“The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICANW) and Nuclear Ban US are organizing a series of events around the country on January 22nd to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).”
“Speakers will address the long-term health effects of radiation exposure, the importance of educating young people about the dangers of nuclear weapons and Martin Luther King’s view that nuclear war would be catastrophic. Speakers will also address the links between climate change and nuclear weapons and the bed-down of the potentially nuclear capable F35 fighter jets at Truax Air Force Base.”
PSR WI: Back from the Brink, Ban Nuclear Weapons
“In 1983, the Madison City Council passed an ordinance declaring the city a “nuclear free zone”. We are asking our City Council members (Alders) to pass a Back from the Brink Resolution which builds on this ordinance and commits the city to nuclear weapons free contracts and investments. Our City already has a socially responsible investment policy in place; it no longer invests in fossil fuel companies. We are asking the City do the same regarding nuclear weapons production.”
Short talk by Brad Geyer, Veterans for Peace Madison…
Climate disaster and military and nuclear weapon spending are all connected.
The US military is one of the largest individual polluters on the planet. It has the largest carbon footprint and creates more greenhouse gases than any other organization, but due to US government pressure, military emissions are not included in important calculations. 
Most nuclear weapons are controlled by the US and Russian governments. Veterans for Peace recently released a report called the Nuclear Posture Review outlining specific numbers and goals.
Pentagon spending is over $700 Billion annually. The US government is spending trillions of dollars of our money to update and to build new nuclear weapons.
Every minute of the day, this government spends about $65,000 of our dollars on nuclear weapons, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists and yet we have been unprepared for a pandemic response. Our priorities are messed up.
On October 4, 2021; F-35s dropped B61 Joint Test Assemblies, which mimic real-world tactical gravity nuclear weapons, at the Tonopah Test Range in Nevada. According to the Air Force Times, the U.S. plans to produce 480 more B61 nuclear weapons in the next four years.
Matt Korda from the Federation of American Scientists has said…
[quote] “Climate change and nuclear weapons have a symbiotic relationship: Each threat exacerbates the other. Climate change is setting the stage for conflict between nuclear-armed states, and a recent study suggests that even a regional nuclear war would … cause mass starvation for over a decade…. decades of uranium mining, nuclear testing, and nuclear waste dumping have contaminated some of our planet’s ecosystems beyond repair, displacing entire communities—often communities of color—in the process.” [unquote]
“The US military is the first and only military to have ever used nuclear weapons in combat.
Twice the Japanese people suffered immediate and protracted death from US nuclear bombs in Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Nuclear testing has also brought displacement, damage and death to people in the Pacific Islands, as well as to US Atomic Veterans.”
We are allowing big money to make decisions when people should be. Often, instead of democracy we have kleptocracy, rule by thieves. The rich get richer because the politicians sell their influence.
To get involved in the Veterans for Peace Climate Crisis and Militarism Project or to work to abolish nuclear weapons, go to veterans for peace dot org
We need to be working with other nations to try to overcome the climate crisis, threatening other nations is not helping.
“On 7 July 2017 – following a decade of advocacy by ICAN and its partners – an overwhelming majority of the world’s nations adopted a landmark global agreement to ban nuclear weapons, known officially as the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. It entered into force on 22 January 2021.”
The Treaty “…prohibits nations from developing, testing, producing, manufacturing, transferring, possessing, stockpiling, using or threatening to use nuclear weapons, or allowing nuclear weapons to be stationed on their territory. It also prohibits them from assisting, encouraging or inducing anyone to engage in any of these activities.”
– ICAN: U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
Back from the Brink: The Call to Prevent Nuclear War seeks “…the abolition of nuclear weapons and fundamental change in U.S. nuclear weapons policy. We’re calling upon the U.S. to enter into negotiations now with the other nuclear-armed states for a verifiable, enforceable, timebound agreement to eliminate their weapons. We also call on the U.S. to unilaterally adopt several key policies to reduce the danger of nuclear war while these negotiations proceed.
A safer, healthier, and more just world is possible. We celebrate the entry into force of the U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), an historic treaty signed by 122 nations that bans nuclear weapons under international law in the same manner as biological and chemical weapons. The TPNW is the international mechanism for the elimination of nuclear weapons. Back from the Brink provides a U.S. roadmap to accomplish this goal.”
Check the link for video and more…
WKOW ABC27 Crowd celebrates first anniversary of UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
MADISON (WKOW) — “A rally was held at the Wisconsin Capitol Saturday to mark the first anniversary of the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
The treaty is the first to ever make nuclear weapons illegal, but several countries with the weapons, including the United States, haven’t ratified it.
Racheal Wilson, a member of the Wisconsin Poor People’s Campaign, was at the rally Saturday. She said she supports the treaty for a number of reasons, including nuclear weapons’ potential danger.
“Nuclear weapons should be illegal because of their destructive capacity,” Wilson said. “They can destroy humanity many times over.”
Wilson also said that she supports the treaty because of nuclear weapons’ high price tag.
“We believe that [the money spent on nuclear weapons] should be used for much better purposes. For education, housing, food access, for all of the critical needs that our communities need,” Wilson said.
Saturday’s rally included signs, speeches by community leaders and conversations about nuclear weapons.
It ended with an opportunity for people to ring a bell provided by Veterans for Peace Milwaukee.”
#JoinTheTreaties
#BanNuclearWeapons
