TODAY. The international political system of nuclear bullying must change, or it will kill us all

The normalisation of mass killing of civilians really got underway in February 1945, with the fire-bombing of Dresden. This normalisation was re-authorised in August 1945 with the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Mass killing can be done in other ways – “normal” bombing, starvation, … and behind all that, the threat that nuclear weapons can be used if the victims resist.

Ray Acheson has beautifully explained this. So – we all live under that threat – at any time a so-called political leader might decide to use nuclear weapons.

So we live under the “international rules-based order” – which is backed up by this nuclear threat.

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It all doesn’t make sense.

Not only do we have to accept that it’s OK for our side to massacre civilians of the other side. We’re also agreeing to the massacre of our own civilians, because the USA has set up numerous missile bases as targets ,so that some of them will attract the nuclear bombing by the enemy. That’s supposed to “dilute” the power of the enemy’s nuclear attack across the nation.

That’s just one bit of the craziness of an international relationship system that is based on nuclear bullying.

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Further insanity, illogic of the system – Ray Acheson quotes Martin Amis:

What is the only provocation that could bring about the use of nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the priority target for nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the only established defence against nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. How do we prevent the use of nuclear weapons? By threatening to use nuclear weapons. And we can’t get rid of nuclear weapons, because of nuclear weapons.

They call it “deterrence”, but as Acheson points out – the possession of nuclear weapons does not deter war and violence. In fact it enables war. The nation possessing nuclear weapons (and there are more of such nations now) can intimidate others – cower them into not standing up to aggression and war crimes.

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Not to be forgotten in our consumer society, with its gospel of eternal growth, and profit as the most virtuous goal – the success of the nuclear business. Financial investments in nuclear weapons provide profits for weapons manufacturers that also build conventional bombs, missiles, guns, fighter jets, and other technologies of war.

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Can the world change from this madness?

Surely so. Let’s remember the conclusion of Anne Frank, 13 year old victim of the Nazi death chambers- “I still believe that people are really good at heart “

The Second Meeting of States Parties (2MSP) to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) will take place from 27 November to 1 December 2023 at UN Headquarters in New York City.

November 25, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

The Shape of Nuclear Abolition

Nuclear Ban Daily, Vol. 4, No. 1  https://reachingcriticalwill.org/disarmament-fora/nuclear-weapon-ban/2msp/reports/17072-nuclear-ban-daily-vol-4-no-1

Editorial: The Shape of Nuclear Abolition
24 November 2023, By Ray Acheson

Writer Martin Amis describes nuclear weapons as instruments of blood and rubble. These days, blood and rubble seems to be everywhere, most of all, for the moment, in Gaza. Thousands of bombs dropped on apartment buildings, hospitals, bakeries. And still, this is apparently not enough blood or rubble. The genocidal bombing continues, as do the shipments of weapons to continue the genocidal bombing. And in the midst of all this bombing, an Israeli minister found it appropriate to muse about dropping a nuclear weapon on Gaza. His remarks have been condemned by many governments, but are they surprising, when the practice of nuclear-armed states is to commit massive amounts of violence wherever and whenever they desire?

Nuclear weapons are part of the spectrum of violence—at the possibly-world-ending end of the spectrum. Daniel Ellsberg recognised this, describing how the firebombing of Dresden, London, and Tokyo in World War II led to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, normalizing the concept of cities on fire, of civilians as targets. In this world of blood and rubble, every day that nuclear weapons exist is a day that they might be detonated, dropped on a city or a missile silo, tested on an island or in a desert, unleashing terrible forces of blast, heat, fire, and radiation on people’s bodies, into the land, water, and air. Every day that nuclear weapons exist is a day that a so-called political leader might decide to use them.

Blood and rubble are policy choices. Blood and rubble are planned for by all of those who shape and propagate the dangerous doctrine of nuclear deterrence. In his introduction to Einstein’s Monsters, Amis writes:

What is the only provocation that could bring about the use of nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the priority target for nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the only established defence against nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. How do we prevent the use of nuclear weapons? By threatening to use nuclear weapons. And we can’t get rid of nuclear weapons, because of nuclear weapons.

This is the relentless circular (il)logic of deterrence, the principal tenant of which is that the possession of nuclear weapons makes their use impossible and thus prevents war. But whether it is the United States attacking Iraq, Russia invading Ukraine, or Israel committing genocide in Palestine, it should be clear to all that nuclear weapons do not prevent war. They enable it.

Whether nuclear weapons are used or not, they facilitate other forms of violence. They are the backbone of a mentality that security can best be achieved through building up the capacity to commit mass destruction, and by committing mass destruction. Nuclear weapons are used as shields to prevent others from standing up to their possessors’ acts of aggression, to their war crimes. Financial investments in nuclear weapons provide profits for weapons manufacturers that also build conventional bombs, missiles, guns, fighter jets, and other technologies of war. Nuclear weapons provide sustenance to the war machine, and exist as the overarching, final threat of that machine.

The possession of nuclear weapons drives the development of self-destructive plans masquerading as national security. Governments willfully put people and the planet in harm’s way, arrogantly asserting that this is the best way to protect them. One example is the land-based missile silos in the United States, which are intended to serve as targets for enemy nuclear weapons with no concern for the communities or land upon which they are based. As part of his new ground-breaking project examining the US government’s plan to modernise its nuclear forces, Sébastien Philippe of Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security writes in Scientific American, “a key argument for the continued existence—and now the replenishment—of the land-based missiles is to provide a large number of fixed targets meant to exhaust the enemy’s resources.” Yet the most recent, 3000-page report from US government on these silos does not mention what happens if the missiles are attacked. But as Philippe’s modelling of these “sacrifice zones” shows:

A concerted nuclear attack on the existing U.S. silo fields—in Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, Montana and North Dakota—would annihilate all life in the surrounding regions and contaminate fertile agricultural land for years. Minnesota, Iowa and Kansas would also probably face high levels of radioactive fallout. Acute radiation exposure alone would cause several million fatalities across the U.S.—if people get advance warning and can shelter in place for at least four days. Without appropriate shelter, that number could be twice as high. Because of great variability in wind directions, the entire population of the contiguous U.S. and the most populated areas of Canada, as well as the northern states of Mexico, would be at risk of lethal fallout—more than 300 million people in total. The inhabitants of the U.S. Midwest and of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario in Canada could receive outdoor whole-body doses of radiation several times higher than the minimum known to result in certain death.

“Higher than the minimum known to result in certain death.” How can anyone read these words and think, “No, this is not relevant for a study on the impacts of our weapon systems.” Or, more broadly, that “No, this is not relevant for our consideration of the possession and deployment of these weapons at all. In fact, we will base our security strategy on the possibility of mass death and unspeakable suffering, and this is normal and fine for us and a few select others—this is how we will dominate. This is how we ‘win’.”

The irrationality of basing national security on the ability to execute or absorb catastrophic events like genocide is not lost on states parties and signatories to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). These governments understand that security must be provided for through other means. That it is both immoral and illogical to threaten to melt people, to turn them into shadows, or to subject them to a protracted, painful death from radiation poisoning, in order to—what, exactly? Exercise dominance within the so-called world order? Be able to wage wars of aggression against whomever one wants, whenever one wants?

The governments that join the TPNW are not just pledging against acquiring nuclear weapons themselves—they are also committed to achieving the abolition of all nuclear weapons, and to building a world that does not rely on massive nuclear violence for security. When these governments gathered with activists and others in 2017 to prohibit nuclear weapons, they changed the world. Not just rhetorically, but materially. The creation of a legally binding treaty outlawing the possession, use, and threat of use of atomic bombs has enabled unprecedented financial divestment and political stigmatisation of these weapons. It has changed discourse, even if it has not yet changed doctrines. But one follows the other.

Six years after the adoption of the TPNW, the nuclear-armed states and nuclear-supportive allies are still clinging to their arsenals of mass destruction. But the horrors these governments have collectively wrought upon the world are clearer—and more condemned—than ever. The masks are off, the wizards are no longer behind the curtain. Political leaders that condone mass death are being denounced; global inequalities are being exposed and opposed. The tide may not yet have fully turned, but the wave of opposition to permanent war and violent aggression is growing every single day. People are organising and getting organised. There is no time to waste, not when it comes to genocide and not when it comes to nuclear weapons.

This meeting of TPNW states parties is an opportunity to advance collective action against the bomb. The governments that have signed and ratified this treaty must adopt a strong declaration condemning nuclear deterrence and the continued possession and modernisation of nuclear arsenals. They must continue to implement last year’s action plan and work to get more countries onboard the treaty, especially those still trying to hide behind the false security promised by nuclear-armed states in exchange for sharing the economic and political burdens of nuclearism. The governments that aid and abet nuclear-armed states must relinquish this immoral space and join the rest of the world in renouncing the policies and practices of mass death.

But this meeting of states parties is not just about governments, it’s about people. It’s about the Indigenous Peoples upon whose bodies and lands nuclear weapons have been detonated, again and again and again. It’s about the communities who have been forced, without their consent or knowledge, to host uranium mines, nuclear laboratories, missile silos or bomber and submarine fleets, radioactive waste dumps. It is about all of us living with radiation from nuclear testing in our bodies, contaminated for generations by the hubris of political and corporate leaders who put their profits and sense of power above everything else. This meeting will be filled with people from affected communities, activist organisations, scientific groups, academic institutions, and more. Nuclear weapons have never just been about states. Nuclear weapons, fundamentally, are about human life, about all life. The nuclear-armed states have refused to acknowledge, let alone include, most people in conversations or policy making about their bombs. But the TPNW is a space for everyone to have a voice, to participate, and to determine how we fight for nuclear abolition, together.

“Nuclear weapons are mirrors in which we see all the versions of the human shape,” writes Amis. What shape do we want to reflect?

November 25, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Second Meeting of State Parties to Treaty on Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons to Be Held at Headquarters, 27 November–1 December

NEW YORK, 24 November (Office for Disarmament Affairs) — The second Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons will be held at the United Nations Headquarters from 27 November-1 December 2023.  Juan Ramón de la Fuente (Mexico) was elected as President of the Meeting.

The Treaty, the first multilateral nuclear disarmament treaty to be negotiated in more than two decades, was adopted on 7 July 2017 at the United Nations and entered into force on 22 January 2021.  United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has called the Treaty “an important step towards the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons and a strong demonstration of support for multilateral approaches to nuclear disarmament.”

The second Meeting of States Parties is expected to hold a thematic debate on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons.  States parties will also consider the status and operation of the Treaty, addressing issues that include universality; the total elimination of nuclear weapons; and victim assistance, environmental remediation and international cooperation and assistance.  Other topics will include scientific and technical advice for the effective implementation of the Treaty, the complementarity of the Treaty with the existing nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation regime and implementing the gender provisions of the Treaty.

The Meeting is expected to adopt a political declaration. The period since the conclusion of the first Meeting of States Parties in April 2022 saw the appointment of a Scientific Advisory Group, which will present its initial reports at the second Meeting of States Parties.  Since the first Meeting of States Parties, seven States signed the Treaty, three ratified it and one acceded to it.

The Treaty contains, inter alia, a comprehensive set of prohibitions on participating in any nuclear-weapon-related activities.  This includes undertakings not to develop, test, produce, acquire, possess, stockpile, use or threaten to use nuclear weapons.  The Treaty also prohibits the deployment of nuclear weapons on national territory as well as the provision of assistance to any State in the conduct of prohibited activities.

The Treaty requires States parties to assist individuals affected by the use or testing of nuclear weapons, as well as to take environmental remediation measures in areas under their jurisdiction or control that have been contaminated due to the testing or use of nuclear weapons.  States parties are required to cooperate with one another to facilitate the Treaty’s implementation.

To date, 69 States have ratified or acceded to the Treaty and 93 have signed it.

Media contacts for the second Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons:  Suzanne Oosterwijk, United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs, UN Secretariat, S-30FW, telephone: +1 917-367-2556, email: suzanne.oosterwijk@un.org.

November 25, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Nuclear waste bags Fukushima – slowly falling apart

“Contaminated soil bags in Fukushima prefecture. The life span of these bags is about 5 years. No government plan to do anything with these so they are slowly falling apart.”

Arkadiusz Podniesinski was in Fukushima Prefecture.

November 25, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

TODAY. Rafael Gross’ and the IAEA’s breath-taking hypocrisy , as the nuclear lobby revs up for COP 28

There is no limit to their bravado and hypocrisy. They know that nuclear power is really for the weapons industry. They know it is not really safe. That it emits radiation – causes cancer. That there’s no solution for its eternal toxic wastes. That it is obscenely expensive.

And – they know that even if nuclear works against climate change (which it doesn’t), it would never be up and running in time to make any difference, as climate change is upon us now.

Does that stop these shameless hypocrites?

“In his opening statement to the IAEA’s Board of Governors today, Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi spoke of the importance of food security in a world where hunger is on the rise, and in many cases is worsening due to climate change. 

“Over the past three years the number of people who go hungry in the world has increased by almost a fifth,” Mr Grossi said in his statement to the Board, which is meeting at the IAEA’s Vienna headquarters from 22­-24 November. The IAEA and Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) have joined forces in response to this challenge. Mr Grossi and FAO Director General Qu Dongyu  launched Atoms4Food at the World Food Forum last month in Rome. The joint initiative aims to increase global food security and tackle growing hunger through the use of nuclear techniques………..

COP28

Looking ahead to the 28th Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Dubai next month, Mr Grossi noted the growing global momentum on nuclear energy. “For the first time in the history of COP, nuclear countries will be able to say ‘yes, we are here, yes nuclear energy is part of the solution for this global climate crisis that we have’.”

The IAEA will showcase initiatives such as Atoms4NetZero and Atoms4Food at COP28 as well as other aspects of its work in helping the world monitor, mitigate and adapt to climate change.

November 23, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

What Would It Mean to ‘Absorb’ a Nuclear Attack?- nuclear missile silos as a “sponge”

Scientific American , By Ella Weber on November 22, 2023

The missiles on the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota make it a potential target for a nuclear attack. And that doesn’t come close to describing what the reality would be for those on the ground.

This podcast is Part 4 of a five-part series. Listen to Part 1 here, Part 2 here, and Part 3 here. The podcast series is a part of “The New Nuclear Age,” a special report on a $1.5-trillion effort to remake the American nuclear arsenal.…..

Ella Weber: Members of my tribe live with nuclear missiles on the Fort Berthold Reservation. The weapons sit in underground concrete silos that are surrounded by antennas in small, fenced-off areas. The missiles are armed and ready to launch in 60 seconds. This is one reason they are called Minutemen missiles…………………………….

Weber: After learning that the Air Force had not explained to my tribe what the new nuclear missiles were for–which the Air Force intended to deploy for another 60 years on our reservation–I decided to dig deeper.

I wanted to know what role the missiles and their silos play today in U.S. nuclear strategy and what the risks for the tribe were in hosting them—something that the tribe never agreed to in the first place………………….

I wasn’t really clear on what Secretary Jim Mattis meant by the ICBM force providing a “cost-imposing strategy,” so I talked to Leonor Tomero to get some clarity. She used to serve as deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear and missile defense policy in the Biden administration in 2021…………

Weber: Leonor explained to me that should the U.S. face a potential nuclear attack, the president would have two choices with regards to the ICBMs: launch them preventively before the missiles possibly got destroyed, or decide to absorb the attack and retaliate later.

Weber (tape): What do you mean by absorbing an attack?

Tomero: I think, you know, it’s, you know, they’re considered a sponge.

Weber (tape): So it’s kind of like making these ICBMs, like, a target ….

Tomero: Yes…

Weber (tape): …. rather than, like, these other major cities or other places…

Tomero: Right.

Weber: In case you don’t know — the role  of the ICBM is to force an adversary to use many nuclear weapons if they decided to attack the U.S. The silos are basically meant to divert and absorb the incoming nuclear missiles from important and critical areas in the country, like cities.

But what would that mean for the Fort Berthold reservation?……………………………………………………………………

Frank Von Hippel: Basically the secretary of defense had come in and testified to Congress. When one of the senators asked how many people would such an attack kill, he estimated 15,000 to 25,000. And he said, ‘Well, that would be terrible, but it would be not what you would expect from a major nuclear attack.’

That seemed low to, actually, the senator from New Jersey [Clifford Case]. And he asked for a peer review of the Defense Department calculations, and, and I was then asked to be an unpaid consultant to look into that. And, in fact, I went over to the Pentagon to talk to the people who have done the calculations.

Weber: Frank found something unexpectedly horrifying.

Von Hippel: The Defense Department had assumed that explosions of the warheads over the ICBM silos would be so high that they would not cause fallout. They pointed out they would also not damage the silos.

Weber: Basically, the Department of Defense hadn’t calculated properly. The DOD had made incorrect assumptions about the altitude of nuclear explosions aimed at destroying the silos. Initially, it had thought the nuclear explosions would need to be at an altitude. But–they actually needed to be at ground level.

Von Hippel: The DoD was forced to go back and do new calculations reflecting these points, and they came out about 1,000 times higher: 20 million—on the order of 20 million people killed.

Weber (tape): Wow.

…………………………………. Von Hippel: Well, you know, the, I don’t know who coined this term about the silos being a nuclear sponge, but the local….I think there would be annihilation of the local population around the silos. Wouldn’t just be the fallout—would also be the, the blast effects, and so on. So they would be the worst affected.

Weber (tape): My grandma only lives two and a half miles away from an ICBM silo. What would happen to her and her place?

Von Hippel: I think she would be within the blast radius … and the fire radius…. I don’t know how flammable… her house would be presumably burned after being knocked flat. And then there would be the fallout. These explosions would have to be low enough to hit the set of silos with sufficient overpressure to destroy the missiles inside. It would have to be low enough for, for the dirt to be and debris to be sucked up into the cloud. And then that would bring down some of the radioactivity in a very intense patch around the silo. So … multiple ways in which she might die. I’m sorry.

Weber (tape): I mean, she didn’t make the decision to have them there. So …

Von Hippel: Yeah, I know

Weber: Being treated as expendable isn’t new to Indigenous communities. As far as I could tell, members of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation don’t see themselves as living in a sacrifice zone. 

This designation treats certain areas and people as acceptable losses; they bear the brunt of the risks and consequences associated with nuclear weapons and decisions made by others. Maybe if members of the tribe had a better understanding of what the risks were, they could challenge the deployment of these silos on our land…………………………….

Sébastien Philippe: Now I’m going to put the whole image of the entire areas that can be impacted by the fallout, and I can walk you through the color coding, but that’s basically the worst case possible for every single person on the map.

Edmund Baker: Okay. Holy crap. Even Disneyland’s not immune. Disney World’s out. New York—there’s no safe place.

So that batch there, North Dakota, the white sort of color…?

Philippe: Yeah.

Baker: That’s 100 percent fatality in that zone?

Philippe: Times 10. Yeah, ten times what you would need to die—and that’s just from the radioactivity.

Baker: Okay, so that’s not in the EIS, I figure, or is it?

Philippe: Uh, no.

Weber: By the way, Edmund’s talking about an environmental impact statement, or EIS—a two-volume report released by the U.S. Air Force that is meant to analyze, “the potential effects on the human and natural environments from the deployment of the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile system.” 

This was the report that the Air Force had presented to my reservation—in a different place than it had initially advertised. And in the entire 3,000 pages of the report and its appendices— which cost $33 million to write, by the way —  Sébastien had found that the consequences of a nuclear war that could impact my tribe were kind of glossed over. 

The EIS mentioned the “casualties” and “grave implications” of such a war but they didn’t really go beyond that. 

Here’s Frank again, speaking about the military’s attitudes toward the consequences of war in general.

Von Hippel: They talk about people like your grandmother as being collateral damage. I mean…, they try to desensitize themselves to what the consequences are, what they’re talking about—and, in fact, I remember when I first went over to the Pentagon to talk to people, I learned—the first time I heard this word called “collateral damage,” that is—“We, you know, we didn’t intend to kill your grandmother…. She’s, unfortunately, collateral damage.”…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Weber: If anyone could advise the U.S. on resilience and survivability, it would be us: the MHA Nation. And I have a feeling that keeping ICBM silos operating across our land may not be part of our preferred strategy.

In the next and final episode, I go back to the rez and report what I found to my family and members of the tribe. We sit down and discuss: What happens now?

This show was reported by me, Ella Weber, produced by Sébastien Philippe and Tulika Bose. Script editing by Tulika Bose. Post-production design and mixing by Jeff DelViscio. Thanks to special advisor Ryo Morimoto and Jessica Lambert. Music by Epidemic Sound. 

I’m Ella Weber, and this was The Missiles on Our Rez, a special podcast collaboration from Scientific American, Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security, Nuclear Princeton, and Columbia Journalism School.   https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/what-would-it-mean-to-absorb-a-nuclear-attack/

November 23, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Nuclear Power: UK’s Financial Challenge Unveiled

the actual cost might reach as high as £10 billion per reactor, resulting in an astonishing cumulative expense for the decommissioning process. …

this substantial cost could ultimately fall on taxpayers, raising concerns about the financial burden on the public.

Dev X Noah Nguyen, November 21, 2023

The UK’s Commitment to Nuclear Power and Financial Challenges

The United Kingdom’s dedication to nuclear power is becoming a financially challenging commitment as the dismantling expenses for its nuclear generating facilities continue to escalate. These costs have been advantageous for businesses involved in the dismantling process but a noteworthy expenditure for UK taxpayers

Regardless of the substantial costs associated with the new nuclear reactors at Hinkley Site C and the rising price of clean-up initiatives, the nation’s government remains committed to nuclear technology. This unwavering commitment is driven by the belief that nuclear power is crucial for achieving the UK’s long-term energy security and climate change goals. However, critics argue that increased investment in renewable energy sources could provide similar benefits, without the high financial burden and safety concerns associated with nuclear power……………………………………………………

Concerns Regarding Decommissioning Costs and Life Expectancy of Reactors

Nearly all of the remaining functional reactors are scheduled for closure by 2028, except Sizewell B, anticipated to stay in operation until 2035. With a life expectancy of roughly 40 years—considerably shorter than the 60 to 80 years frequently claimed by the sector—questions emerge about the demolition costs for the existing 23 reactors and the two under construction at Hinkley Point C.

As these reactors reach the end of their life cycle, it is crucial to plan and allocate resources effectively for their dismantling and waste disposal. The cost of decommissioning and managing nuclear facilities can significantly impact the overall economic feasibility of the energy generated, emphasizing the need for accurate cost estimations and environmentally responsible strategies.

Projected Costs of Dismantling and Importance of Effective Management

By the end of 2022, the UK’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) projected a total dismantling cost of £149 billion. If this figure encompasses Hinkley Site C, it would equate to about £6 billion per reactor. This substantial financial investment highlights the importance of thoroughly managing the decommissioning process to ensure effective resource allocation. With the growing push towards renewable energy sources, proper management and safe dismantling of nuclear reactors have become increasingly significant for the country’s transition towards sustainable energy.

Higher Potential Costs and the Financial Burden on Taxpayers

However, Professor Stephen Thomas from the University of Greenwich’s energy policy department posits that the actual cost might reach as high as £10 billion per reactor, resulting in an astonishing cumulative expense for the decommissioning process. He further elaborates that this substantial cost could ultimately fall on taxpayers, raising concerns about the financial burden on the public. To mitigate such consequences, proper planning and establishing an adequate funding source must be undertaken for a feasible and efficient decommissioning process…………………………………………………………………………………….

What are the concerns regarding the decommissioning costs and life expectancy of nuclear reactors in the UK?

With functional reactors scheduled for closure and shorter life expectancies than often claimed, there are concerns about the demolition costs for the existing reactors and effective management of resources for dismantling and waste disposal. The cost of decommissioning can significantly impact the overall economic feasibility of nuclear-generated energy and necessitates accurate cost estimations and environmentally responsible strategies………….. https://www.devx.com/news/nuclear-power-uks-financial-challenge-unveiled/

November 23, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

White House Fears Pause In Fighting Will Let Journalists See What’s Been Happening In Gaza

Israel and Hamas have reportedly agreed to a four-day ceasefire which will entail the release of 50 hostages held by Hamas in exchange for 150 hostages held by Israeli forces. 

In an article titled “Biden admin officials see proof their strategy is working in hostage deal,” Politico describes the deal as “the administration’s biggest diplomatic victory of the conflict” and reports that White House officials are calling it a “vindication” of Biden’s decision making. Which is an entirely inappropriate level of verbal fellatio for an achievement as minimal as not murdering children for a few days.

Tucked away many paragraphs into this report is a sentence which is getting a lot of attention on social media today saying that according to Politico’s sources there has been some resistance to the pause in fighting within the administration due to fears that it will allow journalists into Gaza to report on the devastation Israel has inflicted upon the enclave.

“And there was some concern in the administration about an unintended consequence of the pause: that it would allow journalists broader access to Gaza and the opportunity to further illuminate the devastation there and turn public opinion on Israel,” Politico reports.

In other words, the White House is worried that a brief pause in the Israeli massacre of civilians in Gaza will allow journalists to report the truth about the Israeli massacre of civilians in Gaza, because it will hurt the information interests of the US and Israel. They are worried that the public will become more aware of facts and truth.

Needless to say, if you’re standing on the right side of history you’re not typically worried about journalists reporting true facts about current events and thereby damaging public support for your agendas. But that is the side that the US and Israel have always stood on, which is why the US empire is currently imprisoning Julian Assange for doing good journalism on US war crimes and why Israel has a decades-long history of threatening and targeting journalists.

During Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza in 2021 the IDF reportedly targeted more than 20 Palestinian press institutions in the enclave, as well as the tower hosting the international outlets AP and Al Jazeera. During this current onslaught Israel has been killing dozens of Palestinian journalists, sometimes by actively bombing their homes where they live with their families. The IDF’s campaign to wipe out inconvenient news reporters has resulted in the Committee to Protect Journalists calling this the deadliest conflict on record for journalists anywhere, ever.

Both the US and Israel have been attacking the press in this way because their governments understand that whoever controls the narrative controls the world. They understand that while power is controlling what happens, ultimate power is controlling what people think about what happens. Human consciousness is dominated by mental narratives, so if you can control society’s dominant narratives, you can control the humans. 

This is why the powerful have been able to remain in power in our civilization — because they understand this, while we the public generally do not. That’s why they bombard us with nonstop mass media propaganda, that’s why they work to censor the internet, that’s why Julian Assange languishes in prison, that’s why Israel routinely murders journalists, and that’s why the White House is afraid of what will happen if worldwide news reporters are able to get their cameras into Gaza.

November 23, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Lawsuit Against Alleged CIA Spying on Assange Visitors: A Rare Court Hearing

A federal judge pushed back when a government attorney refused to confirm or deny whether the CIA had engaged in warrantless surveillance.

SCHEERPOST, By Kevin Gosztola / The Dissenter, November 21, 2023

A United States court held an extraordinary hearing on November 16, where a judge carefully considered a lawsuit against the CIA and former CIA director Mike Pompeo for their alleged role in spying on American attorneys and journalists who visited WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Judge John Koeltl of the Southern District of New York pushed back when Assistant U.S. Attorney Jean-David Barnea refused to confirm or deny that the CIA had targeted Americans without obtaining a warrant. He also invited attorneys for the Americans to update the lawsuit so that claims of privacy violations explicitly dealt with the government’s lack of a warrant.

In August 2022, four Americans sued the CIA and Pompeo: Margaret Ratner Kunstler, a civil rights activist and human rights attorney; Deborah Hrbek, a media lawyer who represented Assange or WikiLeaks; journalist John Goetz, who worked for Der Spiegel when the German media organization first partnered with WikiLeaks; and journalist Charles Glass, who wrote articles on Assange for The Intercept.

The lawsuit alleged that as visitors Glass, Goetz, Hrbek, and Kunstler were required to “surrender” their electronic devices to employees of a Spanish company called UC Global, which was contracted to provide security for the Ecuador embassy.

UC Global and the company’s director David Morales “copied the information stored on the devices” and shared the information with the CIA. The agency even had access to live video and audio feeds from cameras in the embassy………………………………………………………………………………………………

Though the court was open to reviewing arguments against the CIA, Koeltl seemed highly skeptical that the claim against Pompeo in his individual capacity would survive against the government.

In 1971, a U.S. Supreme Court case known as Bivens created a process for bringing cases against federal government officials for violating a person’s constitutional rights. Pompeo was sued under that doctrine. However, courts have been extremely reluctant to allow plaintiffs to pursue damages when a case may set a precedent or lead to a court intruding upon national security and foreign policy matters…………………………………………………………….

The CIA knew from their passports whether they were American citizens or not, and the agency still went ahead with targeted surveillance against them.  https://scheerpost.com/2023/11/21/lawsuit-against-alleged-cia-spying-on-assange-visitors-a-rare-court-hearing/

November 23, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

TODAY. Nuclear lobby busting to control COP 28 – now their stooge John Kerry is touting the fantasy of nuclear fusion.

Yeah yeah – we all know that nuclear fusion is theoretically “carbon-emissions-free”

Great! BUT:

Time. “The reality is that fusion energy will not be viable at scale anytime within the next decade, a time frame over which carbon emissions must be reduced by 50% to avoid catastrophic warming of more than 1.5°C,”  – climate expert Michael Mann

 Energy. Nuclear fusion requires 100 times more energy to charge than the energy it ends up producing.

Cost. Requires highly expensive tritium and lithium.

Space. Current efforts have taken up a huge area – how much space would be needed to do fusion on a commercial scale? 

Wastes. tritium is the radioactive form of hydrogen. Its little isotopes are great at permeating metals and finding ways to escape tight enclosures. Obviously, this will pose a significant problem for those who want to continuously breed tritium in a fusion reactor.

Weapons connection. Since first tried out in that monstrous Marshall Islands explosion, fusion has been intended as a tool of war. the American government is interested not in using fusion technology to power the energy grid, but in using it to further strengthen this country’s already massive arsenal of atomic weapons.

November 21, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

A new Palestinian state could never be free as long as its neighbor, Israel, possesses nuclear weapons.

The 2-State Solution’s Nuclear Option

SCHEERPOST, By Scott Ritter / Consortium News, November 20, 2023

“………………………………………………………………………………………………. the United States continues to provide diplomatic cover for Israel’s nuclear weapons, maintaining the fiction of ambiguity despite knowing full well Israel possesses a very robust nuclear arsenal. This posture is becoming more difficult to sustain, given the increasingly aggressive posture assumed by the Israeli government regarding its own policy of ambiguity. 

In 2022, during a periodic review by the United Nations of the Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) , then-Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid addressed the Israeli Atomic Energy Commission about Israel’s “defensive and offensive capabilities, and what is referred to in the foreign media as other capabilities. These other capabilities,” Lapid said, clearly alluding to Israel’s nuclear weapons, “keep us alive and will keep us alive as long as we and our children are here.”

As things stand, the threat posed by Israeli nuclear weapons to both regional and global security is as great today as at any time in Israeli history. With the potential of the current Palestinian-Israeli conflict expanding to include Hezbollah and perhaps Iran, Israel for the first time since 1973 faces a genuine existential threat — the kind of threat Israel’s nuclear weapons were built to deter. 

An Israeli minister has already alluded to the attractiveness of using nuclear weapons against Hamas in Gaza. But the real threat comes from what happens if Iran is dragged into the war. Here, Israel’s much rumored “Samson Option” could come into play, where Israel uses its nuclear arsenal to destroy as many enemies as possible once the continued survival of Israel is at risk.

Given the present risk posed by Israel’s nuclear arsenal, it is essential that the current Palestinian-Israeli conflict be prevented from expanding. Once the conflict can be ended, the process must begin for a long-term solution that includes a free and independent Palestine. However, a new Palestinian state can never be free if its neighbor, Israel possesses nuclear weapons. 

Operating with the understanding that the creation of a Palestinian state would coincide with a renewed push for normalization of relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors, the result vis-à-vis the security of Israel would be a much-improved situation that made Israel’s need for nuclear weapons moot. 

South African Example

The question then becomes how Israel can be persuaded to voluntarily give up its nuclear weapons. Fortunately, there is an example from history. 

Apartheid South Africa had embarked on a nuclear weapons program in the early 1970s. U.S. intelligence reports show that South Africa formally began its nuclear weapons program in 1973.  By 1982, it had developed and built its first nuclear explosive device.

Seven years later, in 1989, South Africa had manufactured six functional nuclear bombs, each capable of delivering an explosive equivalent of 19 kilotons of TNT.

The South African nuclear weapons program mirrored that of the Israeli program in that it was conducted in great secrecy and designed to deter the threat posed by communist-supported black liberation movements operating all along the periphery of the South African nation. 

In 1989, South Africa elected a new president, F. W. de Klerk, who quickly realized that the political winds were changing and that the country could very well, in the span of a few years, fall under the control of black nationalists led by Nelson Mandela.

To prevent that, De Klerk took the unprecedented decision to join the NPT as a non-nuclear state and open its nuclear program for inspection and dismantlement. South Africa joined the NPT in 1991; by 1994, all South Africa’s nuclear weapons had been dismantled under international supervision.

Once the Palestinian-Israeli war comes to an end, and if Israel begins negotiating in good faith about the possibility of a free and independent Palestinian state, the United States should lead an effort to get the Israeli government to follow the path taken by F. W. de Klerk by signing the NPT and working with the International Atomic Energy Agency to dismantle the totality of Israel’s nuclear arsenal. 

Such a move should be non-negotiable — if the United States is serious about creating the conditions of a long and lasting peace between Israel and Palestine, then it should use all the leverage at its disposal to pressure Israel to voluntarily disarm itself of nuclear weapons.

This is the only viable path to peace between Israel and the Arab and Muslim world that surrounds it. 

November 21, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment