Too-close Nuclear Annihilation – Then and Now

(Sent as letter to editor at Valley Times-News, July 30, 2016)

Probably the closest the world has come in the past to nuclear annihilation happened during the Cold War when one of the global nuclear superpowers began placing potentially nuclear-armed missiles close to the other nuclear superpower’s borders. Both countries had plenty of ICBM type nuclear weapons, but a launch on either side of these over-the-Pole intercontinental missiles would be detected by the enemy country’s radars and allow at least thirty minutes for that country to launch its massive counter-strike before its own cities and missile bases were hit and destroyed.

Thus we had Mutually Assured Destruction. MAD, yes. But it can be plausibly argued that MAD prevented nuclear war. To launch a first-strike nuclear attack under those conditions would be suicidal. Placing nuclear-tipped missiles so close to the other country’s borders, however, would cut the warning time drastically, thus possibly allowing a first strike that would destroy the enemy country’s missile bases and cities before that country could launch its counter-strike.

Understandably, the “enemy” country so threatened began top-level negotiations with the other superpower to withdraw those too-close missile sites. The “enemy” country also began to deploy its military forces to prevent any more of those dangerous shorter-range missiles from being emplaced. That was when the world came within seconds of total nuclear war. The two opposed military forces were also nuclear-armed, and when they went head-to-head, on one side one commander, fearing his unit was about to be destroyed, ordered the launch of a tactical nuclear weapon.

That commander was in fact mistaken about the tactical situation; something that we know often happens when even competent and usually clear-minded military officers are blinded by “the fog of war.” His mistaken order, if carried out, would almost certainly have triggered an exchange that would have spun out of control, with disastrous consequences for both countries, and indeed for the whole world.

Fortunately, his mistaken order to launch a nuclear war was countermanded by a superior officer who happened to be present.  And the top-level negotiations ended with both sides agreeing to pull back from threatening each other in such serious ways.

Captain Vasili Arkhipov and his wife Olga

In this story, which took place in October of 1962, the “enemy” country was the U.S. and the other country the Soviet Union. Those dangerously too-close missiles were being placed in Cuba. The U.S. had already placed similar missiles in Turkey. The officer who said No to nuclear war, who the whole world should be honoring but is mostly and sadly forgotten, was Soviet navy Captain (later Admiral) Vasili Arkhipov.  You can see a PBS docudrama about the story at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VPY2SgyG5w

That was then. Now, the story is being re-enacted, the “enemy” country now being the Russian Federation, not the U.S. It is the U.S. (aka NATO) placing missile sites too close to the “enemy” country’s borders. The “enemy” country’s leader, Vladimir Putin, has called for top-level negotiations, and made a plea to international journalists to understand and fully report on the deployment of so-called anti-missile sites along and near the Russian border, which he reasonably points out as “upsetting the geostrategic balance of power, which used to exist,” in effect threatening Russia with annihilation in a first-strike attack. He says, “From what I can see, we are in grave danger.” You can watch his speech (with English captions, about 12 minutes) at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWZtyXHcUCo

We don’t know the rest of the “Now” story. I hope it will end as happily as the 1962 version, with successful top-level negotiations. But so far the U.S. seems much more interested in ratcheting up both economic and military pressure on Russia. So the situation is extremely dangerous, with too many opportunities for disastrous miscalculations and mistakes up and down both chains of command. If the Russians reasonably perceive that their national security is under threat, possibly even by a devastating first-strike attack, they reasonably will have to consider deploying their own military in some way to oppose and defeat that threat, and possibly launching their own “defensive” first strike.

For the above and for other reasons, William J. Perry, former Secretary of Defense under President Clinton, says we are closer to nuclear annihilation now than we ever were during the Cold War. Perry, a scientist who worked on nuclear issues at top levels starting during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, knows what he is talking about. His book is titled My Journey at the Nuclear Brink. You can read a review in Military Times: http://www.militarytimes.com/story/military/pentagon/2015/12/29/former-pentagon-chief-perry-nuclear-dangers-growing/78015460/.

At this time of year . . .

I began this bloggery on the 4th of July, 2013, with an essay on the origin of the idea of "American Exceptionalism, as seen in John Winthrop's 1630 sermon "A Model of Christian Charity," delivered (probably) on the good ship Arbella as his group of Puritans embarked on their journey to what would become "New England." The idea was that we were entitled, perhaps even divinely ordained, not only to take possession of land not ours but to unlimited exploitation of that land and its native inhabitants. I said, "That idea, taking off and taking over, the refusal to accept limitations, always wanting – and deserving – more and more, has had too strong influence on American history." Which was why I thought the subject appropriate for a blog calling itself The Slowdown Dirty Truth and starting up on the Fourth. 

I contrasted Winthrop's grand misconception justifying a surpassing national selfishness with the alternative and opposed Christian value of nonviolence, of love even for enemies, early on given voice by our African-American "founders," such as Frederick Douglass: “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of the land.” And brought to the forefront of our national political consciousness later by Martin Luther King, Jr. 
  
On this Fourth I notice that at least among the left-liberal-progressive-radical web sites some mention the timeliness of Frederick Douglass's 1852 speech on the meaning of the Fourth, in which he said, "What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants brass fronted impudence; your shout of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanks-givings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour."

I especially recommend checking out Esther Brown's Facebook page: 

https://www.facebook.com/esther.brown.3760

So, on this fourth I return to this theme, but from a somewhat different angle. Following is a letter to the editor published in last year's Christmas eve issue of our local newspaper, the Valley Times-News. It seems to me also relevant at this time of year. Despite all that rockets' red glare and bombs bursting in air. 

At this time of year . . . .

In this the darkest, coldest time, we are reminded, despite all the blood shed in the streets, in schools, even in places of worship here and across the world, of the possibility of better days, of peace and of love. 

What does it take?

Early humans, despite their relatively small size and really puny claws and teeth, apparently not only survived but began their domination of the planet in large part because they were smart enough to cooperate, both in defense against much larger and fiercer animals and in hunting, foraging, and farming. They learned, as Benjamin Franklin said to fellow American revolutionists in 1776, “Gentlemen, we must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”

“Hangtogetherness” thus creates group solidarity and some accompanying level of peace, at least within the group; and perhaps of love, too, as people begin to really appreciate those others they are hanging with.

The importance of hangtogetherness for group survival and success seems to be why some version of the Golden Rule has been adopted by all the world’s major religions and cultures, starting as far back as one million BC (if you count Fred Flintstone in one episode helping a stranger who had been robbed, beaten and left to die, Fred saying :”I’d want him to help me.”) 

Islamic and Jewish (along with Old Testament Christian) teachings emphasize relationships with kin and neighbors, but begin (like Fred Flintstone) to stretch toward including members of out-groups. Leviticus 19:18 says “Love your neighbor as yourself,” but Exodus 23:9 says “Don’t oppress a foreigner, for you well know how it feels to be a foreigner, since you were foreigners yourselves in the land of Egypt.” The Islamic Golden Rule, in verse 4:36 of the Qu’ran, declares: “Do good to parents, kinsfolk, orphans, those in need, neighbours who are near, neighbours who are strangers, the companion by your side, the wayfarer ye meet . . . for Allah loveth not the arrogant, the vainglorious.”

The Jesus of the Sermon on the Mount prescribed a revolutionary expansion of the scope of the Rule: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5:43-44)

Jesus thus takes the Rule far beyond the Us vs Them perspective that was the evolutionary basis for its development. Making the Rule apply not just to the neighborhood or the clan or tribe, or even country, opens the possibility of achieving at least some level of peace and maybe even love across all borders and across all cultural and ideological divisions.

Jesus says about adopting his Rule, “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” So is this just a counsel of perfection to be paid lip service but having little practical application?

Robert Kennedy, speaking in 1966 to University students in South Africa opposing Apartheid about the battle for racial and social justice, said “Let no man think that he fights this battle for others; he fights for himself, and so do we all. The Golden Rule is not sentimentality, but the deepest practical wisdom. For the teaching of our time is that cruelty is contagious, and its disease knows no bounds of race or nation.”

Indeed, cruelty is contagious. And so is love. As Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Returning hate for hate multiplies hate. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”

The bottom line: Make friends, not war.     
                                                                                    – Jim Allen

Afterthought: Admittedly, loving neighbors and even some kinfolk can sometimes be almost as hard as loving declared enemies. When I need inspiration, I turn to the most beautiful and moving expression of hangtogetherness I have ever seen:

“The economy of love is – the more you have the more I have. If I can make you feel happy or hopeful or beautiful I might feel more that way myself. If I want a society that works, then I need you to be powerful, I need you to be responsible, I need you to be fully engaged, and maybe I need you to be joyous. The more I can give you the better my society is, because we are actually in this together.” – Rebecca Solnit