Northampton Committee News Northampton Committee to Stop the War in Iraq ­ http://www.northamptoncommittee.org – June 24, 2017 The Trump Administration Jonathan Schell’s The Fate of the Earth currently engaged against ISIS. Russia has (1982), one of the most powerful books on now warned the that any U.S. Could Be America's Last the prospects and outcomes of nuclear aircraft in that airspace will be seen as ‘air warfare. The descriptions by survivors—the targets.’ Iran has fired ballistic missiles from By Vijay Prashad hibakusha—which illustrate Schell’s book are Iran into eastern Syria. This sends a message Alternet.org, 6/21/17 deeply meaningful. There is one memory of a to and Saudi Arabia that they are ... terrible noise as a survivor sees a horse, pink within range of Iranian missiles. What might because its skin has fallen away, galloping be seen as deterrence at any other time could ne hundred years ago, the German down the street, shrieking. Schell quotes very well be a provocation in these times of communist Rosa Luxemburg (1871­ Torako Hironaka’s list of things she the final administration. Trump’s messy entry O1919) offered a stark choice to the remembered, which included, 1. Some into the Gulf crisis, backing Saudi Arabia and world: or barbarism. There was no burned work­clothes. 5. A naked woman. 6. the against Qatar and third road, she suggested. If human beings Naked girls crying ‘Stupid America’. 10. A Turkey, suggests no finesse in contemporary did not try and organize our societies around field of watermelons. 12. What with dead U.S. diplomacy. More firepower and more the principles of socialism—namely the social cats, pigs and people, it was a just a hell on belligerent talk is the currency of our times. good—we would descend rapidly into the earth. The writings of the Hibakusha are That this might provoke a much greater fires of barbarism. She was thinking about sentinels of the feeling of near annihilation. altercation in West Asia is of little concern to war and the destruction of nature. the final administration. That the war might Watching U.S. President Donald Trump toss Luxemburg was murdered a few years after spread from there into other locations, such binders of environmental regulations onto she made that premonition. It was a brutal as and North Africa, seems to the ground underscored the grave dangers of killing, with her body tossed be of no concern. unceremoniously into Berlin’s Landwehr this administration: the final administration. Canal. The disregard for the negative social and Even more chilling was a tweet Trump sent natural implications of human­induced this week that pertains to the other flank of Perhaps Luxemburg’s formula was not climate change and warfare is striking. It is Eurasia. ‘While I greatly appreciate the efforts sufficient. Barbarism is not the only option. not as if Trump has broken fundamentally of President Xi & China to help with North Our choice is much starker: socialism or with a past where the world leadership was Korea,’ wrote Trump, ‘it has not worked out. annihilation. It is the end of everything that somehow truly worried about climate At least I know China tried!’ has emerged once more as a possibility. catastrophe and extinction by weapons of So now what? Is the United States preparing mass destruction. There are more continuities This was the sentiment after the United for war against North Korea? South Korea here than sharp breaks. Trump has States dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and the U.S. have increased their military nonetheless moved the needle faster, with a and Nagasaki, and during the worst time of activity near North Korea—all provocations much more vicious temperament, unwilling the Cold War when Mutually Assured against a government terrified of being to bend to liberal hypocrisies, eager to hasten Destruction (MAD) was a real threat. In attacked. When a North Korean drone drifted the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock. It 1979, a U.S. government study found that a into South Korean airspace this week, even would not be too much to expect the Trump nuclear weapons exchange between the USA the less military­minded new government in administration to propose to use ‘small’ and the USSR would result in casualty rates the south led by Moon Jae­in suggested that nuclear weapons to blast coal seams and in the hundreds of millions. A few years later, war was on the horizon. Will a ‘small’ nuclear uncover more carbon to power the world to scientists coined the phrase ‘nuclear winter’ exchange be contemplated for the Korean Armageddon. to capture what would happen to the earth Peninsula and for Eastern Asia in general? after a massive nuclear war. The climate It is not as if the Paris or Kyoto agreements We are between climate catastrophe and would be altered dramatically with ‘nuclear would have been sufficient to stem the tide of wars of extinction, with the final famine’ producing enormous deaths since adverse climate change. Even those were too administration provoking both at hyper­ agriculture would be disrupted permanently. mild, too friendly to corporations that make speed. Trump plays the role of Judas in Near extinction of the human species was their money destroying the planet. But at Gaudi’s sculpture. Jesus speaks to him about thought to be possible. least these agreements forced governments to betrayal. But he is looking over Judas’ accept that human activity—namely As I write this, I am sitting not far from the shoulder. He is asking the rest of us if we are industrial —had hastened the small fishing village of Palomares, Spain, participants in the betrayal. What are you destruction of nature. Now, Trump’s Energy where a B­52 struck a KC­135 oil tanker at doing today to prevent Trump's agenda from Secretary Rick Perry says openly that carbon 31,000 feet. The B­52 broke apart and three driving our planet closer to extinction? of its four hydrogen bombs fell near the little dioxide emissions are not the main drivers of village. The fourth fell into the climate change. Perry pointed the finger of Mediterranean Sea. The bombs that hit the blame at ‘ocean waters,’ allowing industrial land exploded on impact, but did not capitalism an exit from responsibility. Why generate a nuclear explosion. Nonetheless, bother with alternatives to carbon when Vijay Prashad is professor of international the area suffered great contamination. This there is no ‘evidence’ that such energy studies at Trinity College in Hartford, was in 1966. Even now, snails are fished out sources bring the planet closer to Connecticut. He is the author of 18 books, of the waters with strange deformations. It is annihilation? including , Libyan Winter (AK not the safest place to go for an afternoon Meanwhile, at the two ends of Eurasia, Press, 2012), The Poorer Nations: A Possible swim. Trump has moved closer to war at a History of the Global South (Verso, 2013) As if by serendipity, the last time I was in this planetary scale. Trump has authorized the and The Death of a Nation and the Future of area, 20 years ago, I carried with me U.S. military to go after Syrian and Iranian the Arab Revolution (University of California military assets in western Syria that are Press, 2016).