Your coverage of the Air Force’s March 23 launch of a Minuteman III Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, “Missile Blasts Off and Blows Smoke Ring,” made light of a very dark situation. The article failed to inform readers that the Minuteman III is the United States’ land-based missile that can deliver a nuclear warhead to most places on the planet within minutes. The U.S. keeps 450 of these missiles on hair-trigger alert in silos dotted across North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado.
Despite decades-old legal obligations to end the nuclear arms race and negotiate nuclear disarmament, the U.S. continues not only to test fire its missiles but also plans to spend at least $1 trillion over the next 30 years to upgrade its nuclear weapons, production facilities, and delivery vehicles. The U.S. is joined in this continued nuclear arms race by all of the other eight countries that possess nuclear weapons, each of which is engaged in some level of nuclear “modernization” of its own.
The missile tested on Monday by the Air Force — with little or no public notice and under the cover of darkness — landed in the Marshall Islands. Last year, the Marshall Islands filed landmark lawsuits against the nine nuclear-armed nations in the International Court of Justice and U.S. Federal Court that seek the fulfillment of legal obligations to end the nuclear arms race and negotiate nuclear disarmament. This courageous stand by a small island nation is what should be celebrated, not a smoke ring party trick by a missile that is capable of killing hundreds of thousands of people in an instant.
Comments
Relax, man. So they’re shooting off some missiles, so what? What are you going to do about it besides get all upset and stressed out? I mean, who cares, really?
So what are you peaceniks getting out of this deal, anyway? In fact, there are so many people who constantly complain about the Nation in which they are presently residing that I wonder what exactly they are getting out of their “protests”. Who’s paying for their protests, the taxpayer?
Besides, land based missiles are no longer the go-to weaponry. We have subs all over the world, loaded for bear with nuke-tipped missiles set to fly.
Seriously, Ricky, this ICBM targeting maneuver is no business of yours. If in your mind you think you have some magical power that enables you to control global superpower maneuvers, maybe you should see someone about that problem.
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=s...
nativeson (anonymous profile)
March 25, 2015 at 5:44 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Yer arright, nativeson, ptooey, scritch scritch.
atomic_state (anonymous profile)
March 25, 2015 at 7:48 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Just a test? Darn, I was hoping we'd sent a "love letter" to ISIS.
Ken_Volok (anonymous profile)
March 25, 2015 at 8:43 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Thanks to the author for raising awareness. There isn't enough publicity about the revival of the nuclear arms race. For about 20 years the US and Russia cooperated in nuclear arms reductions and turned the warheads into electricity with the Megatons to Megawatts program. Just as the program was up for renewal, a coup toppled the Ukrainian government and severed relationships between Russia and the US.
Every American should be very concerned about this.
random_kook (anonymous profile)
March 26, 2015 at 9:08 a.m. (Suggest removal)
For how much we spend on the military and the need for that money elsewhere, you'd think they would have committed America to the insane asylum long ago. Sitting Nukes, and those whose job it is to secure and keep them 'safe'.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Uni...
http://www.thewire.com/national/2014/...
Trust.
spacey (anonymous profile)
March 26, 2015 at 1:59 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Rick's letter is spot on. And the first commentator seriously need to get a life. "So what?" he/she asks. The "so what" is that with a little education on WMD, he/she would know that nukes and climate change, considered together, pose the gravest threats to human existence. So yes, this IS Rick's business, and my business, and the business of everyone who thinks life is worth living. And the idea that advocates for a world free of nuclear weapons somehow receive remuneration from "the taxpayer" is beyond ludicrous to anyone who has ever dug into his/her own pocket for this purpose. Keep those letters coming, Rick.
rcljaldbl3 (anonymous profile)
March 27, 2015 at 10:18 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Well, "rcljaldbl3", that's a matter of opinion, and you are certainly free to express yours even though you apparently would not allow as much for me.
BTW: if that's so all-fired important to you, how about abortion? Abortion is a direct attack on the human race by misanthropes who obviously don't think that life is worth living. Or is that too simple a concept for someone who wants to fight the entire worldwide military-industrial complex?
nativeson (anonymous profile)
March 27, 2015 at 11:46 a.m. (Suggest removal)
A Nuke is the perfect method of population control once the button is depressed, all life as we know it goes Poof! It is the End story of Islam, the total destruction of the Earth for Allah!
dou4now (anonymous profile)
March 30, 2015 at 6:17 a.m. (Suggest removal)
The reason why we have so much "threat" is because WE have become a threat. We are not unlike many other nations who see military answers to everything. Since WWII we have enjoyed an UNREALISTIC economic surge that is now rapidly departing. We dump money into the military because that old formula worked once upon a time. I cannot help but wonder how the people from any nation would ever harbor ill will against us if we were to divert even a fraction of our TAX MONEY from our military and direct it instead to organizations and corporations designed to help out distressed nations. OK... go ahead... I can hear the paranoid rants already.
RickWorth (anonymous profile)
March 30, 2015 at 9:44 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I dunno, Rick; I think it's too easy to blame it on the military when the tough answers lie in poor foreign policy. War after all is but a failure of diplomacy, unless of course you're just some sort of imperialist.
But the foreign policy of this Nation has been skewed for years, and now it appears that those in charge of the administration are trying to weasel out of our alliance with Israel and abandon our support of them in cowardly fear of the Islamofascists. In other words, surrender is the new foreign policy.
What ever happened to The United States of America?
nativeson (anonymous profile)
March 30, 2015 at 11:06 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Yeah, that's what it is nativeson, cowardly fear of Islamofascists. Where do you pick up this crap? Turn the dial.
spacey (anonymous profile)
March 30, 2015 at 11:17 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Rick's correct, and our nuclear insanity IS all of our business. I don't think we can simply blame it on "foreign policy" nativeson. It's indeed high time to to modify our alliance with Israel and bring madman Netanyahu down several notches: what's with him telling our US Congress how to handle Iran? N. is as corrupt as Olmert, and after his PM time N. will also end up in Israeli prison. What's with 47 Senators unconstitutionally writing letters to the Ayatollah undercutting our twice-elected President's constitutional power to negotiate foreign treaties? If the Dems had done this in 2003 it would have literally been called treason. (Senate gets it shot to approve or note AFTER arrangements)
Why so little debate on sending very lethal weapons (NOT defensive!) to the Kiev bunch in Ukraine?
DavyBrown (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 2:30 a.m. (Suggest removal)
OK, spacey, since you are so sure of the real reason, tell me why the administration wants to abandon Israel. If you claim they are not, perhaps you can explain why they are dealing with the duplicitous Iranian Islamofascists; the upshot of which would be to enable the further development of nuclear weapons to use against Israel, which will inevitably lead to nuclear war in the Mideast.
nativeson (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 2:49 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I do not think we will ever "abandon Israel", nativeson. Israel needs to negotiate with Abbas (not Hamas) and horse-trade and pull back from the West Bank. Land for Peace as Barak wanted [yeah, Arafat was an idiot]. Can you really support illegal and unethical Israel post 1967 colonization of land that is most certainly not theirs. Chaim Weitzman and other founders of modern Israel in 1947did not envisage or want this colonization at all! More and more Israelis are willing to negotiate West Bank away [with a few areas excepted] in return for a demilitarized Palestinian state.
And Israel has nukes and will use them if they deem it necessary.
DavyBrown (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 3:04 a.m. (Suggest removal)
DavyBrown, those guys are in a constant state of war; it’s a real wild west out there, maybe worse. Giving up land that was won fair and square from an avowed enemy is a fool’s game, since it would only enable them to once again use those areas from which to fire missiles into Israel.
Abbas and all the “Palestinians” are but tools of the international anti-Semites who are angry that Hitler didn’t finish the job. Take a hard look at the idiots in the UN who constantly threaten Israel with sanctions, yet rarely bring up Assad’s totalitarian state or the misogynistic empire of ayatollahs in Iran. And those are the morons to whom the administration would hand over Israel? No wonder Israel is boycotting much of the UN!!!
We should learn from past mistakes, not use them as a present day dwelling place.
nativeson (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 3:34 a.m. (Suggest removal)
you make good points, nativeson, but the "land that was won fair and square" was NOT won fair and square in the 6-Day War. Many highly intelligent Israelis and terrific American Jewish friends don't agree with you. Read A. Shavit, MY ISRAEL. Further, how can Israel hold the West Bank and still try to call itself a western style democracy? You know all these points, I'm sure. Didn't Netanyahu tell Israeli Jewish citizens "droves of Israeli Arabs" were coming to the voting booths to overwhelm Likud, etc.? Wasn't that a form of racism? What will Israelis do when in fact Arab Israelis outnumber the Jewish ones?? It honestly is untenable. I have always been for Israel's existence; retaining the West Bank undermines Israeli security as many many Israelis know. Some polls show a majority are ready to "deal" if they can get an assured peace, like happened with Jordan and with Egypt.
You change the topic with Assad and stuff; why compare Israel to them?!!
I have worked in Israel, stayed at two kibbutzim, I know it's a wild west and I admire Israel. Trade land for peace, do it now.
DavyBrown (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 4:07 a.m. (Suggest removal)
We fear the mis-use of nukes by a rogue state for sure, but also by mistake from our own state. To insinuate that America is in fear of Islamofascists or is abandoning Israel is only an expression of your own fear nativeson, which I am here to tell you, is un-warranted. Go, be happy and live without these fears. Automobiles kill more Americans each year than Islamofascists. Americans kill more Americans every day than Islamofascists. Cigarettes too. The only thing we have to fear is..... You trying to tell me, what with all our missiles, nukes, military, we should fear Iran? You got it backwards. What we fear is not Islam, America, Iran, but the Human Psychopath like that German pilot and those types are found everywhere.
spacey (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 2:18 p.m. (Suggest removal)
If the MENA soon bristles with nuclear weapons in every dirt bag little sheikdom and they decide to have at it with their new toys, no one will escape this folly. No one.
Such is the nature of all out nuclear war, even if the initial strikes are confined to a small section of the global real estate. Let's find out who turned off the power all over Turkey yesterday, first before you downplay regional bad actors.
JarvisJarvis (anonymous profile)
March 31, 2015 at 2:38 p.m. (Suggest removal)