Stop National Missile Defense

by John Lewallen and Carol Wolman

By advancing national missile defense as the means to neutralize Russian and Chinese second-strike nuclear threat credibility, the Bush administration is throwing away two of the key elements which have prevented nuclear war for decades: the nuclear strategic balance and the arms control treaty structure. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has called the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, long promoted by the U.S. as the cornerstone arms control treaty, "ancient history" which should no longer prevent the U.S. from building a missile defense system. An effective national missile defense system could give the U.S. total military domination over Russia and China.

China and Russia have settled their border disputes. China buys billions of dollars worth of armaments from Russia. Recently Russia and China, the second and third largest nuclear powers in the world, have signed a military friendship pact which implies an eventual nuclear strategic alliance in confrontation with the U.S.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been traveling the world in recent months, building alliances with the very nations the United States fears as rogue states: Iraq, Iran, Cuba, North Korea, Libya and Sudan. Russia has thousands of nuclear missiles it must eliminate somehow, because Russia can't afford to maintain or secure these missiles any longer. Putin is implying that Russia can sell nuclear missiles to rogue states at any time.

At the Mendocino Coast Gray Panthers meeting at the Fort Bragg Library on March 16, 2001, the following resolution was passed:

Resolution: Stop National Missile Defense, Support and Expand the 1972 ABM Treaty, and Begin International Talks to Ban Weapons in Space

Whereas, the U.S. government is committed by the 1972 ABM Treaty not to build a national missile defense system, and by many treaties to move toward complete nuclear disarmament, and

Whereas, the administration of President George W. Bush is committing nuclear aggression by advancing national missile defense, causing global nuclear weapons proliferation, a renewed nuclear arms race, and international military alliances in preparation for nuclear war with the U.S., and

Whereas, the nuclear aggression of U.S. national missile defense uses the American people and the whole world as hostages at increasing risk of nuclear attack, and

Whereas, national missile defense is destroying two factors preventing nuclear war, the nuclear strategic balance and the arms control structure, moving the world toward the brink of nuclear war, and

Whereas, effective national missile defense is technically impossible, and

Whereas, U.S. national missile defense is being used by the high-technology weapons industry to progressively generate threats to justify increasing missile defense contracts, and

Whereas, spending for national missile defense funnels billions of dollars away from meeting human needs, and

Whereas, space is a catastrophically unfavorable field of battle for the U.S., which faces complete information civilization collapse if high-altitude nuclear electromagnetic pulse explosions occur;

Therefore, the Mendocino Coast Gray Panthers ask the U.S. government to:

Completely and permanently abandon all efforts to build a missile defense system for U.S. territory.

Support the ABM Treaty, and begin international talks to expand a treaty banning national missile defense systems to all nations.

Begin talks in the United Nations Disarmament Conference to internationally ban the design, testing and deployment of weapons in space.

Move toward complete worldwide nuclear disarmament and abolition of nuclear weapons, honoring many treaty commitments.

For more information contact John and Eleanor Lewallen, with Loren Lewallen, at lewallen@mcn.org; or www.NuclearPress.com Peace Strategy to Avoid Nuclear War.

John Lewallen and Carol Wolman are organizers of the Nuclear Peace Action Group.

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