BY JEFFREY w. MASON
I’ve studied the nuclear war threat for decades, earned a master’s degree in the field, researched and wrote TV documentaries on the subject, and worked for the U.S. State and Defense Department and the Congressional Research Service. Nuclear experts have worried for decades about the possibility that an irrational world leader might someday accidentally or intentionally (but based on incomplete or erroneous information) trigger a nuclear Armageddon. Donald Trump fits that description in no uncertain terms. He is a match right out of Central Casting for Stephen King’s President Greg Stillson in the nuclear doomsday film “Dead Zone.”
Trump, for the first time in the Nuclear Age, represents the only commander-in-chief to trash long-valued bipartisan supported and internationally negotiated arms control treaties with Russia and other nuclear weapons nations. Examples include the Limited Test Ban Treaty, 1963, the INF Treaty of 1987, and the New START Treaty of 2010-11, all of which have ratcheted down the nuclear arms race or dramatically reduced the number of nuclear weapons aimed at our country and others by tens of thousands of warheads.
Trump is the first American chief executive in decades to not only publicly pronounce that it is acceptable to actually use nuclear weapons “Why can’t we use nuclear weapons?” but also to shrug his shoulders and embrace these dire words — “Let it be an arms race!” (2016).
Despite Trump’s absurd nuclear saber-rattling rhetoric of “We will outmatch them at every pass and outlast them all,” scientists and military strategists have learned over the decades as President Ronald Reagan wisely acknowledged that, “A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” Why? Because it would be suicidal for not only any potential nuclear aggressor but for the entire planet. That’s because of the nuclear winter impact of even a “limited” nuclear war involving the explosion of 100 to 200 nuclear weapons which was discovered in 1983 by a team led by the late Carl Sagan and verified by more recent studies by Professor Alan Robock and his colleagues. Exploding several dozen nuclear weapons over the span of a day or two will inject huge volumes of smoke, dust and debris into the upper atmosphere blotting out the sun and triggering huge temperature drops that will cause mass famine and billions of deaths.
But even if the unthinkable doesn’t happen, Trump’s nuclear strategy will still result in an even greater waste of taxpayer’s treasure by funding more dangerous and unnecessary nuclear weapons and launch platforms. Also, an unrestrained and accelerated nuclear arms race that the president sees as a good thing will only enrich the coffers of those (possibly including Trump) investing in the stock portfolios of nuclear warhead and launch production firms.
Lastly, another dire impact of an accelerated Trump nuclear arms race on steroids will be the creation of even greater levels of deadly radioactive wastes that will impact our citizens’ health and well-being through the toxic contamination of our air, water, and topsoil — something much more likely in a presidential administration that has reduced and diminished substantially the role of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Before he passed away recently, Dr. Bruce Blair, a former nuclear weapons launch control officer, hit the nail on the head by describing Trump as “lacking the responsibility, composure, competence, empathy, and diplomatic skill to keep nuclear deterrence from failing by intent, accident or miscalculation.”
In conclusion, the unconscionable nuclear risks of another four years of Donald Trump are untenable. The evidence is irrefutable that Trump has irrationally and illogically interrupted the long-held and extremely successful bipartisan strategy to derail the nuclear threat that has been embraced by Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Clinton, Bush, Senior and Junior, and Obama. Those leaders, unlike the current occupant of the Oval Office, realized the tremendous benefits of nuclear arms control, not only for Americans but for the entire World.
Jeffrey W. Mason earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at West Virginia University. He currently resides in Washington, D.C.
