The Ugly Origins of Trump's "America First" Policy

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Tuesday March 19, 2024 · 11:17 AM PDT

2024/03/19 · 11:17

People’s choice of words can be revealing. That’s certainly the case with respect to one of Donald Trump’s favorite slogans, “America First.”

In April 2016, Trump initially used the term in a campaign speech, proclaiming that “America First” would be “the major and overriding theme of my administration.” The following year, in his inaugural address, he promised that “a new vision will govern our land. From this day forward, it’s going to be only America first―America first.” Subsequently, he has employed the slogan frequently to describe his approach to foreign and domestic policy.

This approach is remarkable because, over the past century, “America First” has acquired some very unsavory connotations.

Although the seemingly innocent slogan goes back deep in American history, it began to develop a racist, anti-Semitic, and xenophobic tone after World War I. The Ku Klux Klan, which surged to some five million members at that time, employed it frequently for its terrorist mobilizations. Like the Klan, nativist groups took up “America First” as they used racist, eugenicist claims to press, successfully, for U.S. government restrictions on immigration. Appealing to an overheated nationalism, William Randolph Hearst used his newspaper empire to campaign, successfully, against U.S. participation in the League of Nations. Soon thereafter, he became a booster of other nationalist fanatics, the rising fascist powers.

Hearst’s newspapers, with “America First” emblazoned on their masthead, celebrated what they called the “great achievement” of the new Nazi regime in Germany. In 1934, Hearst himself scurried off to Berlin to interview Adolf Hitler. Instructing his reporters in Germany to provide positive coverage of the Nazis, Hearst fired journalists who failed to do so. Meanwhile, the Hearst press ran columns, without rebuttal, by Hitler, Mussolini, and Nazi leader Hermann Göring.

This toxic brew of racism, anti-Semitism, and xenophobia increasingly found its way into a growing isolationist movement that crested in 1940 with the establishment of the America First Committee. Bankrolled by several top corporate leaders, the America First Committee was determined to prevent the United States from becoming involved in what it labeled, disparagingly, “Europe’s wars.” And as fascist military forces swept from triumph to triumph, it emerged as America’s largest isolationist organization. Although the 800,000 America First members had a variety of political opinions, many of them held anti-Semitic views and sympathized with the Nazis.

Henry Ford, for example, a member of the America First executive committee, was a major backer of anti-Semitic and racist organizations, including the Ku Klux Klan. Purchasing a Michigan newspaper, the Dearborn Independent, he used it to publish articles promoting anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, such as the idea that Jews controlled the American financial system, that they started World War I, and that they were plotting to rule the world. The newspaper eventually acquired a circulation of nearly a million thanks to Ford’s requirement that his car dealers distribute it. Ford has the distinction of being the only American Hitler complimented in Mein Kampf.

The most prominent leader of the America First Committee was Charles Lindbergh, who―thanks to his celebrated solo flight over the Atlantic―was also one of the best-known Americans of the era. Hitler, Lindbergh believed, was “a visionary” and “undoubtedly a great man.” Visiting Nazi Germany, Lindbergh liked its professed values―what he called “science and technology harnessed for the preservation of a superior race.” Increasingly, he thought that the “strong central leadership of the Nazi state was the only hope for restoring a moral world order.” Addressing reporters, he said that he was “intensely pleased” by all he had seen while in Germany. By contrast, like other anti-Semites, he fretted over “the Jewish problem,” and blamed Jews for the shattered German economy that followed World War I. In 1938, Field Marshall Göring presented Lindbergh with a medal on behalf of the Führer.

Even after Hitler violated the Munich Pact by dispatching his troops to conquer all of Czechoslovakia in March 1939, Lindbergh thought Hitler’s justification plausible, and argued that France and Britain should form an alliance with the Third Reich. “It is time to turn from our quarrels and to build our White ramparts again,” he declared. “Our future depends on . . . a Western Wall of race and arms which can hold back . . . the infiltration of inferior blood.” Returning from his European travels to the United States, Lindbergh argued that it was “imperative” for “the sake of Western civilization that America stay out of Germany’s way as [it] guarded against the West’s true enemies”―the “Asiatic hordes” of Russia, China, and Japan.

That September, with the outbreak of World War II in Europe, Lindbergh became America’s foremost isolationist, telling a radio audience: “Our bond with Europe is a bond of race. . . . It is the European race we must preserve. . . . If the white race is ever . . . threatened, it may then be time for us to take our part in its protection, to fight side by side with the English, French, and Germans, but not with one against the other for our mutual destruction.” Only after Japan’s devastating attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 did Lindbergh and the America First Committee shut down their isolationist campaign.

Given this record, when Trump revived the “America First” slogan, the Anti-Defamation League urged him to reconsider, pointing to the slogan’s bigoted and pro-Nazi history.

But Trump has continued to invoke “America First” in his statements.

Why? It’s clear that he agrees with this slogan’s connotations. After all, Trump’s top emphases have been barring and deporting minority group immigrants from the United States, attacking “migrant crime,” inflaming Christian Nationalism, and ridiculing international cooperation and organizations. When one adds his obsession with genetic superiority and blood purity, plus his admiration for dictators, it’s an all too familiar pattern.

Indeed, Trump is the heir to America First and its fascist proclivities.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

Einstein's Postwar Campaign to Save the World from Nuclear Destruction

Lawrence S Wittner

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Thursday February 29, 2024 · 2:12 PM PST

2024/02/29 · 14:12

Although the popular new Netflix film, Einstein and the Bomb, purports to tell the story of the great physicist’s relationship to nuclear weapons, it ignores his vital role in rallying the world against nuclear catastrophe.

Aghast at the use of nuclear weapons in August 1945 to obliterate the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Einstein threw himself into efforts to prevent worldwide nuclear annihilation. In September, responding to a letter from Robert Hutchins, Chancellor of the University of Chicago, about nuclear weapons, Einstein contended that, “as long as nations demand unrestricted sovereignty, we shall undoubtedly be faced with still bigger wars, fought with bigger and technologically more advanced weapons.” Thus, “the most important task of intellectuals is to make this clear to the general public and to emphasize over and over again the need to establish a well-organized world government.” Four days later, he made the same point to an interviewer, insisting that “the only salvation for civilization and the human race lies in the creation of a world government, with security of nations founded upon law.”

Determined to prevent nuclear war, Einstein repeatedly hammered away at the need to replace international anarchy with a federation of nations operating under international law. In October 1945, together with other prominent Americans (among them Senator J. William Fulbright, Supreme Court Justice Owen Roberts, and novelist Thomas Mann), Einstein called for a “Federal Constitution of the World.” That November, he returned to this theme in an interview published in the Atlantic Monthly. “The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem,” he said. “It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one. . . . As long as there are sovereign nations possessing great power, war is inevitable.” And war, sooner or later, would become nuclear war.

Einstein promoted these ideas through a burgeoning atomic scientists’ movement in which he played a central role. To bring the full significance of the atomic bomb to the public, the newly-formed Federation of American Scientists put together an inexpensive paperback, One World or None, with individual essays by prominent Americans. In his contribution to the book, Einstein wrote that he was “convinced there is only one way out” and this necessitated creating “a supranational organization” to “make it impossible for any country to wage war.” This hard-hitting book, which first appeared in early 1946, sold more than 100,000 copies.

Given Einstein’s fame and his well-publicized efforts to avert a nuclear holocaust, in May 1946 he became chair of the newly-formed Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists, a fundraising and policymaking arm for the atomic scientists’ movement. In the Committee’s first fund appeal, Einstein warned that “the unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking, and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.”

Einstein also joined the Advisory Board of United World Federalists, the U.S. branch of the world federalist movement.

Even so, despite the fact that Einstein, like most members of the early atomic scientists’ movement, saw world government as the best recipe for survival in the nuclear age, there seemed good reason to consider shorter-range objectives. After all, the Cold War was emerging and nations were beginning to formulate nuclear policies. An early Atomic Scientists of Chicago statement, prepared by Eugene Rabinowitch, editor of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, underscored practical considerations. “Since world government is unlikely to be achieved within the short time available before the atomic armaments race will lead to an acute danger of armed conflict,” it noted, “the establishment of international controls must be considered as a problem of immediate urgency.” Consequently, the movement increasingly worked in support of specific nuclear arms control and disarmament measures.

In the context of the heightening Cold War, however, taking even limited steps forward proved impossible. The Russian government sharply rejected the Baruch Plan for international control of atomic energy and, instead, developed its own atomic arsenal. In turn, U.S. President Harry Truman, in February 1950, announced his decision to develop a hydrogen bomb―a weapon a thousand times as powerful as its predecessor. Naturally, the atomic scientists were deeply disturbed by this lurch toward disaster. Appearing on television, Einstein called once more for the creation of a “supra-national” government as the only “way out of the impasse.” Until then, he declared, “annihilation beckons.”

Despite the dashing of his hopes for postwar action to end the nuclear menace, Einstein lent his support over the following years to peace, nuclear disarmament, and world government projects.

The most important of these ventures occurred in 1955, when Bertrand Russell, like Einstein, a proponent of world federation, conceived the idea of issuing a public statement by a small group of the world’s most eminent scientists about the existential peril nuclear weapons brought to modern war. Asked by Russell for his support, Einstein was delighted to sign the statement and did so in one of his last actions before his death that April. In July, Russell presented the statement to a large meeting in London, packed with representatives of the mass communications media. In the shadow of the Bomb, it read, “we have to learn to think in a new way. . . . Shall we . . . choose death because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings to human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest.”

This Russell-Einstein Manifesto, as it became known, helped trigger a remarkable worldwide uprising against nuclear weapons in the late 1950s and early 1960s, culminating in the world’s first significant nuclear arms control measures. Furthermore, in later years, it inspired legions of activists and world leaders. Among them was the Soviet Union’s Mikhail Gorbachev, whose “new thinking,” modeled on the Manifesto, brought a dramatic end to the Cold War and fostered substantial nuclear disarmament.

The Manifesto thus provided an appropriate conclusion to Einstein’s unremitting campaign to save the world from nuclear destruction.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

"It's Getting Late"

Lawrence S Wittner

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Monday February 19, 2024 · 9:33 AM PST

2024/02/19 · 09:33

For some time, it’s been apparent that the world’s nations are not meeting the growing challenges to human survival.

A key challenge comes from modern war.

Over the centuries, as military weapons have grown ever more destructive, war-related devastation has grown accordingly. World War II was the deadliest military conflict in human history, with an estimated 70-85 million people perishing from the war directly or through war-caused disease, famine, and other indirect factors. Most of the dead were civilians. In addition, many millions of people were wounded―blinded, crippled, driven mad, or otherwise ravaged by the vast carnage. Large portions of the globe had become a charnel house, with the battered survivors left to desperately scavenge for food amid the burnt-out rubble and ruin.

Although some scholars have pointed out that warfare has declined since then, and especially since the end of the Cold War, there was a sharp turnabout in 2022, when the wars in Ethiopia and Ukraine contributed to more battle-related deaths than in any year since 1994. By late 2023, Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine alone had produced an estimated 315,000 killed or injured Russian troops, while the number of casualties among Ukrainian troops and civilians, though unknown, is certainly enormous. Among these and the many other wars currently raging―in Sudan, Myanmar, Ethiopia, the Sahel, and Syria, to name only a few―the recent one in Gaza, with the fastest daily death rate of the 21^st century, is particularly alarming, having already led to nearly 30,000 deaths and nearly 70,000 injuries.

And then, of course, there’s nuclear war, which emerged in 1945 with the utter annihilation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and which now has the capacity to end virtually all life on earth. Amid public threats from leaders of nuclear-armed nations to launch a nuclear war, the editors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists have set their “Doomsday Clock” at its closest ever to apocalypse.

War―particularly nuclear war―is probably the fastest way to extinguish the human race, but there are other crises underway that, on a longer-range basis, seem likely to accomplish the same task.

The most serious of these crises is environmental. In recent decades, there has been a rapid loss of biodiversity, with the sixth mass extinction of wildlife clearly accelerating. Pollution has grown dramatically. This includes pollution of land and water caused by chemicals and by plastic (which takes 400 years to decompose) and of the air caused by industrial, motor vehicle, and other emissions (leading to an estimated 4.2 to 7 million human deaths annually). Damage to the soil, caused especially by use of toxic chemicals and other pollutants, as well as by deforestation, has become particularly severe. The United Nations has estimated that some 40 percent of the planet’s soil is now degraded.

A key element in the environmental collapse is the growing climate catastrophe, caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels. Melting icecaps and rising sea levels, unprecedented hurricanes, floods, and wildfires, and ocean acidification are all well underway. Together with unsustainable farming practices, rising temperatures have produced growing food and water scarcity. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres declared that, unless immediate action is taken, there will be a “global food emergency that could have long term impacts on hundreds of millions of adults and children.” Furthermore, it is estimated that, by 2025, two-thirds of the world’s people might face water shortages. Commenting on the deteriorating climate situation, Guterres declared gloomily in September 2023 that “humanity has opened the gates to hell.”

The rise of rightwing nationalism provides yet another challenge to human survival. In recent years, rightwing political movements―headed by authoritarian demagogues such as Donald Trump (United States), Jair Bolsonaro (Brazil), Vladimir Putin (Russia), Narendra Modi (India), Recep Tayyip Erdogan (Turkey), Marine Le Pen (France), Benjamin Netanyahu (Israel), Viktor Orban (Hungary), and their counterparts in other lands―have transformed the landscape of world politics. Appealing to xenophobia, militarism, racism, and religious prejudice, they have made great strides toward stirring up longstanding hatreds in their ruthless quest for power. A key to their success along these lines has been their call to revive the ostensible glory of their own nations by purging their internal enemies and triumphing over other, ostensibly inferior, countries abroad. Redolent of the fascist movements of the 1930s, this Radical Right approach portends worldwide turmoil, violence, and destruction.

Of course, it might not be too late to head off these developments. After all, in the twentieth century, humanity did manage to defeat the drive of the rightwing maniacs who established fascist regimes and launched vast wars to rule the world. In the aftermath of the chaos and destruction of World War II, humanity did manage to create the United Nations and to extend the range of international law. And, still later, as the planet stood on the brink of nuclear war, humanity did manage to roll back the nuclear menace and, for a time, halt the nuclear arms race and curb the prevalence of war.

Moreover, there are a great many efforts underway―by social movements and some far-sighted governments―to address the contemporary crises. Peace, environmental, and political action movements have flourished and brought forth demands for sweeping changes in public policy. In addition, some social movements, recognizing the global nature of the problems facing humanity, have called for enhanced global governance to cope with the severe threats posed by war, environmental devastation, and violations of human rights.

Even so, as the world once again veers toward destruction, it’s clear that it’s getting late―very late―to avert catastrophe.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

Overcoming the Obstacles to UN Maintenance of International Peace and Security

Lawrence S Wittner

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Wednesday January 24, 2024 · 3:46 PM PST

2024/01/24 · 15:46

Although, according to the UN Charter, the United Nations was established to “maintain international peace and security,” it has often fallen short of this goal. Russia’s ongoing military invasion of Ukraine and the more recent Israeli-Palestinian war in Gaza provide the latest examples of the world organization’s frequent paralysis in the face of violent international conflict.

The hobbling of the Security Council, the UN agency tasked with enforcing international peace and security, bears the lion’s share of the responsibility for this weakness. Under the rules set forth by the UN Charter, each permanent member of the Security Council has the power to veto Security Council resolutions. And these members have used the veto, thereby blocking UN action.

This built-in weakness was inherited from the UN’s predecessor, the League of Nations. In that body, a unanimous vote by all member nations was required for League action. Such unanimity of course, proved nearly impossible to attain, and this fact largely explains the League’s failure and eventual collapse.

The creators of the United Nations, aware of this problem when drafting the new organization’s Charter in 1944-45, limited the number of nations that could veto Security Council resolutions to the five major military powers of the era―the United States, the Soviet Union, Britain, China, and France.

Other nations went along with this arrangement because these “great powers” insisted that, without this acceptance of their primacy, they would not support the establishment of the new world organization. The Charter’s only restriction on their use of the veto was a provision that it could not be cast by a party to a dispute―a provision largely ignored after 1952. Fortifying the privileged position of these five permanent Security Council members, the Charter also provided that any change in their status required their approval.

In this fashion, the great powers of the era locked in the ability of any one of them to block a UN Security Council resolution that it opposed.

Not surprisingly, they availed themselves of this privilege. By May 2022, Russia (which took the seat previously held by the Soviet Union), had cast its veto in the Security Council on 121 occasions. The United States cast 82 vetoes, Britain 29, China 17, and France 16.

As the Council’s paralysis became apparent, proponents of UN action gravitated toward the UN General Assembly. This UN entity expanded substantially after 1945 as newly-independent countries joined the United Nations. Moreover, no veto blocked passage of its resolutions. Therefore, the General Assembly could serve not only as a voice for the world’s nations, but as an alternative source of power.

The first sign of a shift in power from the Security Council to the General Assembly emerged with the General Assembly’s approval of Resolution 377A: “Uniting for Peace.” The catalyst was the Soviet Union’s use of its veto to block the Security Council from authorizing continued military action to end the Korean War. Uniting for Peace, adopted on November 3, 1950 by an overwhelming vote in the General Assembly, stated that, “if the Security Council, because of lack of unanimity of the permanent members, fails to exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security . . . the General Assembly shall consider the matter immediately with a view to making appropriate recommendations to members for collective measures.” To facilitate rapid action, the resolution created the mechanism of the emergency special session.

Between 1951 and 2022, the United Nations drew upon the Uniting for Peace resolution on thirteen occasions, with eleven cases taking the form of the emergency special session. In addition to dealing with the Korean War, Uniting for Peace resolutions addressed the Suez confrontation, as well as crises in Hungary, Congo, Afghanistan, Palestine, Namibia, and Ukraine. Although, under the umbrella of Uniting for Peace, the General Assembly could have recommended “armed force when necessary” against violators of international peace and security, the Assembly adopted that approach only during the Korean War. On the other occasions, it limited itself to calls for peaceful resolution of international conflict and the imposition of sanctions against aggressors.

These developments had mixed results. In 1956, during the Suez crisis, shortly after the General Assembly held a Uniting for Peace session calling for British and French withdrawal from the canal zone, both countries complied. By contrast, in 1980, when a Uniting for Peace session called for an end to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Moscow ignored the UN demand. It could do so thanks to the fact that General Assembly resolutions are mere recommendations and, as such, are not legally binding.

Even so, global crises in recent years have heightened pressure to provide the United Nations with the ability to take effective action. In April 2022, shortly after the Russian government vetoed a Security Council resolution calling for Russia’s unconditional withdrawal from Ukraine, the General Assembly voted that, henceforth a Security Council veto would automatically trigger a meeting of the Assembly within ten days of the action to cope with the situation.

Meanwhile, numerous nations have been working to restrict the veto in specific situations. In July 2015, the UN Accountability, Coherence, and Transparency Group proposed a Code of Conduct against “genocide, crimes against humanity, or war crimes” that called upon all Security Council members to avoid voting to reject any credible draft resolution intended to prevent or halt mass atrocities. By 2022, the Code had been signed by 121 member nations. France and Mexico have taken the lead in proposing the renunciation of the veto in these situations.

These reform initiatives are likely to be addressed at the September 2024 UN Summit of the Future.

Clearly, as the history of the United Nations demonstrates, if the world organization is to maintain international peace and security, it must be freed from its current constraints.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

The Sorrows of Vlad the Conqueror

Lawrence S Wittner

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Wednesday December 27, 2023 · 12:29 PM PST

2023/12/27 · 12:29

Striding masterfully through St. George’s Hall of the Grand Kremlin Palace, Vlad the Conqueror turned his thoughts once again to his place in the pantheon of History’s Immortals.

“Victory follows victory for my splendid military forces,” he assured himself. “I have halted the offensive of the Ukrainian bandits and demonstrated to the world that a great nation―commanded by a great leader!―is unstoppable.”

“Of course,” he noted bitterly, “our national enemies will point to the fact that our military forces are far larger and better armed than those of the treacherous Ukrainians. But what these subversives won’t tell you is that our forces should be. After all, they are fighting for Holy Mother Russia and the restoration of its glorious empire. What could be a worthier cause? Certainly not that of our depraved neighbors, the Ukrainian Untermenschen!”

Stopping briefly, he smiled lovingly at himself in one of the palace’s jewel-encrusted mirrors.

“But just when my superior leadership should be acclaimed around the world,” Vlad brooded, “it has been eclipsed by this Israeli leader, Benjamin Netanyahu. Has this Netanyahu―this zhid leader of a second-rate, little country―slaughtered as many people as I have? Conquered as much territory? Successfully wiped out that small Palestinian terrorist group in their tiny strip of land? No!”

“Now, admittedly,” Vlad remarked, “he’s trying. Also, given the rightwing values that we share, we’ve always gotten along just fine. Still, when it comes to foreign conquest, Netanyahu is a big nothing―at least compared to me! Why does he get all the glory?” Vlad paused for a moment to ponder this paradox.

“My good friend, Kim Jong Un, is also steaming about all the attention Netanyahu is getting. Kim may lead a tiny country,” Vlad observed, “but he really knows how to keep dissidents in line at home and garner public attention abroad. If the poor guy only led a great nation like Russia, he might have a chance. But, you know, life is sometimes unfair.”

Having arrived at one of his favorite intricately-carved gold mirrors, Vlad stopped once more to admire himself.

“By contrast,” he continued,” my friend Donald Trump has had every opportunity for greatness. He was born the son of a multimillionaire, acquired billions through crooked business dealings, and slipped into the U.S. presidency after being substantially outpolled by that $**^%^%* woman, Hillary Clinton. And then, when Trump had the power, he proved too incompetent to use it. What a pathetic insurrection! You can bet that Kim and I wouldn’t have blown it!”

“Alas,” Vlad added, “I do have a re-election campaign to stage next year. But I have enough wisdom to take the necessary precautions. After Alexei Navalny, my leading rival for the presidency, unexpectedly failed to die of poisoning, I saw to it that he was packed off for a 30-year term in a slave labor camp. When another potential rival, an obviously demented woman calling for ending the Ukraine War and freeing political prisoners, announced her candidacy, government officials made sure that she was immediately disqualified. So, have no doubt about it: I’m not only Russia’s longest-serving ruler since Stalin, but I will continue to rule!”

“In fact,” Vlad added, “though I’m a remarkably self-effacing individual, I have to admit that the competition for ruling the world is pretty modest. Kim and Trump? Pathetically childlike, ruled by their temper tantrums. Netanyahu? Aside from eliminating a lot of Palestinians, nothing of significance. And that big Chinese guy with the funny name?” he said, pausing briefly. “Yes, he has potential. But, so far, what has he really done? When it comes to military conquests, no one in recent decades measures up to my record!”

“The tragedy, of course, is that, even when you’re clearly the best man for the job, you can’t rely on people. My old friend, Yevgeny Prigozhin,” Vlad recalled, “was certainly talented. He created a vast mercenary army and unleashed it in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Africa. That’s just the kind of service that a great nation―and a great ruler!―needs. But then, forgetting who ran things in reviving the glorious Russian empire, Prigozhin got out of line and had to be liquidated. Sighing, Vlad asked wearily: “Who can you trust these days? Whatever happened to loyalty?” A few tears trickled slowly down his cheeks.

“And that’s just the latest betrayal,” he remarked. From the Third Reich back in 1941 to Armenia today, our former allies have compiled a long record of treachery. Even the many East European nations that we brought under our generous, protective wing during the Cold War stampeded to join NATO the first chance they got. During the first year of our ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine, as many as a million Russians fled their country. Is there no longer any decency?”

“You know, I have feelings, too,” Vlad said, brushing aside his tears and blowing his nose. “I work hard at this job―commanding Russian armies, subduing and annexing other countries, controlling the mass communications media, and imprisoning traitors and, sometimes, executing them. And what do I get for it? Criticism! Draft-dodging! Seizure of my financial assets! Is that the way to treat a great leader?”

Plunged into gloom, Vlad continued his journey through the ornate palace hall, stopping finally before his favorite full-length mirror―one specially designed to exaggerate his height. Striking a heroic pose before it, he slowly recited: “Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the greatest of them all?” Silence followed.

Red-faced and incensed, Vlad growled: “Well, mirrors don’t talk. And, anyway, there’s no doubt about the answer!” Resuming his march, he muttered: “Damned Ukrainians! Damned Russians! Ingrates―all of them!”

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

Replacing a Disastrous War with a Just Peace in Ukraine

Lawrence S Wittner

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Sunday December 10, 2023 · 7:55 PM PST

2023/12/10 · 19:55

Although the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza has captured the world’s horrified attention, the war in Ukraine has had even more terrible consequences. Grinding on for nearly two years, Russia’s massive military invasion of that country has taken hundreds of thousands of lives, created millions of refugees, wrecked Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and economy, and consumed enormous financial resources from nations around the world.

And yet, despite the Ukraine War’s vast human and economic costs, there is no sign that it is abating. Russia and Ukraine are now bogged down in very bloody military stalemate, with about a fifth of Ukraine’s land occupied and annexed by Russia.

Meanwhile, polls show that an overwhelming majority of Ukrainians remain determined to continue the struggle to free all of Ukraine from Russian captivity. Indeed, an opinion survey in the fall of 2023 found that 80 percent of Ukrainians polled believed that under no circumstances should Ukraine give up any of its territory.

Admittedly, in the United States, the major supplier of military and economic aid to beleaguered Ukraine, some developments point to declining enthusiasm for that role. The Republican Party has revived its 1930s policy (once termed “isolationism”) of appeasing military aggression by rightwing dictatorships, while leftists with an anti-American slant see a Russian victory as a useful way of somehow destroying “U.S. imperialism.” Nonetheless, unless Donald Trump and his MAGA followers sweep into power in 2024, it seems unlikely that the U.S. government or its NATO partners will entirely abandon Ukraine to a future under the jackboot of Russian military occupation.

Given these obstacles, is there a way to secure a just settlement of the Ukraine War?

There is, but it will take some creative action by the United Nations, the global organization that has been authorized to enforce international security.

Since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, the overwhelming majority of the world’s nations have repeatedly used their participation in the UN General Assembly to condemn the Russian invasion and to call for a just peace in Ukraine. For example, on the eve of the one-year anniversary of the war, the General Assembly, by a vote of 141 nations to 7 (with 32 abstentions), demanded that Russia “immediately, completely, and unconditionally” withdraw its military forces from Ukraine and called for a “cessation in hostilities” and a “comprehensive, just and lasting peace” based on the principles enshrined in the UN Charter. The UN Charter, of course, constitutes international law and bans “the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State.”

Even so, it is the UN Security Council that is tasked with enforcing international security, and Russia has used its veto in that UN entity to block UN action to end the Ukraine War.

The paralysis of the UN Security Council, however, need not continue. As Louise Blais, Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations from 2017 to 2021, has recently pointed out, Article 27 (3) of the UN Charter states that a party to a dispute before the Security Council shall abstain from voting in connection with the dispute. But, when it came to the Security Council’s votes on the Ukraine War, as Blais noted, “none of the 10 elected Security Council members had the courage, vision or backing to put forward a resolution” demanding abstention. According to Blais, the unwillingness of the four other veto-wielding members (Britain China, France, and the United States) to avoid a crippling Russian veto and, thereby, empower the Security Council to act, reflected their “zero interest in supporting such a move for fear it would limit their own power in the future.”

But there is ample precedent for limiting the veto in this fashion. The United Nations has a history of veto-wielding nations abstaining from Security Council voting when they are parties to a dispute. As Blais observes, between 1946 and 1952, Security Council members “regularly adhered to the obligatory abstention rule.” Only in later years did the five permanent Security Council members curtail the application of this practice.

In short, based on both international law and precedent, the UN Security Council has the authority to impose a settlement of the disastrous Ukraine War. What kinds of international action this would require would need to be determined by the world organization, just as the final terms of a peace agreement would ultimately need to be accepted by the contending parties. But, given the overwhelming support in the UN General Assembly for the withdrawal of Russian military forces from Ukraine and for a lasting peace agreement, such a peace settlement is likely to be a just one.

At the least, this would be a far better method of dealing with international conflict than the current full-scale war currently raging in Ukraine. And it could serve as a model for resolving other intractable disputes, such as the brutal Israel-Palestine conflict, as well.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

The Brotherhood of Billionaires

Lawrence S Wittner

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Monday November 20, 2023 · 12:51 PM PST

2023/11/20 · 12:51

In recent decades, a growing similarity has developed between the Chinese and U.S. economic systems. Despite the Chinese Communist Party’s talk of “socialism,” the rapidly-expanding Chinese economy has become increasingly capitalist, with the private sector accounting for about two-thirds of China’s Gross Domestic Product in 2021.

Not surprisingly, then, the two countries currently lead the rest of the world’s nations in their number of billionaires. This March, according to Forbes, the United States had 735 billionaires (worth a collective $4.5 trillion) and China had 562 (worth $2 trillion) out of a global total of 2,640.

The richest U.S. billionaire, as well as the wealthiest man in the world, is Elon Musk, who, as of November 2023, possessed a fortune estimated at $241 billion. Born to a wealthy South African family, Musk cofounded six companies, among them Tesla and SpaceX (whose Starships exploded this April and November), and recently purchased Twitter, turning it into a conduit for hate speech. Well-known for his arrogant, incendiary, and antisemitic pronouncements, Musk presides over corporations that have faced lawsuits over civil and workers’ rights violations. This September the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued Tesla, charging racial discrimination and harassment of Black workers.

Jeff Bezos, the second richest American, with $168 billion in wealth, founded and long presided over the e-commerce giant Amazon, the second largest corporation in the United States, with $514 billion in revenue during 2022. He also owns the Washington Post and Blue Origin, an aerospace company that produces rockets, one of which he flew into space for a joyride in 2021. Bezos modestly thanked “every Amazon employee” because “you guys paid for this”―a fact surely recognized by Amazon’s delivery drivers, timed so relentlessly on the job that they urinate in bottles while on the road. Amazon also fought ferociously to block unionization of its employees and, though thousands of workers at Amazon’s massive Staten Island warehouse startled the nation by defiantly voting for a union, the company refused to recognize it. This May, Bezos and his glamorous fiancée set off on his three-masted sailing yacht, the largest in the world, blissfully touring Europe and holding an at-sea engagement party amid movie stars, royalty, and, of course, billionaires.

Larry Ellison, the third richest American, currently possesses $145 billion in wealth, based largely on his holdings in Oracle, a software giant. Dubbed the “nation’s most avid trophy-home buyer” by the Wall Street Journal, Ellison has purchased dozens of very expensive mansions and real estate properties. They include a 23-acre estate, modeled after a 16^th-century Japanese imperial palace, that he reportedly spent $200 million to renovate, as well as 98 percent of Lanai, the sixth-largest island in the Hawaiian archipelago, which he purchased for $300 million. Ellison has owned many exotic cars, the twelfth-largest yacht in the world (built at a cost of $200 million), and several planes, and has had four wives and divorces. He has also sued San Jose, California over the local airport’s rule that prevented him from landing his private jet there in the middle of the night.

Today’s top three Chinese billionaires are Zhong Shanshan (bottled spring water manufacturer, $64 billion), Zhang Yiming (founder of tech giant ByteDance, $43 billion), and Colin Huang (e-commerce leader, $41 billion). Given China’s government-controlled communications media and sensitivity about the existence of fabulous wealth and extravagant lifestyles in this ostensibly socialist nation, public information about these and most other wealthy Chinese is far less available than for their U.S. counterparts. Even so, the lives of China’s billionaires have been revealed again and again to include luxurious mansions, private jets, collections of the world’s most expensive cars, jewelry, and art, and other glittering accoutrements of private privilege.

It’s certainly a different way of life from that of the people who produce their wealth. Although there has been substantial economic growth in China, the country is characterized by a high level of economic inequality. Chinese workers in manufacturing average only about $6 an hour, and life for many of them is precarious. Companies employ hundreds of millions of rural migrants, often on temporary contracts or hired informally, and this leaves them vulnerable to unpaid overtime work, sudden pay cuts, or layoffs. Increasingly, factories have resorted to not paying workers, paying them late, or letting them go. Barred from forming independent unions, workers have nonetheless conducted a surge of strikes. Furthermore, the country’s safety net is minimal and, in rural regions, social security benefits are only about $27 a month. In 2020, China’s premier reported that 600 million Chinese had a monthly income of less than $150.

Much the same pattern exists in the United States. For decades, despite a rising GNP, income and wealth have grown more unequal and, as of 2018, the three wealthiest U.S. billionaires had combined fortunes exceeding the total wealth of half the American population. Today, real wages in the United States stand at roughly the same level as 40 years ago, with the federal minimum wage stuck at $7.25 per hour. Almost 18 million Americans exist in what has been called “deep poverty”―defined as living on less than $6,380 a year for an individual or living on less than $13,100 a year for a family of four. Amid heightening inequality and declining membership, American unions are waging a fierce struggle for economic justice.

This prevalence of economic inequality reflects not only corporate priorities, but the enormous political influence billionaires exercise in both nations, either through their vast wealth or through direct personal control of government. Billionaire politicians like Donald Trump make appeals to the working class, but deliver tax breaks for the rich, just as billionaire rulers like Xi Jinping talk of “common prosperity,” but simultaneously promote China as “open for business.”

In the world they desired and did much to create, the billionaires of both countries have a lot more in common with each other than with their fellow citizens.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

Time to Abandon International Anarchy?

Lawrence S Wittner

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Sunday October 22, 2023 · 11:05 AM PDT

2023/10/22 · 11:05

In December 1934, Arthur Henderson, a leader of the British Labour Party, declared in his speech accepting the Nobel Peace Prize that the immense human suffering caused by World War I “led to the very clear realization that international anarchy must be abandoned if civilization was to survive.”

Unfortunately, that realization did not go very far or very deep. Although, since that time, international law has been refined, nations remain far from adhering to its provisions or accepting its enforcement by the United Nations.

The lengthy, bloody conflict between the Israelis and their Arab neighbors provides a dramatic illustration of this point.

On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted a plan to replace the British Mandate in Palestine with a partition of that land between a Jewish state and a Palestinian state. The UN decision was fiercely resented by the surrounding Arab nations, which launched a war against the new Jewish state, Israel—a war from which Israel emerged victorious in 1948.

This victory did not end the violence, however, or the violations of international law. Having fled abroad from the fighting in 1948, over 700,000 Palestinians, in contravention of international law, were denied the right to return to their homes in Israel. Egypt, which, in 1956, had agreed under UN pressure to the demilitarization of the Sinai Peninsula, expelled UN observers in 1967, massed its troops on Israel’s border, and together with Jordan, readied itself to invade Israel. In turn, Israel launched devastating attacks on Egyptian, Jordanian, Syrian, and Iraqi military forces. Victorious in this Six-Day War, Israel gained control of the Sinai Peninsula, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights.

Over the ensuing decades, numerous violent clashes followed, with Israel, now the dominant military power in the region, defeating Arab and Palestinian resistance. Meanwhile, Israel defied international law by continuing to occupy the territory conquered in 1967, colonizing it with Jewish settlements, and violating the human rights of its Palestinian residents. For their part, Hamas terrorists, dedicated to unremitting war against Israel, committed horrendous war crimes against noncombatants in clear violation of the 1949 Geneva Conventions. When the Israeli government deprived Gaza’s civilian population of food, water, and other essentials of survival, it, too, defied international law.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine provides another clear example of flouting international law. Article 2, Section 4 of the UN Charter prohibits the “use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” Ukraine had been an independent, sovereign nation since 1991, when the Soviet Union authorized a referendum on whether it wanted to become part of the new Russian Federation or to become independent. In the balloting, 90 percent voted for independence, which was formally accepted. Three years later, in the Budapest Memorandum, the Russian government pledged to “respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine” and to “refrain from the threat or use of force” against that nation.

Nevertheless, in 2014 the Putin regime drew upon Russian military power to seize and annex Crimea in southern Ukraine and to arm pro-Russian separatists and unleash its own thinly-disguised military forces in eastern Ukraine. In February 2022, the Russian government, determined to seize full control of Ukraine, launched a massive military invasion. Although fierce resistance by the Ukrainians prevented a complete Russian takeover, that September Putin announced the annexation of four additional regions of Ukraine, declaring that Russia would never surrender them.

Most of the world’s nations assailed this behavior as a flagrant violation of international law. In March 2014, after a Russian veto blocked a UN Security Council rebuke, the UN General Assembly voted by an overwhelming margin to condemn the Russian action that year. In March 2022, amid a new Russian veto of UN Security Council action, the UN General Assembly roundly condemned the full-scale Russian invasion by a vote of 141 to 5 (with 35 abstentions), while the International Court of Justice, the world’s highest judicial authority, voted by 13 to 2 (with Russia’s judge casting one of the negative votes) that Russia should “immediately suspend” its invasion. That October, the UN General Assembly, by a vote of 143 nations to 5 (with 35 abstentions), called on all nations to refuse recognition of Russia’s “attempted illegal annexation” of Ukrainian territory.

Perhaps the most chilling manifestation of international anarchy is the renewed nuclear arms race. Recognizing the potential for worldwide destruction in a nuclear war and pressed for action by an uneasy public, the nations of the world did, eventually, sign nuclear arms control treaties. Among these agreements was the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty of 1968, in which non-nuclear nations pledged to forgo building nuclear weapons, while the nuclear nations agreed to divest themselves of their nuclear arsenals. Nevertheless, in recent decades, additional nations have become nuclear powers, while existing nuclear powers have scrapped previous nuclear disarmament agreements. Symptomatically, the nuclear powers oppose the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which became international law in 2021.

Indeed, all the nuclear nations are currently engaged in nuclear weapons buildups―planning and developing new, more efficient weapons of mass destruction. Some government officials, among them Vladimir Putin, publicly threaten to launch nuclear war against nations opposing their international policies.

Against this backdrop, it’s tempting to conclude that, thanks to the apparently ungovernable nature of the world, the annihilation of civilization is inevitable. But is the world ungovernable―or merely lacking an effective government?

Given the fact that the United Nations was created to guarantee international security, a logical solution to the problem of effective governance is to strengthen the ability of the world organization to enforce international law. By curbing international anarchy, this action would prevent marauding nations and armed bands alike from indulging their worst impulses. It would also significantly enhance the prospects for peace, justice, and human survival.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

World Peace and Security Require a Stronger United Nations

Lawrence S Wittner

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Saturday September 23, 2023 · 5:31 PM PDT

2023/09/23 · 17:31

Addressing the UN Security Council on September 20, 2023, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered a heartfelt plea “to update the existing security architecture in the world, in particular, to restore the real power of the UN Charter.”

This call for strengthening international security under the aegis of the United Nations makes sense not only for Ukraine―a country suffering from brutal military invasion, occupation, and annexation by its much larger, more powerful neighbor, the Russian Federation―but for the nations of the world.

For thousands of years, competing territories, nations, and empires have spilled rivers of blood and laid waste to much of the world through wars and plunder. Hundreds of millions of people have died, while many more have been horribly injured or forced to flee their shattered homelands in a desperate search for safety. World Wars I and II, capped off by the use of nuclear weapons to annihilate the populations of entire cities, brought massive suffering to people around the globe.

In 1945, this mad slaughter and devastation convinced far-sighted thinkers, as well as many government leaders, that human survival was dependent upon developing a framework for international security: the United Nations. The UN Charter, adopted in a conference in the spring of that year in San Francisco by 50 Allied nations, declared that a key purpose of the new organization was “to maintain international peace and security.”

The UN Charter, which constitutes international law, included provisions detailing how nations were to treat one another in the battered world emerging from the Second World War. Among its major provisions was Article 2, Section 4, which declared that “all members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” Furthermore, Article 51 declared that “nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a member of the United Nations.”

Although the UN Charter provided for a General Assembly in which all member nations were represented, action to maintain international peace and security was delegated primarily to a UN Security Council with fifteen members, five of whom (the United States, the Soviet Union, China, Britain, and France) were to be permanent members with the right to veto Security Council resolutions or action.

Not surprisingly, the right of any of these five nations to block Security Council peace efforts, a right they had insisted upon as the price of their participation in the United Nations, hamstrung the world organization from enforcing peace and international security on numerous occasions. The most recent instance has occurred in the case of the Ukraine War, a conflict in which, as Zelensky lamented, “all [Security Council] efforts are vetoed by the aggressor.” As a result, the United Nations has all too often lacked the power to enforce the principles of international law confirmed by its members and enshrined in its Charter.

Some people are perfectly content with the weakness of the United Nations. Fierce nationalists, as exemplified by Donald Trump and his Republican followers, are contemptuous of this or any international security organization, and many would prefer its abolition. Others have little use for the United Nations but, instead, place their hopes for the maintenance of international peace and stability upon public and governmental acceptance of great power spheres of influence. Meanwhile, a segment of the international Left ignores the United Nations and insists that world peace will only be secured by smashing “U.S. imperialism.”

Sadly, those forces opposing international organization and action fail to recognize that their proposals represent not only a return to thousands of years of international strife and mass slaughter among nations, but, in today’s world, an open door to a nuclear holocaust that will end virtually all life on earth.

Compared to this descent into international chaos and destruction, proposals to strengthen the United Nations are remarkably practical and potentially effective. Zelensky has suggested empowering the UN General Assembly to overcome a Security Council veto by a vote of two-thirds or more of the Assembly’s nations. In addition, he has proposed expanding the representation of nations in the Security Council, temporarily suspending membership of a Security Council member when it “resorts to aggression against another nation in violation of the UN Charter,” and creating a deterrent to international aggression by agreeing on the response to it before it occurs.

Of course, there are numerous other ways to strengthen the United Nations as a force for peace and to help ensure that it works as an effective international agency for battling the onrushing climate catastrophe, combating disease pandemics, and cracking down on the exploitative practices of multinational corporations. Its member nations could also rally behind the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (still unsigned by the nuclear powers), agree on a UN program to handle the burgeoning international refugee crisis, and provide the world organization with substantially greater financial resources to reduce global poverty and mass misery than it currently receives.

Indeed, the horrific Ukraine War is but the latest canary in the coal mine―the danger signal that people of all nations should recognize as indicating the necessity for moving beyond national isolation and beginning a new era of global responsibility, cooperation, and unity.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

From the Partial Test Ban Treaty to a Nuclear Weapons-Free World

Lawrence S Wittner

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Sunday September 03, 2023 · 1:50 PM PDT

2023/09/03 · 13:50

This September is the sixtieth anniversary of U.S. and Soviet ratification of the world’s first significant nuclear arms control agreement, the Partial Test Ban Treaty. Thus, it’s an appropriate time to examine that treaty, as well as to consider what might be done to end the danger of nuclear annihilation.

Although the use, in 1945, of atomic bombs to destroy Hiroshima and Nagasaki unleashed a wave of public concern about human survival in the nuclear age, it declined with the emergence of the Cold War. But another, even larger wave developed during the 1950s and early 1960s as the nuclear arms race surged forward. At the time, the governments of the United States, the Soviet Union, and Britain engaged in testing a new nuclear device, the H-bomb, with a thousand times the power of the atomic bomb.

Many people found this situation alarming. Not only did the advent of H-bombs point toward universal doom in a future war, but the testing of the weapons sent vast clouds of radioactive “fallout” into the atmosphere, where it drifted around the planet until it descended upon the populace below. In 1957, Professor Linus Pauling, a Nobel Prize winner in chemistry, predicted that, thanks to the nuclear tests already conducted, a million people would die early, and 200,000 children would be born with serious mental deficiency or physical defects.

In reaction to this growing menace, millions of people around the world began to resist nuclear weapons. They formed new, activist organizations, including the National Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy (better known as SANE) and Women Strike for Peace (in the United States), the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (in Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand), the Japan Council Against A & H Bombs and the Japan Congress Against A & H Bombs (in Japan), and the Struggle Against Atomic Death (in West Germany). Even in the Soviet bloc, concerned scientists pressed for an end to the nuclear arms race.

Government officials in nuclear-armed nations, troubled by the rising agitation, as well as by opinion polls showing widespread popular distaste for nuclear testing, nuclear weapons, and nuclear war, gradually began to adapt their policies to the demands of the public. Meeting with top scientists in the U.S. nuclear weapons program, U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower told them that the U.S. government was “up against an extremely difficult world opinion situation” and that the country “could not permit itself to be ‘crucified on a cross of atoms.’” If U.S. nuclear testing continued, U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles warned the president, “the slight military gains” would be “outweighed by the political losses.”

Accordingly, in 1958, the Soviet, American, and British governments halted nuclear testing while beginning negotiations for a test ban treaty. Failing to secure an agreement, they resumed nuclear tests in 1961, which led to nuclear testing remaining a very hot political issue for people and governments alike.

Into this controversy stepped Norman Cousins, the editor of a widely-read public affairs magazine, the Saturday Review, and, also, founder and co-chair of SANE. During a lengthy meeting at the White House with President John F. Kennedy in November 1962, Cousins inquired if the president would like him to meet with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to try to smooth the diplomatic path toward a nuclear test ban treaty. Kennedy responded affirmatively and, in the following months, Cousins shuttled back and forth between the two world leaders. Ultimately, Cousins overcame Khrushchev’s suspicions of Kennedy and, then, convinced Kennedy to deliver a major speech with “a breathtaking new approach” to Soviet-American relations.

This American University address, partially written by Cousins, proved an immediate success with Khrushchev. Test ban negotiations commenced in Moscow during July 1963, resulting in the Partial Test Ban Treaty―banning nuclear testing in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water.

From the standpoint of ending the nuclear arms race, the treaty had its limitations. Because the treaty left unaddressed the issue of nuclear testing underground, the nuclear powers and aspiring nuclear powers simply shifted nuclear tests to this new locale. Furthermore, with nuclear fallout no longer a major public concern, popular pressure to halt nuclear testing―and, thereby, choke off the arms race―declined.

Nevertheless, the Partial Test Ban Treaty proved a turning point in world history. Together with the nuclear disarmament campaign that produced the treaty, it reduced Cold War hostility and ushered in a period of détente between the U.S. and Soviet governments. Furthermore, widespread nuclear proliferation, which seemed imminent at the time, failed to materialize. Even today, sixty years later, there are only nine nuclear powers.

Most important, the treaty demonstrated that nuclear arms control and disarmament were feasible. And so a host of treaties followed that substantially reduced nuclear dangers. These included the Nonproliferation Treaty, Strategic Arms Limitation Treaties, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties, and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Through these treaties, as well as through unilateral action―both spurred on by popular pressure―the number of nuclear weapons in the world dropped sharply, from 70,000 to roughly 12,500. Meanwhile, nuclear war became increasingly unthinkable.

Of course, in recent years, with the decline of popular pressure against nuclear weapons, the prospect of nuclear annihilation has revived. Disarmament treaties have been scrapped, a new nuclear arms race has begun, and reckless leaders of nuclear nations have publicly threatened nuclear war. Although a UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons entered into force in 2021, the nine nuclear powers have resisted signing it.

Even so, as the Partial Test Ban Treaty and its successors show us, arms control and disarmament treaties have helped to curb the nuclear arms race and prevent nuclear war. Similarly, the revived march toward nuclear catastrophe can be halted by finally banning nuclear weapons―if people will demand it.

[Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).]

Spinning Illusions: The Anti-American Left and the Ukraine War

Lawrence S Wittner

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Saturday August 05, 2023 · 10:13 AM PDT

2023/08/05 · 10:13

In recent decades, a segment of the global Left has looked upon the U.S. government as the Great Satan in international affairs, responsible for the world’s major ills. Thus, on those occasions when countries at odds with the United States behaved like brutal imperialist powers, these “campists” (as they were called thanks to their division of the world into an evil U.S. imperialist camp and its benign opponents) either ignored the action or blamed it on the U.S. government and U.S. allies.

This warped vision became particularly apparent during the Russian government’s military invasion, occupation, and annexation of Ukraine, when major organizations on the anti-American Left, although supposedly antiwar and anti-imperialist, focused their criticism on the U.S. government, NATO, and Ukraine.

But this position failed to generate widespread popularity, even on the Left. In the United States, progressives in Congress uniformly condemned the Russian conquest of Ukraine and voted to support Ukraine’s defense effort. Meanwhile, leftwing activists organized a Ukraine Solidarity Network that leafletted, distributed articles, and sponsored speakers. In March 2023, when the campists finally held a national rally in Washington, DC, whitewashing Russian military aggression, it drew a remarkably small turnout that even the admiring Chinese government news agency estimated as numbering only in the hundreds.

Leftwing apologists for Russian behavior in Ukraine also faced tough going around the world. Opinion polls found wide-ranging international hostility toward Vladimir Putin and his government. At the UN General Assembly, the Russian military invasion was quickly condemned by a vote of 141 nations to 5 (with 35 abstentions), while later Russian annexation of Ukrainian territory was denounced by a vote of 143 nations to 5 (with 35 abstentions).

In these difficult circumstances, the campists promoted a more popular idea, championed by Kremlin propagandists, that the unipolar world order dominated by the United States should be supplanted by a multipolar one. The United States had frequently meddled in or invaded weaker nations, they argued. Therefore, why shouldn’t Russia or others do the same? Thus, instead of advocating the abolition of imperialism, anti-American leftists called for admitting other nations to the imperialist club.

This support for “multipolarity” often pointed toward the rise of the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa). Decades ago, they began working together to promote alternative investment opportunities. More recently, they formed a loose geopolitical bloc that, given their large populations and growing share of the world economy, provided them with considerable potential power. From the standpoint of anti-American leftists, this was a particularly appealing organization, for it included Russia and China and omitted the United States and its NATO partners.

In July 2022, Sara Flounders, a leader of the International Action Center and the United National Antiwar Coalition, two of the largest campist organizations in the United States, lovingly depicted a recent BRICS summit as devoted to “building an open world economy that . . . promotes cooperation.” She contrasted this with a summit of the Group of Seven (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain, and the United States)―“the countries responsible for the looting and colonization of Asia, Africa, and the Americas. They owe reparations for the genocide of Indigenous peoples, the enslavement of African people, and the devastating world wars of the 20^th century.” Naturally, “this summit of the most powerful and wealthiest imperialist powers was focused on how to intensify sanctions on Russia and how to continue the war in Ukraine.” Behind them stood NATO, “the U.S. commanded military alliance that serves as a global enforcer of U.S. corporate power.”

Leading campist writers and lecturers devote considerable effort to lauding the BRICS nations as the humane alternative to U.S. imperialism. In a recent article, Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies insist that BRICS nations and other foes of U.S. policy will “show the world that other nations can actually bring peace and prosperity to countries and regions where the United States has brought only war, chaos and instability.” Scott Ritter, who insists that Putin is “one of the greatest leaders of all time,” exulted that American domination of the world was crumbling. “It’s not just Russia,” he argued; “the world is waking up.” NATO was “a paper tiger,” and “BRICS is now the major player in the world.”

In fact, though, the governments of BRICS nations―other than Russia’s―are not as enthusiastic about the Russian assault upon Ukraine as the anti-American Left contends and would like. They refused to support the Russian invasion in votes at the UN General Assembly, avoided selling arms to the weapons-hungry Russian government, and chided Putin when he threatened nuclear war. From the standpoint of providing a strong defense for beleaguered Ukraine, this behavior was insufficient. But it was far from wholehearted backing for Russian policy, either.

Furthermore, the public in BRICS countries has frequently been more critical of Russia’s actions in Ukraine than their governments have been. According to a public opinion survey in March 2022, shortly after the wholesale Russian invasion began, only 4 percent of Indian respondents and 8 percent of Chinese respondents expressed a positive view of Russia, while 71 percent in China supported or sympathized with Ukraine. That May, another survey reported that the share of Brazilian adults with a favorable view of Russia had dropped from 38 percent to 13 percent. In the fall, a YouGov poll found that only 28 percent of Indian respondents blamed Western countries for the Ukraine War, while 53 percent of South African respondents and 54 percent of Brazilian respondents thought a Russian victory in Ukraine would make the world a more dangerous place.

Indeed, a survey in early 2023 reported that large majorities of the public in all BRICS nations except Russia favored non-recognition of Russian-conquered Ukrainian land, trade sanctions against Russia, and Russian payment of war reparations to Ukraine.

Illusions have their limits.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

J. Robert Oppenheimer's Tragedy--and Ours

Lawrence S Wittner

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Sunday July 09, 2023 · 6:24 PM PDT

2023/07/09 · 18:24

The July 21, 2023 theatrical release of the film Oppenheimer, focused on the life of a prominent American nuclear physicist, should help to remind us of how badly the development of modern weapons has played out for individuals and for all of humanity.

Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography, American Prometheus, written by Kai Bird and the late Martin Sherwin, the film tells the story of the rise and fall of young J. Robert Oppenheimer, recruited by the U.S. government during World War II to direct the construction and testing of the world’s first atomic bomb at Los Alamos, New Mexico. His success in these ventures was followed shortly thereafter by President Truman’s ordering the use of nuclear weapons to destroy Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

During the immediate postwar years, Oppenheimer, widely lauded as “the father of the atomic bomb,” attained extraordinary power for a scientist within U.S. government ranks, including as chair of the General Advisory Committee of the new Atomic Energy Commission (AEC).

But his influence ebbed as his ambivalence about nuclear weapons grew. In the fall of 1945, during a meeting at the White House with Truman, Oppenheimer said: “Mr. President, I feel I have blood on my hands.” Incensed, Truman later told Assistant Secretary of State Dean Acheson that Oppenheimer had become “a crybaby” and that he didn’t want “to see that son of a bitch in this office ever again.”

Oppenheimer was also disturbed by the emerging nuclear arms race and, like many atomic scientists, championed the international control of atomic energy. Indeed, in late 1949, the entire General Advisory Committee of the AEC came out in opposition to the U.S. development of the H-bomb―although the president, ignoring this recommendation, approved developing the new weapon and adding it to the rapidly growing U.S. nuclear arsenal.

In these circumstances, figures with considerably less ambivalence about nuclear weapons took action to purge Oppenheimer from power. In December 1953, shortly after becoming chair of the AEC, Lewis Strauss, a fervent champion of a U.S. nuclear buildup, ordered Oppenheimer’s security clearance suspended. Anxious to counter implications of disloyalty, Oppenheimer appealed the decision and, in subsequent hearings before the AEC’s Personnel Security Board, faced grueling questioning not only about his criticism of nuclear weapons, but about his relationships decades before with individuals who had been Communist Party members.

Ultimately, the AEC ruled that Oppenheimer was a security risk, an official determination that added to his public humiliation, completed his removal from government service, and delivered a shattering blow to his meteoric career.

Of course, the development of nuclear weapons had far broader consequences than the downfall of J. Robert Oppenheimer. In addition to killing more than 200,000 people and injuring many more in Japan, the advent of nuclear weaponry led nations around the world to enter a fierce nuclear arms race. By the 1980s, spurred on by conflicts among the major powers, 70,000 nuclear weapons had come into existence, with the potential to destroy virtually all life on earth.

Fortunately, a massive grassroots citizens campaign emerged to counter this drive toward a nuclear apocalypse. And it succeeded in pressuring reluctant governments into an array of nuclear arms control and disarmament treaties, as well as unilateral actions, to reduce nuclear dangers. As a result, by 2023 the number of nuclear weapons had declined to roughly 12,500.

Nevertheless, in recent years, thanks to a sharp decrease in citizen activism and increase in international conflict, the potential for nuclear war has dramatically revived. All nine nuclear powers (Russia, the United States, China, Britain, France, Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea) are currently engaged in upgrading their nuclear arsenals with new production facilities and new, improved nuclear weapons. During 2022, these governments poured nearly $83 billion into this nuclear buildup. Public threats to initiate nuclear war, including those by Donald Trump, Kim Jong Un, and Vladimir Putin, have become more common. The hands of the Doomsday Clock of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, established in 1946, now stand at 100 seconds to midnight―the most dangerous setting in its history.

Not surprisingly, the nuclear powers display little interest in further action for nuclear arms control and disarmament. The two nations possessing some 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons―Russia (with the most) and the United States (not far behind)―have pulled out of nearly all such agreements with one another. Although the U.S. government has proposed extending the New Start Treaty (which limits the number of strategic nuclear weapons) with Russia, Putin reportedly responded this June that Russia would not engage in any nuclear disarmament talks with the West, commenting: “We possess more weaponry of such sort than the NATO countries. They know that and are always trying to persuade us to start negotiations on reduction. Nuts to them . . . as our people say.” The Chinese government―whose nuclear arsenal, while growing substantially, still ranks a distant third in numbers―has stated that it sees no reason for China to engage in any nuclear arms control talks.

To head off a looming nuclear catastrophe, non-nuclear nations have been championing the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). Adopted by an overwhelming vote of nations at a UN conference in July 2017, the TPNW bans developing, testing, producing, acquiring, possessing, stockpiling, and threatening to use nuclear weapons. The treaty went into force in January 2021 and―though opposed by all the nuclear powers―it has thus far been signed by 92 nations and ratified by 68 of them. Brazil and Indonesia are likely to ratify it in the near future. Polls have found that the TPNW has substantial support in numerous countries, including the United States and other NATO nations.

There does remain some hope, then, that the nuclear tragedy that engulfed Robert Oppenheimer and has long threatened the survival of world civilization can still be averted.

Lawrence S. Wittner (https://www.lawrenceswittner.com/ ) is Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press).

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