New Zealand will push for total ban on nuclear weapons – Jacinda Ardern
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/new-zealand-will-push-for-total-ban-on-nuclear-weapons-jacinda-ardern/KMAJHPQARBHVY3ETZGUGOI7COA/ By Thomas Coughlan, 24 Sep, 2022
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said there is an “outlier” amongst countries that have nuclear weapons because Russia now appears to believe that a nuclear war can be won and fought, as she continued to push for the abolition of nuclear weapons.
Speaking to media after her address to the United Nations General Assembly, Ardern said New Zealand never believed the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD), which meant that countries would not start a nuclear war, because they believed they would be annihilated by their enemy in retaliation.
“New Zealand – no one wants to be proven right on this issue,” Ardern said.
“We’ve always had the view that so long as everyone holds them [nuclear weapons] that no one will push the button – New Zealand has never had the view that that is a good strategy or a safe strategy.”
arlier in the day, she told the United Nations that one country – a reference to Russia – believed it could fight and win a nuclear war.
“It takes one country to believe that their cause is nobler, their might stronger, their people more willing to be sacrificed,” Ardern said.
“None of us can stand on this platform and turn a blind eye to the fact that there are already leaders amongst us who believe this,” she said.
Russia’s apparent belief that it could start and win a nuclear war is a reversal from its position in January, when it made a pledge with other nuclear powers who were signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought”.
American and Russian leaders have been making some version of this statement since leaders Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev first said it in 1985.
If the doctrine of MAD is gone, then the world could be closer to a nuclear war than ever before.
Ardern said Russia was an “outlier” and other countries had a far more stable nuclear policy.
“I wouldn’t take Russia’s position as indicative of the rest of the world.”
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1.This month.
The Road to War brings a sharp focus to why it is not in Australia’s best interest to be dragged into a war with China which will almost inevitably go nuclear very quickly. The filmmaker has interviewed some of Australia’s senior foreign policy analysts who have vast experience behind them in analysing what really is going on here as the United States rattles its sabres with China. And sets us up to be its proxy, like the poor Ukranians have been fed into the Meatgrinder. So America can remain the Top Dog. The Road to War reveals how the United States through its spy base at Pine Gap and by stationing six nuclear capable B52 bombers in the Top End (without permission from the traditional owners) is making Australia a prime nuclear target if the current war of words suddenly melts down into full scale war.
The Road to War shows the implicit connection between Carbon emissions (the US military uses a whopping 70% of America’s annual petroleum to move its armies and vast War Machine around the globe to its 800+ military bases..but under a loophole wangled at Kyoto, the US military does not have to report its C02 annual emissions). The Road to War starts screening at selected cities and regional centres in March. See the trailer end for details.
Antinuclear 
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