Greenfield Recorder – Thomas E. Wartenberg: Help prevent nuclear war

When I read American Prometheus, the biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer, I was amazed to learn that he began campaigning against nuclear proliferation nearly 80 years ago. Yet, despite his efforts and those of many others, the threat of nuclear war is greater today than ever before. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Doomsday Clock is 90 seconds to midnight; closer than it has ever been. I hope that fact will cause you to listen carefully to the bells ringing in the valley at 8:15 a.m. on the morning of August 6. On this day and at this time 79 years ago, the United States dropped the first atomic bomb, destroying the city of Hiroshima, Japan, and three days later, Nagasaki, killing between 129,000 and 226,000 people and ushering in the threat of nuclear war. The bells also remind us that countries that possess nuclear weapons have a choice—either to continue down this self-destructive path or to work toward their abolition. Like the Hibakusha, the survivors of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, many people and groups in Western Massachusetts are working to abolish nuclear weapons. One of these groups, Back from the Brink (of nuclear war), is calling on the U.S. government to put safeguards in place to reduce the risk of nuclear war and end this threat to all life on Earth. (see https://preventnuclearwar.org/our-five-policy-solutions/) Now is the time for each of us to redouble our efforts to help solve this most existential of challenges we face.

Thomas E. Wartenberg

Goshen