A Statement by The Elders – "No More Hiroshimas" – the Elders call for urgent nuclear dialogue as conflict risks rise, 14 May 2025
-- note: I have added italic emphasis to some sections to mark for further discussion below --
The risk of nuclear catastrophe is higher than at any time since the Cold War. Leaders are failing to uphold international law, and eroding basic norms. We are regressing into a world in which the rule of law is being replaced by rule by power, with a destabilising new nuclear arms race. We have come to Hiroshima to honour the victims of the atomic bombing in 1945. The upcoming 80th anniversary should compel all leaders to revitalise efforts towards nuclear disarmament. Instead, we are deeply concerned at the trivialisation of the use of nuclear weapons.
We reaffirm our support for full abolition of nuclear weapons. To reach this, we need a progressive global disarmament agenda based on four essential pillars: every nuclear-armed state should adopt a "no first use" doctrine, as many weapons as possible should be taken off high-alert status, a dramatic and urgent reduction in the number of weapons that are operationally deployed, and decreasing numbers to a maximum of 500 warheads each for the USA, Russia and China. The recent fighting between India and Pakistan, two nuclear-armed states, underscores the terrifying risk of how quickly conflict can escalate to the point of a nuclear exchange.
President Putin's contempt for the basic norms of state sovereignty and territorial integrity is driving a new arms race across Europe. Uncertainty around President Trump's commitment to the USA's traditional defence alliances is also accelerating rearmament. Putting nuclear weapons at the heart of national defence perpetuates the dangerous myth that nuclear deterrence keeps us safe. Today's weapons have a combined destructive capability of close to 100,000 Hiroshima or Nagasaki-sized bombs. One single bomb dropped in Hiroshima claimed around 140,000 victims by the end of 1945. Today's collective arsenal has the capacity to destroy human civilisation. Yet war and nuclear confrontation are not inevitable. The ongoing talks between the US and Iranian governments on Iran's nuclear programme could be a successful example of leaders pursuing political solutions over military confrontation.
We urge President Trump to follow through on negotiating nuclear reductions with Russia and China. The looming expiry of the New START agreement between Russia and the USA could leave a vacuum at the heart of non-proliferation efforts. Both countries must focus urgently on extending an agreement that is in both their interests. All nuclear states should also enter into sustained high-level dialogue on placing guardrails on the role of Artificial Intelligence in weapons systems, focused on how to maintain meaningful human control.
In Hiroshima, we have heard again from survivors of the 1945 bombing, whose moving testimony of the intergenerational human suffering caused by these terrible weapons must never be forgotten. We have been inspired too by the commitment of young Japanese activists to the total eradication of nuclear weapons. We encourage the Government of Japan to be a strong global voice to strengthen the taboo on using nuclear weapons. Engaging with the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) is one important way for Japan to use its unique moral authority, building on the leadership it showed when hosting the G7 in 2023.
All leaders must take meaningful steps to minimise nuclear risks, revitalise dialogue on arms control and de-escalate nuclear modernisation. Failure to do so would be a betrayal of the memory of the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the security of current and future generations. END
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The Elders support "full abolition of nuclear weapons." Why not go the distance and really call for "full abolition" and not preserve 500 each for USA, Russia and China? When will we stop pretending that there is a civilization on this planet and fix this fatally-flawed male-brain error? Before it's too late! We were too close to a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan last week, and that is partially postponed, but nowhere near resolved. Have a look at the already mapped out targets for bomb strikes, or read the whole article at The Bulletin. That represents wide-spread destruction, eliminating food production in both countries. And a rather-bad nuclear winter world-wide. Yet these fools sit there with their finger over the button, and could at any time imagine that they need to strike before the other side goes first. This same line of thinking drove the Manhattan Project and the following build-up of nuclear arms. Obviously there is an error somewhere in that line of thinking, that so-called logic, as evidenced by the outcome! Yet it continues, with ongoing "modernization" of the nuclear arsenal. What does it say about this species if this is what it takes to have "peace"?
On the sidelines we still have people bloviating about global warming during an interglacial while imminent nuclear risk prevails. (Yes, CO2 emissions must end!) We still have people on the margins clamouring for biodiversity while arms deals increase and more land is destroyed by more bombs. Can't we first deal with the elephants in the room rather than just sweep up around the edges? The lack of civilization on this planet Trumps all other issues and must be remediated without delay. Fixing that issue brings nuclear weapons elimination into focus - any imagined purpose for them would be gone. In their above statement, The Elders mention that rule by international law is being replaced by rule of the most powerful and of course nuclear weapons are the extreme form of power. Good international law has gradually been eroded over time since the founding of the United Nations. However, it never came to be that international borders were inviolate; international law never reached the point where boundaries were set by world-community consensus as there were no teeth in the directives against aggression, so determination of borders was left to power struggles, a definite veto of a civilized world. I don't just sit here like a Substack writer complaining about stuff, I have sent these suggestions to the UN but nobody there has any authority to initiate real change. As mentioned in a previous post, years ago I had an article in English Pravda on the Ukraine situation and in November 2024 sent a letter to the President of the Russian Federation with the best-yet peace proposal for Europe, as usual, ignored.
How do we get from today with a world in chaos to a better path to Peace? For a starter, it takes every person engaged in planning and making war to just end that activity and get a real job. I passed the entrance exams to work at JPL and could have worked on missiles, etc., but chose another path. All people must stop this nonsense. Constant preparation for war is a learned, hereditary cultural construct passed along since the early warring tribes of Europe. In a new article in Jacobin by José Mujica, the former president of Uruguay, in an excerpt from a new book Surviving the 21st Century (Verso, Sept. 2025), titled Pepe Mujica: My Generation Made a Naïve Error, the author makes it clear that capitalism is a culture of selfishness and that we need to generate an entirely new culture based on solidarity, "to live with a certain sobriety, not to squander, not to waste," if we don't learn this soon, our (human) world will not survive. Again, the making of war, including that in the human toolkit, is a culture that must be overcome and replaced. And the two degenerate cultures of capitalism and war make a perfect pairing, one supporting the other, with every war of the 20th Century being about oil and the extractive industries needed to support forever-wars feeding the overturn in the economy - the conversion of valuable resources into destruction and trash.
Pope Leo XIV delivered his first Sunday blessing from the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica on Sunday and used the address to pray for peace. "In today's dramatic scenario of a third world war being fought piecemeal, as Pope Francis said, I too turn to the world's leaders with an ever timely appeal: never again war!"
Sag mir wo die Blumen sind:
Where have all the flowers gone...
Oh when will we ever learn...
(Pete Seeger)
It's time for another rabbit recipe - people in USA should learn rabbit-raising, which can be done anywhere, even an extra bedroom, to help out in your coming self-inflicted Dark Age. Read about raising rabbits in my ebook, free with Amazon Prime.
Leave a comment! This is a re-direct to my Substack page.
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