http://prop1.org/wilpf/2017/2017.Resource.list.NFF.Tours.htm
WILPF-US RESOURCE
LIST FOR A NUCLEAR FREE FUTURE
Carol Urner
of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom developed the following
resource list for the 2016 Nuclear-Free Future Tour,
and updated it for 2017. This is formatted for printing with web links
shown.
SECTION I: LIST OF RESOURCES FOR
FOLLOWING 2017 NEGOTIATIONS ON THE UNITED NATIONS NUCLEAR WEAPONS BAN TREATY
Go to http://www.icanw.org/ for best and most
accessible ongoing coverage of the nuclear weapons ban treaty negotiations.
WILPF is also very involved and on the steering committee for this wonderful
effort.
Here is the text of the Nuclear Weapons Ban Treaty as
approved by representatives of 122 nations July 7, 2017 - http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/nuclear-weapon-ban/documents/L3-Rev1.pdf
- who will be reconvening at the UN on September 20, 2017 for
ratification. WILPF Reaching Critical
has in-depth reporting and many publications on the treaty. Those listed under
Resources/Publications at http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications
include -
Banning nuclear weapons: principles
and elements for a legally binding instrument. (http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/11390-banning-nuclear-weapons-principles-and-elements-for-a-legally-binding-instrument
)
Filling the legal
gap: the prohibition of nuclear weapons. This table overleaf
from Reaching Critical Will and Article 36 summarizes the gaps in existing
treaty law related to nuclear weapons that could be filled by a treaty banning
nuclear weapons. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/9730-filling-the-legal-gap-the-prohibition-of-nuclear-weapons
Filling the gap: report on the
Vienna conference on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/9500-filling-the-gap-report-on-the-vienna-conference-on-the-humanitarian-impact-of-nuclear-weapons
Banning nuclear weapons: an effective
measure for disarmament
This paper explores the effective measures for
nuclear disarmament presented by the New Agenda Coalition in its 2014 NPT
working paper. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/9141-banning-nuclear-weapons-an-effective-measure-for-disarmament
A treaty banning nuclear weapons:
This joint paper by Reaching Critical Will and Article 36 explores the
development of a legal framework for the prohibition and elimination of nuclear
weapons. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/8654-a-treaty-banning-nuclear-weapons
Preventing collapse: the NPT
and a ban on nuclear weapons. This paper examines the complementarity between the nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty and a ban on nuclear weapons. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/8316-preventing-collapse-the-npt-and-a-ban-on-nuclear-weapons
Unspeakable suffering: the
humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons: This publication
examines the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons and is aimed for civil
society actors, academics, and governments that are interested in approaching
weapons negotiations with a humanitarian lens. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/7422-unspeakable-suffering-the-humanitarian-impact-of-nuclear-weapons
SECTION II: LIST OF RESOURCES (prepared for the first NUCLEAR FREE FUTURE ACTION
TOUR, January 21 to February 22, 2016) -
The 2016
tour began on the U.S. west coast by Ellen Thomas and Carol Urner,
with the approval of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
(WILPF) National Disarm/End Wars Issue Committee, of which they were
co-chairs. The tour focused on the abolition of nuclear weapons and had two
aims:
WILPF Branches and members were urged to
seek co-sponsors for a bill introduced by Eleanor Holmes Norton (Washington
D.C. Congresswoman) mandating leadership from the Obama Administration in the
search for global nuclear weapons abolition. WILPF Branches and members were also urged to inform themselves and support
the work of WILPF Reaching Critical Will (RCW) in supporting the nuclear
weapons ban treaty now being negotiated under the aegis of the United
Nations General Assembly.
BASIC DOCUMENTS REFERRED TO IN
PRESENTATIONS:
1) When the World Outlawed War by David
Swanson. Paperback, 172 pages, 2011. The story of the Kellogg
Briand Pact which was ratified by the US Senate in 1928 with only one
dissenting vote. US originally supported it and it formed the basis for
the UN charter and the Nuremberg trials. It is still international law although
the US currently ignores it and defies it with every war or special
forces action for regime change. You can order the book from Amazon for
around $10.00 including shipping. You can also download for free from Google
books. http://davidswanson.org/outlawry
2) WILPF Centennial Manifesto is the vision of Womens International League for Peace and Freedom published
as we began our second century of working for a world without war and for human
rights and human security for all. 19 pp. Download it at http://wilpf.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/FINAL-VERSION-English.pdf
3) A Global Security System: An Alternative to War is a
publication of World Beyond War.org, an
action coalition and think tank of which WILPF US is an integral part. This
77 page document is our initial effort to think together about building a
non-violent global security system incorporating and building on international
law and peace building institutions developed over the past 100 years. Download
for free at http://wilpf.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/FINAL-VERSION-English.pdf
and join in creating the 2016 version which should be an improvement as we move
forward in our thinking and working together. http://worldbeyondwar.org/alternative/
THE NEO-CONSERVATIVE MANIFESTO, STAR
WARS, AND PENTAGON REFORMATION
4) Paradise and Power: America and Europe in the New
World Order by Robert Kagan (2003). Paperback, 158 pages, 2003. This is a short version of the
neo-conservative vision for US world domination: Europe is Venus but the US has
the power and is Mars. Robert Kagan also
co-founded with William Cristal the Project for a New American Century
(PNAC). (PNAC ended in 2006-2009. Robert Kagan and
William Kristol then created a new think tank, the Foreign
Policy Initiative which uses terms like human rights and democracy but
again seems devoted to world domination But
explore it and think for yourself.) As of April, 2016, Kagan
expressed his abandonment of the Republican Party and support for Hillary
Clinton as US President.
5) The Project for a New American Century (PNAC) and
Rebuilding Americas Defenses. PNAC was first published in
1998 and became regarded as the Manifesto of Neo-Cons like Jeb Bush, Dick
Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. Rebuilding
Americas Defenses was a more detailed document which served as a blueprint
for the reorganization of US military forces into a space dominated system that
its founders believed could result in a kind of Pax
Americana that would control the worlds essential
resources and also extend that control to the solar system beyond. You can find
summaries of the projects like the one in Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century.
The complete documents are also available on-line at http://www.visibility911.org/pdf-the-neo-con-manifesto-rebuilding-americas-defenses
6) Vision 2020 was a document of the Space
Command published in 1998 and later made available to the general public
during the George W. Bush regime. (https://fas.org/spp/military/docops/usspac/visbook.pdf).
It was a simplified version of the revolution in the US armed forces that the
new Bush Administration hoped to achieve. WILPF tried to stop this revolution
and young staff members formed WILPF Reaching Critical Will in the
process; but by 2008 the vision was achieved and the United States military
dominated the space dimension of military operations to protect US interest
and investment. Integrating space forces overwhelming capability across the
full spectrum of conflict. (from General Estes
introduction to Vision 2020.)
THE PRAGUE PROMISES AND THE NEW NUCLEAR
ARMS RACE
7) The successful Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) meeting and the failure of the Conference on
Disarmament (CD) both dominated United Nations disarmament news in 2000. The
NPT occurred in May before the USA election and all governments agreed on Thirteen
Practical Steps toward abolition of nuclear weapons. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/13_steps, WILPF
joined a wide variety of organizations in welcoming this document and looked for
ways to support it. However, once the new US Administration was in place in
early 2001 it blocked all forward action in the Conference on Disarmament (CD),
the sole disarmament negotiating body in Geneva. The CD is now, for a variety
of reasons, thoroughly broken and has not even been able to set a working
agenda, let alone negotiate a nuclear weapons comprehensive disarmament treaty
or any other treaty on disarmament -- since 1996. You can track the history of
this tragic failure on Reaching Critical Will at http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/disarmament-fora/others/cd.
Read the UNs own version at http://www.unog.ch/cd/
WILPF staff monitored every session of the CD from 2003 and wrote reports for
public perusal until March 10 2015. At that point WILPF staff announced in a
public statement that they would cease to waste energy on monitoring the CD
until it changed and resumed a program of work. See http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/cd/2015/statements/part1/10March_WILPF.pdf
10) International Physicians for Prevention of Nuclear War
(IPPNPW) http://lcnp.org/pubs/2007-securing-our-survival.pdf
11) The text of President Barack Obama’s Prague speech April 5, 2009 at delivered http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/05/obama-prague-speech-on-nu_n_183219.html.
But instead of leading a new effort to abolish nuclear weapons, President Obama
gave the military industrial complex all the money they wanted.
12) See the 2015 edition of Assuring Destruction Forever. This
updated study, first issued in 2012 by WILPF Reaching Critical Will,
explores the ongoing and planned nuclear weapon modernization programs in
China, France, India, Israel, Pakistan, Russian Federation, the United Kingdom,
and the United States. Download it for free at http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/resources/publications-and-research/publications/9724-assuring-destruction-forever-2015-edition.
The original version was first published in March 2012 and is 145 pages - http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Publications/modernization/assuring-destruction-forever.pdf.
THE HUMANITARIAN IMPACT OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND NEW
HOPE FOR CHANGE
13) The International Red Cross/Red
Crescent Society has opposed nuclear weapons as against humanitarian law
since their first use in 1945 and has called for their complete elimination. In
2011 they reconfirmed their longstanding call for abolition of these weapons - http://www.icanw.org/campaign-news/red-cross-and-red-crescent-reconfirms-commitment-to-a-nuclear-ban.
In WILPF-US we urge local WILPF Branches to engage on this issue with their
local Red Cross chapter re their support for this resolution and nuclear
weapons abolition. (Report back their reaction to carol.disarm@gmail.com. We have been told
that US offices have been cautioned not to discuss the issue in the U.S.)
14) This resolution helped fuel a powerful new global movement to ban nuclear
weapons.
See http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/disarmament-fora/hinw
for a summary of this movement, supported initially by the
government of Norway with a conference March 2013, and then by Mexico in
February 2014 and by Austria ten months later in December 2014. Reports on all
three conferences are available from Reaching Critical Will online:
- Oslo, Norway March 4-5 2013, 127 governments, 8
pages with Reaching Critical Will Resources. Norwegian report in English
at https://www.regjeringen.no/en/topics/foreign-affairs/humanitarian-efforts/humimpact_2013/id708603
- Nayarit, Mexico February 13-14 2014, 146 governments, 20 pp with statement to
the conference by Ray Acheson, WILPF Reaching Critical Will. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/disarmament-fora/hinw/nayarit-2014
- Vienna, Austria December 8-9 2013, 158 governments, 88 pp.
It includes the Humanitarian
Pledge
in which the Austrian government pledges to cooperate with all relevant
stakeholders, States, international organizations, the International Red Cross
and Red Crescent movements, Parliamentarians and civil society, in efforts to
stigmatize, prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons in light of their
unacceptable humanitarian consequences and associated risks. http://www.icanw.org/pledge/
FACEBOOK
NEWS SITES you might want to follow:
Many people don’t keep up with Facebook
because of the sheer quantity of messages they receive. Ellen Thomas has been posting stories about
nuclear issues to NucNews on Yahoo
since 1998. In 2016 Ellen launched the
following Facebook pages to share news specifically
related to issues, for those who seek to be educated without being overwhelmed.
NucNews - https://www.facebook.com/nucnews/
Radioactive Roads - https://www.facebook.com/RadioactiveRoads/
Eye on Congress - https://www.facebook.com/EyeOnCongress/
WILPF-US - https://www.facebook.com/wilpfus/
Nuclear Free Future Tour - https://www.facebook.com/NFFtour/
SECTION III: SPEAKING TO LEGISLATORS – (developed during 2017 Nuclear Free Future Tour)
We are asking both
Representatives and Senators to
- insist the US government enter in good faith into the UN Nuclear Weapons Ban Treaty. See ICANW.org and ReachingCriticalWill.org for updates.
- halt the unnecessary and extremely hazardous shipments of highly radioactive liquid materials (HRLM) from Chalk River, Canada to Savannah River Site, South Carolina. The US has not, to our knowledge, required an Environmental Impact Statement or public education about the dangers involved in shipping 100-150 truckloads of HRLM on our nation’s highways. We suggest Canada should deal with its own radioactive waste, preferably hardened onsite storage.
- help St. Louis, Missouri, move the residents living beside the Manhattan Project radioactive waste at the West Lake Landfill, currently threatened by an underground fire out of control.
- investigate and stop the dangerous pollution of the Nolichucky River in Erwin, Tennessee, by Nuclear Fuel Services; insist on a cancer survey and that the NRC rescind the 25-year extension of NFF’s license to operate – “Wall of Women”
- encourage Arizona Representative Raul Grijalva to introduce the “Uranium Mining Moratorium and Cleanup Act” developed by Defenders of the Black Hills - http://www.cleanupthemines.org.
- if you support Senator Markey and Representative Lieu’s “Restricting First Use of Nuclear Weapons Act” - S. 3400 and H.R. 6179 - don’t stop there! We need to move the money from nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants! So…
Be sure to also support DC Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton’s “Nuclear Weapons Abolition and Economic and Energy Conversion Act” in the 115th Congress! See http://prop1.org for history of bill and Roots Action petition.
Share
your news, photos and questions on WILPF-US Facebook by
emailing et@prop1.org!