When the cold war ended in 1989,
most people expected the wolds nuclear arsenals to be dismantled
and the threat of nuclear war to go away.
But the danger has not passed.
Tens of thousands of nuclear weapons remain. Thousands are poised
on missiles on "hair-trigger" alert, ready to be launched
within minutes at cities and towns populated by millions of human
beings.
While improved relations between
the US and Russia makes a deliberate nuclear attack less likely
than during the cold war, the weakening of command and control
structures in the former Soviet Union has actually increased the
chance of an accidental nuclear war. And the possibility remains
that political change on either side could re-ignite Cold War
era tensions.
 Military
leaders, physicians, politicians, religious groups, and the vast
of Americans agree that nuclear weapons must be abolished to improve
national and global security. In the nearer term, separating warheads
from delivery systems would substantially reduce the risk of accidental
nuclear war.
- Some Solutions
President Bush must use the historic opportunity offered by recent
US-Russian START III framework agreement to further reduce and
ultimately eliminate the nuclear threat. He should do all he can
do:
- Remove all existing weapons from alert status.
- Pursue a START III agreement and then negotiate deeper reductions
that would set a target of no more than 1000 warheads on each
side. This would set the stage for multilateral negotiations with
the other nuclear powers for the complete abolition of nuclear
weapons.
A Case History
On January 25, 1995, an unidentified ballistic missile was detected
over the Norwegian Sea by Russia's nuclear command center. Russian
President Boris Yeltsin had to choose whether or not to retaliate
against the US. He had four minutes to decide.
The alleged missile turned out to
be a Norwegian weather rocket. Norwegian officials had notified
the Russians in advance, but the message was not relayed to the
Russian nuclear weapons command center. Fortunately, President Yeltsin
had decided not to retaliate with a nuclear strike.
The continuing threat of accidental
or illicit nuclear was id a grim and stark reality. The situation
requires immediate leadership from the US and Russia to reduce and
ultimately eliminate the nuclear threat.
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