Page 6
August 31, 2016
O PINION
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A Massive Deployment of Nukes Next Door
Living with the
bomb
by M artha
b askin
The ad pierces
your
conscious-
ness and catches
you by surprise.
Plastered on the side of Seattle’s
King County Metro it hurls you
momentarily back in time, to a
time when nuclear weapons were
an imminent threat to our survival.
Or did the era never end?
The ad — sponsored by local
Ground Zero Center for Nonvi-
olent Action — reads: “20 miles
west of Seattle is the largest con-
centration of deployed nuclear
weapons in the U.S.”
Behind this text is a map, depict-
ing the proximity of Seattle to Naval
Base Kitsap, located on the eastern
shore of Hood Canal, one of the four
main basins in Washington state’s
Puget Sound. The base is home
port for eight of the US Navy’s 14
Trident ballistic missile submarines
as well as an underground nuclear
weapons storage complex. Together
they’re believed to store more than
1,300 nuclear warheads, according
to Hans Kristensen, director of the
Nuclear Information Project at
the Federation of American Sci-
entists.
This is arguably the biggest
single concentration of nuclear
warheads not only in the U.S.,
but in the world.
King County Metro was ini-
tially hesitant to run the ad, until
Kristensen confirmed its accuracy.
The combined explosive power
contained in the base is equivalent
to more than 14,000 Hiroshima
bombs, he says.
But the most surprising thing
to him about the underground nu-
clear weapons storage complex —
known as the Strategic Weapons
Facility Pacific and completed in
2012 — is the extent to which a
$294 million bunker has largely
escaped public debate, except for
a few industry-related articles.
The enormous amount of nucle-
ar weaponry in Seattle’s backyard
is no secret to industry analysts,
military contractors, or public of-
ficials. But the general public is
less informed, say those who initi-
ated Ground Zero’s bus campaign.
They describe the goals of the
advertisements as two-fold: to lift
the veil of secrecy surrounding the
naval base, and to re-ignite public
debate about nuclear weapons in
the U.S. arsenal.
“This is a wake up call,” says
Ground Zero’s Leonard Eiger.
“Why do these nuclear weapons
exist 70 years after Hiroshima and
Nagasaki? Why do we continue to
not only deploy them but why are
we maintaining them and planning
for a new fleet that could run over
$100 billion? What are the eco-
nomic, political and social costs?”
The Washington Military Al-
liance — a group formally estab-
lished in 2014 by Gov. Jay Ins-
lee, which advocates for military
investment in the state — claims
that Naval Base Kitsap is a driving
economic force in the region.
The U.S. Navy has presented a
plan to spend more than a trillion
dollars during the next 30 years up-
grading and maintaining the entire
triad of U.S. based nuclear weap-
ons, according to Martin Fleck of
Physicians for Social Responsibil-
ity, a group that advocates for nu-
clear disarmament. This includes
over $100 billion to replace the
base’s nuclear submarines.
The plan was approved by
Obama in 2010.
“We and our allies,” says Fleck,
“are arguing for sanity with nu-
clear weapons given that we have
enough already to end the world
several times over. Why on earth
would we invest another trillion
dollars in them at this late date?”
Nuclear weapons contractors in
the United States brought in $334
billion in government contracts be-
tween 2012 and 2014, according to
research conducted by Physicians
for Social Responsibility.
The ranking member of the
House Armed Services Committee,
Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., has
questioned the nuclear spending
currently being proposed. Smith
joined 159 other members of the
House of Representatives to sup-
port an amendment to the House
Defense Appropriations bill, which
would have slashed funding for a
nuclear cruise missile.
Both Lockheed Martin and
Boeing Corporation weighed in to
oppose the amendment, and it was
defeated along partisan lines. But
the vote, says PSR’s Fleck, proved
that Congress is far from united
over the government’s massive
WMD spending plan. Smith lat-
er penned an op-ed for Foreign
Policy magazine, titled “America
Already Has More Than Enough
Nuclear Missiles.”
Kristensen of the Federation
of American Scientists disputes
whether a new nuclear arms race
is underway, but admits there’s
been a resurgence in the adversar-
ial relationship between the Unit-
ed States and Russia. As a result,
“nuclear weapons are gradually
becoming more explicit. For now,
this is fueling modernization of
arsenals and adjustments of oper-
ations and strategies.”
Nine nations, including China
and North Korea, are engaged in
building or modernizing their nu-
clear arsenal. In the face of this,
those behind Ground Zero’s bus
ad say it’s time to “demilitarize
diplomacy.”
“It’s time to step back from
building another generation of nu-
clear weapons,” says Eiger. “The
doctrine came out of the Cold War
but it still exists. It’s a dangerous
road to travel.”
Martha Baskin is a Seat-
tle-based journalist. Distributed
by PeaceVoice.
Diversity Wins Gold at 2016 Olympic Games
The winning
mosaic of
America
M arC h. M orial
For 16 days, the
eyes and the atten-
tion of the world
were trained on the
drama of victory and defeat in Rio
de Janeiro. At a time when intoler-
ance, conflict and division invade
our headlines on a daily basis, the
by
greatest athletes from 206 countries
gathered at the Games—held for
the first time in a South Ameri-
can country—and reminded us
that tolerance, peace and unity
are real ambitions that can be
achieved, even in the heat of
intense competition.
Team USA set a gold stan-
dard for diversity in Rio. From
the balance beam to the swim-
ming lanes, our country’s 555 ath-
letes represented the gender, ethnic
and religious diversity that has al-
ways made America great.
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Team USA featured more wom-
en athletes than male athletes (292
to 263). Ibtihaj Muhammed, a Mus-
lim-American fencer who went on
to win a bronze medal, became the
first Olympian to compete while
wearing a hijab. Our women’s gym-
nastics team—also known as the
“Final Five”—was the most racially
and ethnically diverse in the team’s
history.
A Kenyan-born American, who
is a sergeant in the United States
Army and has a brother serving in
Afghanistan, competed for our na-
tion in the 3,000-meter steeplechase.
American lightweight boxer Carlos
Balderas scored an emotional victo-
ry in Rio, representing our country
all the way to the quarter-finals. The
19-year-old, a first generation Mex-
ican-American, dedicated his vic-
tory to his grandfather and uncles
who came to America and labored
in California’s strawberry fields to
achieve a better life for their family.
Team USA’s 121 medals are
the most ever for a U.S. team in a
non-boycotted Games, and individ-
ual achievement was everywhere to
be seen. Winning five gold medals
and a silver in Rio, swimmer Mi-
chael Phelps became the most dec-
orated Olympian of all time with a
total of 28, and holds the record for
most Olympic gold medals, with 23.
The two gold medals she earned in
Rio made runner Allyson Felix the
only female track and field athlete to
win six Olympic gold medals. And
Simone Biles, the most decorated
American gymnast of all time, set a
new American record for most gold
medals in women’s gymnastics at a
single Olympics. She was the first
gymnast since 1984 to win four
gold medals at a single games.
These stories, these achieve-
ments—some of them historic—
these athletes, who train night and
day and sacrifice everything for the
love of their sport and our nation,
could not exist in an America that
builds walls.
Many of the inspirational stories
we’ve watched unfold—and most
importantly, our children can now
take for granted—could not ex-
ist in an America that bars people
from our country based on their re-
ligious belief. The winning mosaic
of America we all watched walk in
the Opening Ceremony’s parade of
nations could not exist in an Amer-
ica that shuns diversity and prizes
above all the forced and inevitable
homogeneity of ideological screen
tests.
I believe the power of our Olym-
pic victory lies in its representation
of what we as a nation are constant-
ly striving to be: inclusive, tolerant,
peaceful, united under one flag and
committed to excellence at home
and abroad. There are real problems
and concerns we face as a nation
and we must remain committed to
solving them and keeping our coun-
try safe, but tolerance, diversity and
camaraderie are not problems, and
if the Olympics are any indication,
they are, in fact, our strengths.
Our athletes are back now and
they should how proud we are
of them—all of them. President
Barack Obama, our nation’s first
black president, can add this factoid
to his legacy: with a total of 289
medals under both his terms, Team
USA brought home more Olympic
medals during his presidency than
any other presidency. The presi-
dent with the second highest tally of
Olympic medals is Ronald Regan
with 282 medals.
There are many lessons to be
learned from the Summer Olym-
pics, and my hope is that one of
them will be that America is great
and always wins when we embrace,
nurture and support the talent and
skills of all Americans in all arenas.
Marc H. Morial is president and
chief executive officer of the Nation-
al Urban League.