{"id":29831,"date":"2023-02-12T18:17:05","date_gmt":"2023-02-12T17:17:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=29831"},"modified":"2023-02-12T18:24:39","modified_gmt":"2023-02-12T17:24:39","slug":"interview-with-helen-caldicott-weve-never-been-closer-to-nuclear-catastrophe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/?p=29831","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Helen Caldicott: “We\u2019ve never been closer to nuclear catastrophe”"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY .<\/p>\n

An article produced by\u00a0Earth | Food | Life<\/a>, a project of the Independent Media Institute and pubished by the Asia Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The following interview took place on January 25, 2023, one day after the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists\u00a0advanced\u00a0<\/a> the hands of the Doomsday Clock to 90 seconds before midnight \u2013 in large part because of developments in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

Helen Caldicott (above), an Australian peace activist and environmentalist, discussed the extreme and imminent threat of a nuclear holocaust due to a proxy war between the US and Russia in Ukraine. She also addressed the announcement by the US Department of Energy of a controlled nuclear reaction and outlines the relationship between the nuclear power industry and nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n

Caldicott is the author of numerous books and is a recipient of at least 12 honorary doctorates. She was nominated for the Nobel Prize by physicist Linus Pauling and named by the Smithsonian Institution as one of the most influential women of the 20th century. Her public talks describing the horrors of nuclear war from a medical perspective raised the consciousness of a generation.<\/p>\n

Caldicott believes that the reality of destroying all of life on the planet has receded from public consciousness, making doomsday more likely. As the title of her\u00a0recent book\u00a0<\/a> states, we are \u201csleepwalking to Armageddon.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steve Taylor:<\/strong>\u00a0What is the Doomsday Clock, and why is it now set to 90 seconds to midnight?<\/p>\n

Helen Caldicott:<\/strong>\u00a0For the last year, it\u2019s been at 100 seconds to midnight, which is the closest it\u2019s ever been. Each year they reset the clock according to international problems, nuclear problems. Ninety seconds to midnight \u2013 I don\u2019t think that is close enough; it\u2019s closer than that. I would put it at 20 seconds to midnight.<\/p>\n

I think we\u2019re in an extremely invidious position where nuclear war could occur tonight, by accident or by design. It\u2019s very clear to me, actually, that the United States is going to war with Russia. And that means, almost certainly, nuclear war \u2013 and that means the end of almost all life on Earth.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0Do you see similarities with the 1962 Cuban missile crisis?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Yes. I got to know John F Kennedy\u2019s secretary of defense, Robert McNamara,\u00a0later in his life<\/a>. He was in the Oval Office at the time of the Cuban missile crisis. He once told me, \u201cHelen, we came so close to nuclear war \u2013 three minutes.\u201d\u00a0Three minutes<\/a>. We\u2019re in a similar situation now.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0So back then, though, famously, the world held its breath during the missile crisis.<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Oh, we were terrified. Terrified, absolutely terrified.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0That doesn\u2019t seem to be the case today.<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Today, the public and policymakers are not being informed adequately about what this really means <\/a> \u2013 that the consequences would be so bizarre and so horrifying.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s very funny;\u00a0New York City\u00a0<\/a> put out a\u00a0video\u00a0<\/a> as a hypothetical [public service\u00a0announcement] in July 2022 showing a woman in the street, and it says the bombs are coming, and it\u2019s going to be a nuclear war. It says that what you do is go inside, you don\u2019t stand by the windows, you stand in the center of the room, and you\u2019ll be all right. I mean, it\u2019s absolutely absurd.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0That is what you were fighting against back in the \u201970s and \u201980s \u2013 this notion that a nuclear war is survivable.<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Yes. There was a US defense official called T K Jones who reportedly said, don\u2019t worry; \u201cif there are enough shovels to go around,\u201d we\u2019ll make it. And his plan was if the bombs are coming and they take half an hour to come, you get out the trusty shovel. You dig a hole. You get in the hole. Someone puts two doors on top and then piles on dirt.<\/p>\n

(Continued in right column)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Question related to this article:<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\n 
\nWhere in the world can we find good leadership today?<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

(Continued from left column)<\/p>\n

I mean, they had plans. But the thing about it is that evolution will be destroyed. We may be the only life in the universe. And if you\u2019ve ever looked at the structure of a single cell, or the beauty of the birds or a rose, I mean, what responsibility do we have?<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0During the Cuban missile crisis, the US did not want missiles pointed at it from Cuba, and the Soviet Union did not want missiles pointed at it from Turkey. Do you see any similarities with the conflict in Ukraine?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Oh, sure. The United States has nuclear weapons in European countries, all ready to go and land on Russia. How do you think Russia feels \u2013 a little bit paranoid?<\/p>\n

Imagine if the Warsaw Pact moved into Canada, all along the northern border of the US, and put missiles all along the northern border. What would the US do? She\u2019d probably blow up the planet as she nearly did with the Cuban missile crisis. I mean, it\u2019s so extraordinarily unilateral in the thinking, not putting ourselves in the minds of the Russian people.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0Do you feel we\u2019re more at risk of nuclear war now than we were during the Cold War?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Yes. We\u2019re closer to nuclear war than we\u2019ve ever been. And that\u2019s what the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists indicated by moving the clock to 90 seconds to midnight.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0Does it seem like political leaders are more cavalier about nuclear exchange now?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Yes, because they haven\u2019t taken in what nuclear war would really mean. And the Pentagon is run by these cavalier folks who are making millions out of selling weapons. Almost the whole of the US budget goes to killing and murder, rather than to health care and education and the children in Yemen, who are, millions of them, starving.<\/p>\n

I mean, we\u2019ve got the money to fix everything on Earth, and also to power the world with renewable energy. The money is there. It\u2019s going into killing and murder instead of life.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0You mentioned energy. The US Department of Energy has\u00a0announced\u00a0<\/a> a so-called\u00a0fusion breakthrough<\/a>. What do you think about the claims that fusion may be our energy future?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0The technology wasn\u2019t part of an energy experiment. It was part of a\u00a0nuclear weapons experiment\u00a0<\/a> called the\u00a0Stockpile Stewardship Program<\/a>. It is inappropriate; it produced an enormous amount of radioactive waste and very little energy. It will never be used to fuel global energy needs for humankind.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0Could you tell us a little bit about the history of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, where scientists developed this fusion technology?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0The Lawrence Livermore Laboratory was where the first hydrogen bombs were developed. It was set up in 1952, by Edward Teller, a wicked man.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0There is this promotion of nuclear energy as a green alternative. Is the nuclear-energy industry tied to nuclear weapons?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0Of course. In the \u201960s, when people were scared stiff of nuclear weapons, there was a Pentagon psychologist who said, look, if we have peaceful nuclear energy, that will alleviate the people\u2019s fear.<\/p>\n

ST<\/strong>:\u00a0At the end of your\u00a01992 book\u00a0If You Love This Planet<\/a>, you wrote, \u201cHope for the Earth lies not with leaders, but in your own heart and soul. If you decide to save the Earth, it will be saved. Each person can be as powerful as the most powerful person who ever lived \u2013 and that is you, if you love this planet.\u201d Do you stand by that?<\/p>\n

HC<\/strong>:\u00a0If we acknowledge the horrifying reality that there is an extreme and imminent threat of nuclear war, it\u2019s like being told that as a planet, we have a terminal disease. If we\u2019re scared enough, every one of us can save the planet. But we have to be very powerful and determined.<\/p>\n

– – – – –<\/p>\n

This interview has been edited for clarity and length. A video of the description of nuclear war from the interview can be\u00a0viewed on Vimeo<\/a>.\u00a0Listen to the entire interview, available for streaming on\u00a0Breaking Green\u2019s website\u00a0<\/a> or\u00a0wherever you get your podcasts.\u00a0Breaking Green\u00a0<\/a> is produced by the\u00a0Global Justice Ecology Project<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DISARMAMENT & SECURITY . An article produced by\u00a0Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute and pubished by the Asia Times. The following interview took place on January 25, 2023, one day after the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists\u00a0advanced\u00a0 the hands of the Doomsday Clock to 90 seconds before midnight \u2013 … Continue reading Interview with Helen Caldicott: “We\u2019ve never been closer to nuclear catastrophe”<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,15],"tags":[11],"class_list":["post-29831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-disarmament","category-information","tag-global"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29831\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.cpnn-world.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}