece in the New Yorker - and today brings a doozy: Defending the Arsenal.
The thrust of the piece is that the greatest threat to the security of Pakistan's nukes could come not from the Taliban, but from within the military itself. Hersh also goes into extensive detail about the workings of the Pakistani nuclear arsenal and the US' secret efforts to help better secure it. Lots of great tidbits in there like:
Safeguards have been built into the system. Pakistani nuclear doctrine calls for the warheads (containing an enriched radioactive core) and their triggers (sophisticated devices containing highly explosive lenses, detonators, and krytrons) to be stored separately from each other and from their delivery devices (missiles or aircraft). The goal is to insure that no one can launch a warhead—in the heat of a showdown with India, for example—without pausing to put it together. Final authority to order a nuclear strike requires consensus within Pakistan’s ten-member National Command Authority, with the chairman—by statute, President Zardari—casting the deciding vote.
At least one blogger in the Pakistani blogosphere has been less than kind to Mr. Hersh for calling the effectiveness of their military into question. From the blog Bazm-e-Iqbal:
American scaremongerers like Seymour Hersh need to come out of the wonderland they are living in. Before talking about mutiny in the Pakistan army and trying to help secure our nukes you better pay attention to securing Fort Hood.
Recently on the Current News Blog:
- Real Recovery college stories
- Fall of the Berlin Wall
- Chavez: Prepare for war
- Al Qaeda has a magazine!
- Recession and the college graduate - The Real RecoveryThere are few things I love more than finding a big long Seymour Hersh piece in the... more
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http://members.greenpeace.org/blog/greenpeaceusa_blog/2010/02/25/vermont_senate_vote_shows_that_obama_s_n
Yesterday for the first time in U.S. history a state legislature voted to shut down a nuclear power plant. This is a huge victory for Vermonters and our clean energy future. The Vermont State Senate voted 24-6 to close Entergy's Vermont Yankee, rejecting the Obama administration's plans for "nuclear renaissance."
Nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen discovered late last year that then Vice President of Operations Jay Thayer had lied about the existence of underground pipes containing dangerous, radioactive tritium beneath the plant. Tritium up to 37 times the acceptable federal limit has been found in nearby wells and radioactive water may be leaking into the Connecticut River.
Despite President Obama’s announcement last week of 8.3 billion dollars in loan guarantees to build the first new nuclear plant in thirty years, Vermont has taken a bold stand on nixing nuclear power. Vermont knows that nuclear energy can’t be a part of our energy future. We need investment in renewable sources of energy to power our future and put people back to work.
“When Americans have the choice about the kind of energy they want in their communities, they don’t want nuclear. Vermont has shut down the myth of the so-called nuclear renaissance," said Greenpeace’s Nuclear Policy Analyst Jim Riccio.
But the fight isn’t over. Entergy is a powerful corporation and its executives are not above telling outright lies about its plants and practices to hide the dirty truth about nuclear power from us. Just look at Entergy's website for the Vermont Yankee: SafeCleanReliable.com. Neither safe. Nor clean. Nor reliable. Discuss.
http://members.greenpeace.org/blog/greenpeaceusa_blog/2010/02/25/vermont_senate_vote_shows_that_obama_s_nhttp://members.greenpeace.org/blog/greenpeaceusa_blog/2010/02/25/vermont_senate_vote_sh... more
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This is the first installment of Daniel Ellsberg’s personal memoir of the nuclear era, “The American Doomsday Machine.” The online book will recount highlights of his six years of research and consulting for the Departments of Defense and State and the White House on issues of nuclear command and control, nuclear war planning and nuclear crises. It further draws on 34 subsequent years of research and activism largely on nuclear policy, which followed the intervening 11 years of his preoccupation with the Vietnam War.This is the first installment of Daniel Ellsberg’s personal memoir of the... more
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By SUE MAJOR HOLMES, Associated Press Writer – Mon Feb 1, 7:24 pm ET
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – President Barack Obama is seeking increased funding for nuclear weapons research and security programs next year, even as his administration promotes nonproliferation and has pledged to reduce the world's stockpile of nuclear arms.
The administration on Monday asked Congress for more than $7 billion for activities related to nuclear weapons in the budget of the National Nuclear Security Administration, an increase of $624 million from the 2010 fiscal year.
NNSA Administrator Thomas D'Agostino defended putting more money into the programs, saying the U.S. needs the best nuclear weapons facilities, scientists, technicians and engineers as it moves toward eventual disarmament.
"This budget is implementing the president's nuclear vision," he said.
The total Department of Energy request for New Mexico's Los Alamos National Laboratory totals $2.21 billion, up from $1.82 billion in 2010. The request for weapons-related activities is $1.6 billion, up from $1.3 billion, while nonproliferation activities would get $233 million, up from $188 million.
The total request for Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque is $1.49 billion, an increase from $1.3 billion. Weapons activities would get $1.14 billion, compared with the 2010 total of $953 million, while nonproliferation would increase to $187 million from the current $171 million.
The investment would ensure a smaller stockpile will take care of the nation's needs; the stockpile is safe and secure; and other nations aren't cheating as the U.S. moves "from a Cold War nuclear weapons complex ... into a 21st century, nuclear security enterprise," D'Agostino said.
Greg Mello, director of the nuclear watchdog Los Alamos Study Group, said budgets for NNSA and DOE have increased in recent years, but the nation "hasn't seen any increase in weapons activities like this since the early years of Ronald Reagan."
He called the budget "a complete surrender to Senate Republicans," who have argued that stockpile reductions must be accompanied by a modernized nuclear weapons complex.
NNSA wants a 4.7 percent overall increase for infrastructure to more than $2.3 billion, including money for major long-term projects to replace aging buildings for plutonium work at Los Alamos and uranium work at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
Los Alamos' budget includes about $225 million for design work for a chemical and metallurgy research replacement building, known as CMRR, to replace a 58-year-old lab where scientists analyze samples of plutonium and other radioactive materials.
Watchdog groups contend CMRR positions the U.S. to build more nuclear weapons by giving Los Alamos the capacity to make large numbers of new plutonium pit designs — the triggers of nuclear weapons.
Los Alamos lab officials have said the facility would replace existing capabilities and would be needed for other science, even if Los Alamos didn't do pit production.
There's no exact cost figure for CMRR, but a 2008 Senate report estimated it at $2.6 billion — more than five times the initial estimate. The price tag awaits a final design for the facility, which cannot be done until a national nuclear posture review is completed this year.
NNSA's budget request includes more than $2 billion for stockpile support activities, a 25 percent increase, and $1.6 billion for science, technology and engineering, an increase of more than 10 percent.By SUE MAJOR HOLMES, Associated Press Writer – Mon Feb 1, 7:24 pm ET... more
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