Dear Friends,
You have probably seen last week’s announcement from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) about preparing Americans for a nuclear detonation somewhere here in the U.S. If a nuclear detonation ever happens here in the U.S., it will bring about a rapid return of numerous nuclear weapons toward the sender and likely a volley back and forth. Are we this close to an all-out nuclear exchange and no one is pursuing serious diplomacy? Are we American citizens perturbed … or are we just moving forward unconsciously like lemmings to the sea?
I suggest we call or write our newspapers, public officials, congress members, and everyone on our e-lists––and say, NO! We need to pursue a radical course of diplomacy, a total reevaluation of the US-North Korea history in order to learn why they are so defensive and paranoid.
Please get a copy of Professor Bruce Cumings’, North Korea: Another Country, written in 2004. Cumings is a noted authority on North Korea. This book is based on “declassified materials” from our U.S. military archives. Reading the pages will break your heart. More napalm was dropped needlessly on North Korea after WWII than on Vietnam. Multiple killing fields were created where the shooting of thousands of North Koreans was carried out systematically by our troops in each of them. Their cities were mercilessly bombed when they were totally helpless. Every current U.S. politician and military officer should be mandated to read this book. It is not make-believe, it’s full of quotes from our generals whose names we know from the 50’s forward. Yes, the North Koreans are terribly paranoid. No wonder they have a warped view of the outside world, particularly of American power.
China and Russia recently created large trilateral projects designed to help North Koreans develop regions in North Korea and in eastern Russia that will be beneficial to all concerned. There are a number of constructive options possible if American policy makers back off of their power trip, which includes conducting huge military operations in North Korea’s immediate vicinity to frighten them. Bring the situation down to our neighborhoods, if we know the man next door to us is paranoid, fearful and angry with us, does it make sense to parade around his property with a battalion of uniformed fighters with hoards of lethal weapons?
It appears we are choosing the latter … and preparing our people for an exchange of nuclear bombs. This is insane!
Please see the article below. If this concerns you also, please pass on to your friends and colleagues.
Sharon Tennison
Center for Citizen Initiatives
STAT
January 4, 2018
CDC plans session on ‘preparing for the unthinkable’: a nuclear detonation
With this week’s bellicose boasting about who has the bigger red button on his desk, an alert Thursday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention felt more than a bit on the nose.
With the prospect of actual nuclear war breaking out between North Korea and the United States seeming ever more real, the CDC is moving to prepare health professionals and others on what the public health response would be to a nuclear detonation.