Beyond Nuclear International
The ride aboard our “Pale Blue Dot”
Reflections from an 87-year journey
Every Winter Solstice, Walt Patterson, a UK-based Canadian physicist and widely published writer and campaigner on energy, sends Solstice Greetings to some 600 friends and colleagues around the world. Beyond Nuclear was one of the recipients. It’s a delightful read to start the new year, with some important reflections, so we republish it here, thereby expanding Walt’s circle of “friends and colleagues.”
By Walt Patterson
Once more the time rolls round to send you the traditional Solstice Greetings. I am frankly dumfounded to realize that since I arrived on this planet the earth has gone the whole way around the sun eighty-seven times. A lot has happened to me in those eighty-seven trips, and I’m delighted to find that I can still recall a lot of it, despite the stroke that hit me two years ago. Was that really only two years ago? Amazing.
In 1990 the NASA Voyager spacecraft 3.7 billion miles away took and sent back to us the photo that Carl Sagan the US astronomer called ‘The pale blue dot’. For what we call eighty-seven years, I’ve been riding this pale blue dot around the universe, as it circles an unremarkable ordinary star in a tenuous arm of what we call our local galaxy. Even on the blue dot I’ve covered a lot of ground.
Soon after I got here, Otto Frisch, Otto Hahn and Lise Meitner discovered nuclear fission in uranium. Physics had long been the most dramatic and exciting branch of science, but now nuclear physics leapt to the forefront. My first love of science was astronomy, but as an impressionable youngster I decided I wanted to study nuclear physics too. I did, acquiring a post-graduate Master’s degree, and was about to try for a PhD at the University of Edinburgh, until I changed my mind.
After leaving my home town of Winnipeg in the middle of Canada, five hundred miles from anywhere, I had spent the winter in Greenwich Village in Manhattan, crossed the Atlantic on a freighter, travelled around the UK in an old black London taxicab with two South African guys and three Australian girls, hitchhiked all over northern Europe, including an unforgettable ride with a fellow Danish hitchhiker in a vast American convertible with two young US GIs who picked us up at the Dutch-German border and drove us all the way to Copenhagen.
When I reached Wien (Vienna) on my return trip I walked to the Zentralfriedhof, the Central Cemetery, which is far from central as it proved, and found area 31, the burial place of great composers. I can’t now recall which exactly were actually buried there rather than just memorials; walking among the statues of many Strausses, and Mozart and Schubert and Beethoven and Bach, the air and my head were filled with melody, a vivid sensation.
Read MoreA ‘dangerous distraction’
COP plot to triple nuclear power by 2050 decried
By Jon Queally, Common Dreams
Climate campaigners scoffed Saturday at a 22-nation pledge to triple nuclear power capacity by mid-century as a way to ward off the increasing damage of warming temperatures, with opponents calling it a costly and “dangerous” distraction from the urgent need for a fossil fuel phaseout alongside a rapid increase in more affordable and scaleable renewable sources such as wind and solar.
The Declaration to Triple Nuclear Energy—backed by the United States, Canada, France, the Czech Republic, and others—was announced as part of the Climate Action Summit taking place in Dubai as a part of the two-week U.N. climate talks known as COP28.
While the document claims a “key role” for nuclear energy to keep “a 1.5°C limit on temperature rise within reach” by 2050 and to help attain the so-called “net-zero emissions” goal that governments and the fossil fuel industry deploy to justify the continued burning of coal, oil, and gas, critics say the false solution of atomic power actually harms the effort to reduce emissions by wasting precious time and money that could be spent better and faster elsewhere.
“There is no space for dangerous nuclear power to accelerate the decarbonization needed to achieve the Paris climate goal,” said Masayoshi Iyoda, a 350.org campaigner in Japan who cited the 2011 Fukushima disaster as evidence of the inherent dangers of nuclear power.
Nuclear energy, said Iyoda, “is nothing more than a dangerous distraction. The attempt of a ‘nuclear renaissance’ led by nuclear industries’ lobbyists since the 2000s has never been successful—it is simply too costly, too risky, too undemocratic, and too time-consuming. We already have cheaper, safer, democratic, and faster solutions to the climate crisis, and they are renewable energy and energy efficiency.”
Read MoreA resounding rejection of ‘nuclearism’
Non-nuclear states gathered in New York are decidedly anti-nuclear in outlook and approach
By Tom Unterrainer, chair, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
The non-nuclear majority met in New York between 27 November and 1 December for the Second Meeting of States Parties (2MSP) to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). This coming together was not simply ‘non-nuclear’ but decidedly anti-nuclear in outlook and approach.
The TPNW represents many things: a ‘work in progress’, a part of international law, a mechanism for the eventual abolition of nuclear weapons and similar. What it represents politically, at the time of coming into force and since, is a full-frontal rejection of ‘nuclearism’ and a challenge to the nuclear-armed world. 2MSP saw discussion and decision making on how to embed this aspect of the Treaty.
Between 15 and 27 October 1953, the British government carried out ‘Operation Totem’ over an area in Southern Australia. Totem I and Totem II were atmospheric nuclear tests and together with five additional ‘non-critical’ tests, Britain delivered death and catastrophe on the First Nations people inhabiting the area.
These people “felt the ground shaking and the black mist rolling”, as Karina Lester put it on the floor of 2MSP. “We know our lands are poisoned”, she went on, clearly stating that “we want governments to recognise what they have done.”
What the British government did in 1953 was to consign a people and their land to death, destruction and continuing – intergenerational – harm.
The British government has refused to recognise or make recompense for what it did over seventy years ago and recently affirmed that it would not do so now. This roadblock to justice must be challenged, as should the other roadblocks to peace and justice that are erected by nuclear-armed states.
Read MoreDoes nuclear war as entertainment numb our fears?
Do movie heroes who stop nuclear war breed apathy about the real danger?
By Farah Sonde
(This article contains film plot spoilers)
As much as I love my job as a Communications Associate at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, there’s nothing more refreshing than taking a step back from the issues to pop on a film or a television show. However, art reflects the anxieties of the world around us, and as such I still find myself followed by nuclear weapons, whether it’s a throwaway comment or a major plot point.
In the wake of Oppenheimer, I decided to take a critical eye to films from around the world that found box-office success and contained nuclear weapons as a plot device. While Oppenheimer’s release has reminded us how films can draw more eyes to the nuclear field, we should be concerned about how blockbuster films from Hollywood to Bollywood subliminally encourage audiences to sit out of nuclear policy conversations.
Deus ex Machina
Tom Cruise seems to have an affinity for stopping nuclear disasters. At the climax of “Mission: Impossible – Fallout,” three nuclear bombs are primed to destroy the water supply of India, China and Pakistan. Superspy Ethan Hunt saves the day by wrestling a detonator from an impossibly handsome Henry Cavill, averting the nuclear poisoning plot.
More recently, “Top Gun: Maverick” also had a nuclear dimension somewhat obscured by the razzle-dazzle of supersonic jets. The ticking clock that drives Maverick’s plot is an unsanctioned uranium enrichment plant that needs to be eliminated before it becomes operational. The plant is destroyed and Maverick makes a daredevil escape, leaving questions on nuclear security unanswered and an audience in awe.
Nuclear weapons have long had their place in Hollywood, whether as a Macguffin or a deus ex machina, and it’s not hard to see why. At the height of the Cold War, films like “Dr. Strangelove” and “On the Beach” allowed audiences to critically engage with their worst anxieties.
When nuclear weapons seemed to leave the cultural zeitgeist, they still found a place in Hollywood as entertainment. What better way to raise the stakes for the heroes than to threaten a nuclear disaster?
Or if the writers painted themselves into a corner with an absurd plot, nuclear weapons offer a way out. Need to get aliens off of Earth? Take Will Smith’s example in “Independence Day” and nuke them away!
Read MoreA nuclear assault on freedoms in South Africa
Industry shows contempt for democratic processes and civil society groups
By Gerard Boyce
A considerable number of pro-nuclear articles penned by supposedly impartial nuclear experts or professed nuclear industry lobbyists have appeared in the South African media of late. The flurry of pro-nuclear activity has been so noticeable that the cynic would be forgiven for thinking that this outpouring of pro-nuclear sentiment was not random but part of a concerted campaign to push a pro-nuclear agenda that coincided with some specific event or cause.
One possibility could be that it was aimed at delegates attending this summer’s BRICS summit, an alliance of countries whose members (both current and invited) are all pro-nuclear, that was held in Johannesburg during August.
Alternatively, observers of South Africa’s nuclear industry might attribute this activity to Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe’s still delayed address to Cabinet on what he has dubbed an ‘updated Integrated Resource Plan’ that will reportedly include an allocation for nuclear power even though the Presidential Climate Commission concluded in its recently released final report into South Africa’s energy transition that there was no place for nuclear power in the country’s least costly energy plans.
Seen against this backdrop, it is relatively easy to ignore most of these articles or dismiss them as propaganda produced by the nuclear lobby as part of its ongoing and seemingly futile bid to have government expand nuclear power output.
It is difficult, however, to dismiss a specific recent article that appeared in a nationally syndicated business news supplement that is distributed along with daily newspapers belonging to the Independent Online (IOL) media group; a large South African newspaper group that is owned by embattled holding company Sekunjalo Investment Holdings.
Read MoreJoy and gratitude grounded in hope
Lack of fear was one of Daniel Ellsberg’s superpowers, son says
As we prepare to celebrate Daniel Ellsberg posthumously with the Nuclear-Free Future Award’s Lifetime Achievement honor, we reproduce the eulogy written by his son, Robert, and published on Common Dreams. Robert will accept the Nuclear-Free Future Award on his father’s behalf. It will be presented by Democracy Now! host, Amy Goodman. The three activist Nuclear-Free Future Awards go to Tina Cordova, Benetick Kabua Maddison and Hinamoeura Morgant-Cross (see our earlier article for details.) The Awards take place at the Blue Gallery in New York City on November 28, beginning with a reception at 6pm followed by the awards ceremony. Everyone is encouraged to attend. The event is free and open to the public.
By Robert Ellsberg
Peacemaker and whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg died on June 16, 2023, four months after his diagnosis with inoperable pancreatic cancer. In March, he shared news of his prognosis with friends and supporters in the peace movement in a letter posted on Common Dreams. On October 22 his family hosted an online Celebration of Life which featured testimonials by his wife, Patricia, his children, Robert, Mary, and Michael, his grandchildren, and a wide range of friends, fellow peacemakers, and whistleblowers, including Edward Snowden, Jane Fonda, Barbra Streisand, Rev. John Dear, Norman Soloman, Rep. Barbara Lee, Gov. Jerry Brown, Tom Reiffer, Richard Falk, and Randy Kehler. Dan’s son Robert, the Publisher of Orbis Books, delivered this opening eulogy:
During a phone call in February, Dad mentioned—almost as a side note—“If I had a potentially serious condition, would you want to know about it?” I answered with words to the effect: Hell yes! Thus, I learned of a possible mass on his pancreas, which was later confirmed to be pancreatic cancer and was deemed inoperable. He was told he had three to six months to live. He lived for four.
I had known that Dad was never particularly worried or anxious about the prospect of his own death. Since surviving the car accident that killed his mother and sister when he was 15, I think he had always felt he was living on borrowed time. He admitted to me that this probably accounted for his ability to take risks that others might have feared—some of them, arguably reckless, such as driving through the countryside of Vietnam in his Triumph Spitfire. Others, like his willingness to risk life in prison for releasing the Pentagon Papers, served a higher purpose. That lack of fear was one of his superpowers.
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