Hi Friends, a pleasant end of 2016 to you!
The New Yorker has published a “must read” piece on how close we may be to Nuclear War… as we enjoy Holiday celebrations and usher in 2017’s New Year.
Pointed out near the end of this article, the author confesses, “My greatest concern is the lack of public awareness about this existential threat (and) the absence of a vigorous public debate.”
This is the shared deep concern for most of us who follow these issues closely––yet the average American is totally unaware that this possibility exists––or what our scientists are saying.
We so need to be aware of what people like Shlosser are warning––then speak with others. You might try something light weight for openers; e.g., “What do you make of the scuttlebutt about being close to a nuclear war again?” Surely, they will have some response and may even think about it later.
Enjoy the Holiday week with family and friends!
Sharon
The New Yorker
December 23, 2016
World War Three, By Mistake
Harsh political rhetoric, combined with the vulnerability of the nuclear command-and-control system, has made the risk of global catastrophe greater than ever.
By Eric Schlosser
On June 3, 1980, at about two-thirty in the morning, computers at the National Military Command Center, beneath the Pentagon, at the headquarters of the North American Air Defense Command (norad), deep within Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado, and at Site R, the Pentagon’s alternate command post center hidden inside Raven Rock Mountain, Pennsylvania, issued an urgent warning: the Soviet Union had just launched a nuclear attack on the United States. The Soviets had recently invaded Afghanistan, and the animosity between the two superpowers was greater than at any other time since the Cuban Missile Crisis.
U.S. Air Force ballistic-missile crews removed their launch keys from the safes, bomber crews ran to their planes, fighter planes took off to search the skies, and the Federal Aviation Administration prepared to order every airborne commercial airliner to land.