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COLLECTED ESSAYS VOLUME 2 by John Scales Avery Published by the Danish Peace Academy Copenhagen Denmark 4 October, 2013 May be freely downloaded and circulated CONTENTS 1. SCIENCE CHANGES THE CHARACTER OF WAR, first published by TMS Weekly Digest, and Countercurrents, page 1. 2. ETHICS FOR THE FUTURE, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 6. 3. “HUMANITARIAN” MISSILE STRIKES AGAINST SYRIA?, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, repub- lished by the Danish Peace Academy, page 16. 4. SYRIA, DEMOCRACY AND INTERNATIONAL LAW, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, republished by the Danish Peace Academy, page 21. 5. NOBEL PEACE PRIZE WINNER AND WAR CRIMINAL?, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, repub- lished by the Danish Peace Academy, page 25. 6. SYRIA AND IRAN: AUTOMATIC ESCALATION TO WORLD WAR III?, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercur- rents, republished by the Danish Peace Academy, page 28. 7. SOME PEACE EDUCATION INITIATIVES IN DENMARK, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents; repub- lished by the Danish Peace Academy, page 31. 8. PROTECTING WHISTLEBLOWERS, first published by the Nu- clear Age Peace Foundation website, later republished by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 53. 9. A GOVERNMENT WITH MANY SECRETS IS NOT A DEMOCRACY, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Coun- tercurrents, page 57. 10. THE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY OF SCIENTISTS, first pub- lished by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 60. 11. THE TASK BEFORE US, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 65. 12. SECRECY VERSUS DEMOCRACY, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 71. 13. THE ARROGANCE OF POWER, first published by Countercur- rents, page 76. 14. RACISM, COLONIALISM AND EXCEPTIONALISM, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 81. 15. THE CASE FOR ECONOMIC REFORM, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 84. 16. AN ATTACK ON IRAN COULD ESCALATE INTO A GLOBAL NUCLEAR WAR, first published by Countercurrents, page 94. 17. THE HUMANITARIAN IMPACT OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS, MEXICO, FEBRUARY, 2014, first published by the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 100. 18. MANDELA AND GANDHI, first published by TMS Weekly Di- gest and Countercurrents, page 108. 19. SOME EXAMPLES OF GENOCIDE, first published by TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 117. 20. NUCLEAR WARFARE AS GENOCIDE, first published by the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, page 123. 21. ARE WE BEING DRIVEN LIKE CATTLE?, first published by TMS Weekly Digest, Countercurrents and Information Clearing House, page 128. 22. DOES THE AKERICAN JEWISH COMMUNITY REALLY WANT A GENERAL WAR IN THE MIDDLE EAST?, first published in Countercurrents, page 136. 23. THE FRAGILITY OF OUR COMPLEX CIVILIZATION, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 140. 24. AN ACCIDENT WAITING TO HAPPEN, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 149. 25. “ATOMS FOR PEACE”?, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 155. 26. TRUTH VERSUS POWER, first published in TMS Weekly Digest, page 169. 27. LESSONS FROM WORLD WAR I, Cadmus Journal (in press), page 176. 28. UKRAINE AND THE DANGER OF NUCLEAR WAR, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, and Waging Peace, page 208. 29. ADAM SMITH’S INVISIBLE HAND IS AT OUR THROATS, first published in TMS Weekly Digest, Countercurrents, page 220. 30. UNFULFILLED RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE MEDIA, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 233. 31. EUROPE NEEDS TO BE INDEPENDENT, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 245. 32. THE LONG-TERM FUTURE, first published in TMS Weekly Di- gest and Countercurrents, page 251. 33. GEOLOGICAL EXTINCTION EVENTS AND RUNAWAY CLIMATE CHANGE, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 263. 34. PREVENTING A HUMAN-INITIATED 6TH GEOLOGICAL EXTINCTION EVENT, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 265. 35. OUR DUTY TO FUTURE GENERATIONS, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 268. 36. THE ILLEGALITY OF NATO, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 276. 37. THE URGENT NEED FOR RENEWABLE ENERGY, first published in TMS Weekly Digest and Countercurrents, page 284. SCIENCE CHANGES THE CHARACTER OF WAR Casualties produced by modern weapons The American Civil War was the first war in which breech-loading and re- peating rifles were used on a large scale, and observers came from Europe to study their horrifying effectiveness. Together, the North and South had 3,867,000 men under arms - about 11 percent of Americas population at that time. By its end, the Civil War had killed or wounded almost a million people! No war before or since has resulted in as many American casualties, either absolutely or proportionately. Neither side had expected anything of the kind. They had entered lightheartedly a war that both North and South had expected to be romantic and brief, but a new technology of killing had changed the character of war In the First World War, it became still clearer that the romantic ideal of war no longer existed. Ideals of heroism, patriotism and gallantry filled the minds of the millions of young men who went to war in 1914, but instead of the romantic adventures they expected, they experienced the horrors of trench warfare, gangrene, barbed wire, artillery bombardments, machine-gun slaughter, and poison gas. Sixty-five million soldiers were mobilized in the First World War. When it was over, 37.5 million of these were casualties: either killed, wounded or missing. For some countries, the percentage of casu- alties among the mobilized soldiers was astonishingly high: Austria-Hungary mobilized 7.8 million soldiers, and of these, 7.0 million were casualties, i.e., 90 percent! In the Second World War, the number of soldiers killed was roughly the same as in World War I, but the numbers of civilian deaths was much larger. In the USSR alone, about 20 million people are thought to have been killed, directly or indirectly, by World War II, and of these only 7.5 million were battle deaths. Many of the USSRs civilian deaths were caused by starvation, disease or exposure. Civilian populations also suffered greatly in the dev- astating bombings of cities such as London, Coventry, Rotterdam, Warsaw, Dresden, Cologne, Berlin, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Estimates of the total number of soldiers and civilians killed in World War II range between 1 Figure 1: The American Civil War killed or wounded almost a million people. 60 million and 85 million (Wikipedia). Nuclear weapons threaten to destroy human civilization and much of the biosphere There is much worry today about climate change, but an ecological catas- trophe of equal or greater magnitude could be produced by a nuclear war. One can gain a small idea of what this would be like by thinking of the ra- dioactive contamination that has made an area half the size of Italy near to Chernobyl permanently uninhabitable. It is too soon to know the full effects of the Fukushima disaster, but it appears that it will be comparable with Chernobyl or worse. The testing of hydrogen bombs in the Pacific half a century ago continues to cause cancer and birth defects in the Marshall Islands today. This too can give us a small idea of the environmental effects of a nuclear war. In 1954, the United States tested a hydrogen bomb at Bikini. The bomb was 1,300 times more powerful than the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Na- gasaki. Fallout from the bomb contaminated the island of Rongelap, one of the Marshall Islands 120 kilometers from Bikini. The islanders experienced 2 Figure 2: Hiroshima radiation illness, and many died from cancer. Even today, half a century later, both people and animals on Rongelap and other nearby islands suffer from birth defects. The most common defects have been “jelly fish babies”, born with no bones and with transparent skin. Their brains and beating hearts can be seen. The babies usually live a day or two before they stop breathing. The environmental effects of a nuclear war would be catastrophic. A war fought with hydrogen bombs would produce radioactive contamination of the kind that we have already experienced in the areas around Chernobyl and Fukushima and in the Marshall Islands, but on an enormously increased scale. We have to remember that the total explosive power of the nuclear weapons in the world today is 500,0000 times as great as the power of the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. What is threatened by a nuclear war today is the complete breakdown of human civilization. Besides spreading deadly radioactivity throughout the world, a nuclear war would inflict catastrophic damage on global agriculture. Firestorms in burn- ing cities would produce many millions of tons of black, thick, radioactive smoke. The smoke would rise to the stratosphere where it would spread around the earth and remain for a decade. Prolonged cold, decreased sun- light and rainfall, and massive increases in harmful ultraviolet light would 3 Figure 3: A 14-year-old girl after the Hiroshima bombing 4 shorten or eliminate growing seasons, producing a nuclear famine. Even a small nuclear war could endanger the lives of the billion people who today are chronically undernourished. A full-scale war fought with hydrogen bombs would mean that most humans would die from hunger. Many animal and plant species would also be threatened with extinction. But politicians still threaten the world with war! Most of our politicians learned nothing at all from the million casualties of the American Civil War. They learned nothing whatever from the 37,5 million killed, wounded or missing in the slaughter of the First World War.

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