Text & Video Fwd: Bombspotting hoax exposes irrationality of NATO's nuclear strategy 밤스팟팅의 장난이 나토 핵 전략의 비합리성을 노출시킴

* Video and Text sent from Hans Lammerant (Vredesactie) through Nousbases

Nuclear Terrorism : proof of concept (Video URL)


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press release Bombspotting

NATO's new Strategic Concept: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb part 2

Bombspotting hoax exposes irrationality of NATO's nuclear strategy
Bombspotting exposes the irrational Cold War rhetoric behind NATO's new Strategic Concept with a hoax NATO News-website (natonews.tv) and interview on nuclear strategy with a representative of the Political Affairs and Security Policy Division.
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NATO NEWS TV Issue 17 Nov 2010

NATO's nuclear policy

NATO's nuclear policy has been subject of vivid discussions between the NATO member states during the drafting process of the new Strategic Concept. Mr Tulpens of the Political Affairs and Security Policy Division explains NATO's nuclear policy and why NATO still needs nuclear weapons. Watch this video on natonews.tv
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The interview is not with NATO's but with Bombspotting's Political Affairs and Security Policy Division. History presents itself sometimes as a tragedy and sometimes as a farce, and NATO participates in both. Bombspotting's Political Affairs and Security Policy Division mimicks the NATO Division in its farcical aspects, while hoping this can limit a bit NATO's capacity for tragedy.

NATO continues to put a nuclear deterrence doctrine in practice, in unofficial terms known as MAD or Mutual Assured Destruction. The video interview exposes the logic behind NATO's nuclear policy in less sanitized language as commonly used by NATO.

Where islamist suicide terrorists are considered as irrational fanatics, the interview challenges the viewer to question if the only difference between so-called rational and irrational behaviour is institutionalized group think.


NATO's Nuclear weapons

By approving the new Strategic Concept NATO is deciding about its future. This future seems to consist of continuing old recepies like nuclear weapons. 20 years after the end of the Cold War, NATO decides it still needs nuclear weapons for its safety.

At the same moment it is not even capable of naming an enemy against which nuclear deterrence is a necessity. No political interest proves capable of legitimating the use of nuclear weapons. By consequence NATO is, in the new as in the old Strategic Concept, only able to point to hypothetical dangers as legitimation for its nuclear posture. Although it will prove lip service to nuclear disarmament, NATO is rather an obstacle for the new nuclear disarmament dynamic.

The only interest served by the 150-250 tactical nuclear weapons at NATO's disposal are the interests of the NATO bureaucrats. These nuclear weapons serve no military purpose anymore, but give NATO diplomats an opportunity to discuss nuclear strategy with the US. In other words, these bombs deliver prestige to some NATO bureaucrats and they do not want to lose it. But with security these nuclear bombs have nothing to do.

Even the US military, who have these weapons under control, state that these nukes are useless and a waste of money. A report of a Defense Secretary Task force on nuclear weapons management quotes a USEUCOM senior leader: "We pay a king’s ransom for these things and . . . they have no military value.” and states that according to USEUCOM "there is no military downside to the unilateral withdrawal of nuclear weapons from Europe" and that "strategic nuclear capabilities outside of Europe are more cost effective". (source: Report Task Force on DoD Nuclear Weapons Management (dec 2008), p.59 - http://www.defense.gov/npr/docs/DOD%20NW%20Management%20Phase%20II%20Schlesinger.pdf)

A similar attitude can be found at the European air forces with nuclear tasks. Result is that the military continues to do nuclear tasks, but try to spend as little money on it as possible. Security problems are the logical consequence of this gap between the military reality and the bureaucratic power games.

Bombspotting exposed the security problems in the video 'Nuclear Terrorism: Proof of Concept', showing the weak security at the nuclear weapon base in Belgium. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1fnDhwWm-U)

NATO's Cold war recepies do not bring security but are rather a source of insecurity. NATO brings no solution but is part of the problem. If Europe wants more security, it can better give NATO a burial: NATO Game Over. NATO keeps Europe catched in a military approach of international relations. NATO has no future anymore, it merely can prolong the past. Europe would be better of without NATO.


www.bombspotting.org - www.vredesactie.be

Text Fwd: Peace activists close NATO headquarters

Text Fwd by Bruce Gagnon on March 23, 2009

* Image Source*
1, 2: C. Dossche; 3: Gino; 4: Christophe

NATO GAME OVER: peace activists close NATO headquarters
21 March 2009

Pictures on http://www.vredesactie.be/gallery.php?gallery=25,0,0,60
and http://www.vredesactie.be/article.php?id=563

From all over Belgium, by bus, bike, taxi, public transport and even by walking, hundreds of activists came to NATO's headquarters in Evere, Brussels. They tried non-violently to enter the NATO terrain and seal gates, windows and doors. At the same time, the NATO has been symbolically buried during a farewell ceremony. Today, this burial is still a symbolic act, but the will to turn this symbol into reality is very high.

Despite the massive presence of police forces equipped with water canons, helicopters, horses, kilometres of barb wire, ... several activists managed to enter the military base to seal gates, windows and doors. 450 peace activists have been arrested and showed clearly that Vredesactie and the Bombspotters do not let the NATO keep going with its business as usual.

"I left Liège this morning and we joined the group from Brussels. We have left the bus on the east side of NATO headquarters and we have spread in smaller groups. There was a lot of police there. I have been arrested very quickly while I was walking towards the fence, but I have seen at least one person who managed to climb over the fences with the support of other participants. Anyway, we have been able to send our message very clearly : NATO must be shut down and the NATO nuclear weapons must disappear !", said Fabien, one of the many participants.

NATO GAME OVER is an action of civil disobedience. We commit an offence trying to prevent severe crimes. We are justified by international law. All over Europe, people campaign against NATO. Today, not only Belgium, but also the Netherlands and Germany have seen actions. In the Netherlands, activists occupy the military terrain of Nieuw Milligen, where DARS is deployed, NATO's mobile air surveillance and command system. In Germany, people protest at Büchel nuclear weapons base and NATO's headquarters in Heidelberg.

NATO: which future?

NATO is on the threshold of a fundamental reconfiguration. The Strasbourg NATO summit will not only be NATO's 60th anniversary celebration, it will also be the official start of the discussion on a new Strategic Concept. This document will define the direction of NATO for the years to come. This will be a crucial period for the alliance, and hence for Belgium's foreign and defence policy as well.

Due to NATO membership, Belgium fights a war in Afghanistan. Eight years after the start of the war we don't see any progress. In Afghanistan, NATO is stuck in a dead end. Nevertheless, our government does not hesitate to send extra troops and jet fighters. NATO agreements make Belgium and other European countries a logistic hub for the US army. The American war machine is transported on our roads, harbours and airports to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Meanwhile, NATO deploys 150 to 240 US nuclear weapons in Germany, Italy, Belgium, The Netherlands and Turkey. According to international law, these weapons are just as illegal as elsewhere. The removal of the US nuclear weapons out of Europe would mean an important boost to the multilateral non-proliferation process and a significant step towards nuclear disarmament worldwide.

With the NATO GAME OVER campaign, we give our government, two weeks before the Strasbourg summit, a message that's hard to ignore: a military alliance which intervenes worldwide, which deploys nuclear weapons and is prepared to use them, is a threat to world peace. 60 years of NATO is more than enough.

International campaigning against NATO

The Strasbourg NATO summit itself will not go unnoticed. From April 1st to April 5th, an international action camp will be organised as a home base for actions and demonstrations. An international counter summit will start on April 3rd. It will be a platform for a broad range of speakers and groups to express their opposition and criticism against NATO and military globalisation. This conference will be interrupted for the actions on Saturday, to continue on Sunday April 5th. Early morning April 4th, hundreds of activists will try to prevent NATO from meeting with massive street blockades. This action is organised by a coalition of German, French and international groups, one of which is Vredesactie. In the afternoon the broad coalition 'No to war - No to NATO', who also organises the conference and, calls for a big demonstration in the city of Strasbourg.

www.bombspotting.org - www.vredesactie.be


Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space
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Brunswick, ME 04011
(207) 443-9502
http://www.space4peace.org
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