Everything You Treasure— For a World Free From Nuclear Weapons What do we treasure? This exhibition is designed to provide a forum for dialogue, a place where people can learn together, exchange views and share ideas and experiences in the quest for a better world. We invite you to bring this “passport to the future” with you as you walk through the exhibition. Please use it to write notes about what you treasure, what you feel and what actions you plan to take in and for the future. Soka Gakkai International © Fadil Aziz/Alcibbum Photography/Corbis Aziz/Alcibbum © Fadil Photo credit: Photo How do we protect the things we treasure? The world is a single system The desire to protect the things and connected over space and time. In people we love from harm is a primal recent decades, the reality of that human impulse. For thousands of interdependence—the degree to years, this has driven us to build which we influence, impact and homes, weave clothing, plant and require each other—has become harvest crops... increasingly apparent. Likewise, the This same desire—to protect those choices and actions of the present we value and love from other generation will impact people and people—has also motivated the the planet far into the future. development of war-fighting As we become more aware of our technologies. Over the course of interdependence, we see that centuries, the destructive capability benefiting others means benefiting of weapons continued to escalate ourselves, and that harming others until it culminated, in 1945, in the means harming ourselves. Just as development and use of nuclear we cannot obtain all the things we weapons. need without the cooperation of others, we cannot protect the things we treasure alone, in isolation, or in conflict with others. We cannot sacrifice the future to the present, or the present for the future. Every action has an effect. These effects may be felt in ways and places we cannot imagine. Kiyotaka Shishido Kiyotaka Photo credit: Photo No one is immune. Of all the threats facing Catastrophic Global threats impact us all. humanitarian humankind, that posed consequences by nuclear weapons is The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute the most acute and (SIPRI) reports that there were approximately 15,000 nuclear catastrophic—and the warheads on Earth as of 2017. The longer these weapons most preventable. continue to exist, the greater Freedom the likelihood they will be used. from fear, Any use of nuclear weapons will cause catastrophic freedom humanitarian consequences— from want instantly killing vast numbers of people, incinerating Our planet continues to be population centers and wracked by violent conflict. disrupting the global climate. People around the world endure unacceptable burdens of poverty and hunger. Human rights violations and discrimination wound human bodies and hearts every day. Natural disasters can strike A pyramid of violence at any moment, instantly robbing people of their lives, Nuclear weapons—the most destructive Threat of Nuclear War undermining the foundations by far of all our tools of war—are at the of entire societies. Economic peak of a pyramid of violence. As the crises create profound pyramid spreads downward it reaches Regional Armed Conflicts disruption in people's lives, as into our daily lives. Conflict and mistrust do environmental degradation between communities, crime, domestic and the effects of climate violence and abuse—even the biting Low-level Conflict change. The possibility of a comment—are all part of the larger deadly global pandemic culture of violence. Societal Violence remains a constant presence. Source: Abolition 2000. Handbook for a World without Nuclear Weapons, 1995, IPPNW “e reason that I hate the atomic bomb e threat posed by nuclear weapons is not a is because of what it does to the dignity of thing of the past—it is a threat we face today. human beings.” —Tsutomu Yamaguchi e only ocially recognized survivor of both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings The atomic bombings of Many states are developing nuclear energy capacities that would make it relatively easy for Hiroshima and Nagasaki them to build nuclear weapons should they decide to do so. The possibility that terrorist organizations On 6 August 1945, an American B-29 bomber will acquire such weapons is also real. The danger dropped a nuclear bomb over the center of that these apocalyptic weapons will be used—by Hiroshima, Japan. It exploded about 600 meters accident, or deliberately, in an act of madness— above the city with a blast equivalent to about 16 hangs over all of us. thousand tons (kilotons) of high explosive TNT. Although that is only a fraction of the destructive power of today's nuclear weapons, by the end of World nuclear forces 1945, tens of thousands had died from their injuries and radiation poisoning, bringing the total killed in United States 6,450 warheads Hiroshima within the year to perhaps 140,000. Russia Three days after the first bombing, on 9 August 6,850 warheads United 1945, another B-29 dropped a second atomic 215 warheads bomb on Nagasaki, directly above the industrial Kingdom city. The resulting explosion had a blast yield France 300 warheads equivalent to 21 thousand tons (kilotons) of TNT. An estimated 70,000 people had died by the end China 280 warheads of the year. Israel 80 warheads (No confirmed date of first nuclear test) India 130–140 warheads Pakistan 140–150 warheads North 10–20 Korea 1945 1955 1965 1975 1985 1995 2005 2015 Year of First Nuclear Test Source: SIPRI Yearbook 2018 Everything you treasure could be reduced to ash in a moment. “Cities Are Not Targets!” “e right of belligerents to adopt means —Mayors for Peace of injuring the enemy is not unlimited.” —e Hague Conventions, 1899 In every culture, war has its rules and protocols. Among these is the idea that there is a difference 2017 between the conditions of war and peace, that wars should be ended in ways that make peace possible, that a distinction will be drawn between soldiers and civilians, that the The Humanitarian Challenge destruction and death of war should Nuclear Ban Treaty be limited and contained. The massive destructive force of Civilian casualties of war nuclear weapons makes distinguishing The history of war in the 20th century was between civilian and military targets a history of increasing disregard for these 2008 impossible. The long-term impacts traditions. During World War I, 5% of the causalities were civilians; in World War II, would undermine the social and almost half were. Today the proportion has International humanitarian law ecological foundations of future reached 75% or more in internal conflicts. generations of human society. and nuclear weapons Cluster Munitions Treaty In 1961, the United Nations General States parties for the first time Assembly adopted a resolution explicitly expressed “deep declaring that: concern at the catastrophic “Any State using nuclear and humanitarian consequences of thermo-nuclear weapons is to be any use of nuclear weapons,” considered as violating the and reaffirmed “the need for all 1997 Charter of the United Nations, as States at all times to comply acting contrary to the laws of with applicable international humanity and as committing a law, including international crime against mankind and humanitarian law.” WWI WWII TODAY civilization.” In 2017, the Treaty on the Source: Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Children, 1996, UN In 1996, the International Court of Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons 80km Landmine Treaty Justice issued an advisory opinion (TPNW) was adopted at the UN. stating that the use or threat of It prohibits a full range of Radioactive fallout spreads. Over time, use of nuclear weapons would nuclear-weapon-related many thousands will die from radiation, generally be contrary to the activities, such as developing, principles of international law. testing, producing, sickness and cancers. manufacturing, acquiring, In the final document of the 1993 possessing or stockpiling nuclear Review Conference of the Nuclear weapons, as well as using or Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2010, 10km threatening to use these About half die from trauma and burns. Many succumb soon after to fires and Chemical Weapons radiation sickness. Convention International Red Cross and 5km Red Crescent Movement 1972 In April 2010, International Committee The vast majority of people die quickly of the Red Cross (ICRC) President Jakob from blast injuries, asphyxiation or (over Kellenberger issued an historic appeal regarding nuclear weapons. In his weeks) radiation sickness. statement, Kellenberger stressed that the organization’s position on nuclear weapons must go beyond purely legal Biological Weapons considerations. 3km Convention In November 2011, the Council of A radioactive fireball hotter than the Delegates of the International Red Cross sun and with the force of 100,000 tons and Red Crescent Movement adopted a “In the view of the ICRC, resolution titled “Working towards the of TNT kills everyone. 1925 elimination of nuclear weapons,” calling preventing the use of nuclear for activities to raise awareness of “the weapons requires fulllment need for concrete actions leading to the prohibition of use and elimination of of existing obligations to such weapons.” pursue negotiations aimed at prohibiting and completely Poison Gas Protocol eliminating such weapons through a legally binding international treaty.” Treaties banning inhumane weapons Treaties 1868 St. Petersburg Declaration (the first formal agreement prohibiting the use of certain weapons in war) Effects of a 100-kiloton nuclear bomb Source: Catastrophic Humanitarian Harm, 2012, ICAN “Nuclear weapons are the greatest environmental “Models made by Russian and American scientists danger to the planet from humans, not global showed that a nuclear war would result in a nuclear warming or ozone depletion.” winter that would be extremely destructive to all life —Alan Robock Climate scientist and author of “Climatic Consequences of Nuclear Conict” on Earth; the knowledge of that was a great stimulus Day 5 to us, to people of honor and morality, to act.” While the danger of war between the US —Mikhail S.