The resurgence of arms racing and the collapse of nuclear arms control: Time once again to protest and survive
The last few years have seen a growing arms race among the leading nuclear-armed countries. In parallel, there is the collapse of the remaining arms control treaties that have placed limitations on the kinds and numbers of nuclear weapons that could be deployed by Russia and the United States, which together possess over 90% of the world’s nuclear arms. This round of arms racing could surpass the Cold War in complexity and instability. Today there are more countries with significant nuclear arsenals, and new material and political conflicts among the elites who govern nuclear-armed states. Military-industrial complexes remain powerful forces entrenched for over a half-century, their interests bound to endless high-technology military confrontation. All of this is happening as authoritarian nationalist governments have emerged and there has been an erosion of what democracy has existed in the world’s most powerful states.
This talk will address this resurgence of tensions and arms racing among the nuclear powers, and will offer some thoughts concerning the kinds of movements and civil society responses needed to avoid catastrophic wars, and to create a world in which the elimination of nuclear arsenals might be possible.
Speaker: Andrew Lichterman, Western States Legal Foundation, Oakland, California
