Editor,
As we commemorate the 78th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Japan and acknowledge the U.S. Senate who finally passed an amendment to expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to include compensation to New Mexico downwinders and post-1971 uranium miners, there remains more than 15,000 abandoned uranium mines yet to be cleaned up, and the Marshall Islands will forever be poisoned.
But the millions throughout the world who have rallied for nuclear disarmament since 1945 remain aghast at the politicians who keep their finger on the trigger. The Oppenheimer movie, while focusing on the contradictions of the scientist, may have missed an opportunity to spark Americans to petition their representatives to help get us out of the second arms race. Today there are approximately 12,500 nuclear warheads in nine countries with almost 90% of them held by the U.S. and Russia. It is estimated that 100 nuclear weapons is an “adequate deterrence” threshold for the mutually assured destruction of the world.
Let this be the week that you contact your representative and call on them to cosponsor House Resolution 77 on the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which is the path to a world free of nuclear weapons.
Brenda Bunce
Vancouver
