UC Nuclear Free http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/ en Copyright 2007 Thu, 11 Jan 2007 13:59:25 -0800 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/?v=3.2 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss a a

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]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/10/foo.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/10/foo.html Tue, 10 Oct 2006 12:14:50 -0800 Repression at the University of New Mexico; Support Bob Anderson The repressive underbelly of the military-academic-industrial complex was on full display last month at the University of New Mexico, where Bob Anderson of the Albuquerque group Stop the War Machine was violently arrested for speaking out at a symposium hosted by the campus’ Political Science department on behalf of Sandia National Laboratories (Sandia is one of the three United States nuclear weapons research and production facilities, along with the Los Alamos National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory).]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/10/repression_at_the_university_o_1.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/10/repression_at_the_university_o_1.html Miscellaneous Sun, 08 Oct 2006 23:21:28 -0800 Against Techno-Strategic Discourse, Against the Reliable Replacement Warhead (The following is a response to a series of articles recently published by DefenseTech.org about the Reliable Replacement Warhead program.)

Actually, as with all writing that predominately employs "TechnoStrategic" discourse, these DefenseTech articles leave out a lot -- and what they include is highly problematic. If we want to rid the planet of nuclear weapons, we need to become skilled at naming these problems – and then name them relentlessly.

In 1987, the feminist writer Carol Cohn published an article in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists called "Slick 'Ems, Glick 'Ems, Christmas Trees, and Cookie Cutters: Nuclear Language and How We Learned to Pat the Bomb," which was based on her experience as a visiting scholar at an unnamed university's "defense studies center." During her time as the visiting scholar, Cohn set out to learn what she refers to as "Technostrategic Discourse" -- that is, the set of words and phrases used by "defense" intellectuals and nuclear weapons scientists to describe all things nuclear.

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/against_technostrategic_discou.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/against_technostrategic_discou.html Mon, 28 Aug 2006 17:16:30 -0800 Report-Back from New Mexico, Part 2 Earlier today, I posted a detailed round-up of the UC Weapons Inspection Team's doings in New Mexico at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation Youth Empowerment Initiative web site. Check it out for a complete wrap-up on the themes and activities I broached in the previous blog entry.]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/reportback_from_new_mexico_par.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/reportback_from_new_mexico_par.html Events & Actions Tue, 22 Aug 2006 16:11:32 -0800 The University of California Weapons Inspection Team: Report-Back from New Mexico From the heart of the global nuclear weapons complex…

On August 8th, six of the seven members of the self-described “UC Weapons Inspection Team” arrived in New Mexico for an 11-day volunteering stint with the Los Alamos Study Group (LASG). Our first day here took place at an appropriately frenetic pace. Within hours of our arrival, we were whisked away to a National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) hearing regarding -- and I’m not describing the purpose of the event using anything close to official language -- the NNSA’s plans to make the Los Alamos National Laboratory the nation’s new plutonium bomb core factory, with a production rate of (ultimately) over 100 new plutonium pits per year.

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/the_university_of_california_w.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/the_university_of_california_w.html Events & Actions Thu, 17 Aug 2006 01:01:38 -0800 Lawrence Livermore Lab: Protest on the 61st Anniversary of the Hiroshima Bombing From August 6-9, peace advocates (joined, no doubt, by a federal agent or two or 12) will converge at various strategic locations throughout the country for nuclear disarmament demonstrations to coincide with the 61st anniversaries of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. As part of one of the four largest actions on August 6th, I and a number of other members of the Coalition to Demilitarize the UC will participate in a gathering at the gates of the University of California-managed Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

The Livermore lab is one of three -- that's the official number, anyway -- nuclear weapons research and design facilities overseen by the United States government. The lab receives far more funding for nuclear weapons projects today than it did during the Cold War, even adjusting for inflation; its primary current focuses include designing a new warhead as part of the United States’ Reliable Replacement Weapon (RRW) program; simulating nuclear weapons tests on high-powered super computers; and attempting to create a fusion-powered nuclear bomb via 192 high-powered lasers.

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/lawrence_livermore_lab_join_a.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/08/lawrence_livermore_lab_join_a.html Commentary Wed, 02 Aug 2006 16:14:12 -0800 UC Regents Visit Livermore Lab The UC Regents visited the Lawrence Livermore National Lab on June 15. Tara Dorabji of Tri-Valley CAREs and the Coalition to Demilitarize provided brief notes from the gathering, which are excerpted below...

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/uc_regents_visit_livermore_lab.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/uc_regents_visit_livermore_lab.html News Fri, 23 Jun 2006 14:59:21 -0800 The Reliable Replacement Warhead Program and Exposing the Nuclear Emperor It must have been a “slow news day” last Tuesday, because a slew of mainstream media outlets decided to cover, in-depth, the competition between Los Alamos and Livermore labs to design the Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW) (the United Kingdom’s nuclear establishment is designing a RRW as well). There was a lengthy front-page article in the Los Angeles Times, coverage by the Associated Press, and stories in multiple mainstream outlets based on these. Other than stories by the San Francisco Chronicle and Tri-Valley Herald, this is the corporate press’ first reporting on the fact that the United States plans to overhaul its entire nuclear weapons arsenal.

The recent round of reporting on the RRW was, not unexpectedly, extremely lacking.

Uber-Orwellian LA Times headline notwithstanding (“Rival U.S. Labs in Arms Race to Build Safer Nuclear Bomb”), the central purpose of the RRW is to increase the destructive capacity of the US nuclear weapons arsenal. The nuclear arsenal may become "safer" as a bi-product, but concerns regarding "safety" have little, if anything, to do with this program. Not even the slightest hint that this is the case in the aforementioned articles.

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/the_reliable_replacement_warhe_1.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/the_reliable_replacement_warhe_1.html Commentary Fri, 23 Jun 2006 14:36:40 -0800 More "Hellish Strake" Round-Up and Updates Shundahai Network sponsored a "River of Peace" march this past weekend to continue to pressure the US government to cancel Divine Strake (remember, the test isn't officially canceled -- it's merely "indefinitely postponed.") I haven't yet seen a report of how the event went, though I encourage everyone reading this to keep their eyes out for reports on this and similar gatherings.

In addition to the report-back I filed on my experiences at the "Stop Divine Strake" gathering, which is featured on the main page, I highly recommend a more broad-ranging article by Andy Lichterman at disarmamentactivist.org, which includes partial text from the very excellent speech he gave at the rally outside the Nevada Test Site on May 28.

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/more_hellish_strake_roundup_an.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/more_hellish_strake_roundup_an.html News Mon, 05 Jun 2006 18:34:43 -0800 Enter Los Alamos Security LLC After more than 62 years as sole manager of the facility, the University of California turned over managerial duties of the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) this past Thursday, June 1, to Los Alamos Security LLC. This historic turn of events has received a bit of fanfare, though not much (see the Featured News section of this web site, on the right-hand sidebar).

Officially, the UC has 50-50 partner status in its relationship with Bechtel within the Los Alamos Security LLC framework. In reality, it seems that Bechtel is mostly running the show; the UC's primary function is to provide a veneer of academic legitimacy to the privatization of new nuclear weapons production, which is set to take place in earnest at LANL in the coming years.

A phenomenal analysis of what this means in the greater scheme of things is posted at the Los Alamos Study Group's web site. If you ask me, the LASG piece is must reading for any regular visitor to this site, and I'll soon be posting a permanent link to it in the "Bids for the Bomb Labs" feature (which is badly in need of an update), which can be accessed from the left-hand sidebar.

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/enter_los_alamos_security_llc.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/enter_los_alamos_security_llc.html News Mon, 05 Jun 2006 18:29:26 -0800 Divine Strake Stopped! Check the main page for a report on my weekend trip to be a part of the "Stop Divine Strake" gathering in Nevada. One of the participants (who works by day as a journalist and moonlights as an activist) also wrote a strong article about the gathering, which I recommend.]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/divine_strake_stopped_1.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/06/divine_strake_stopped_1.html Events & Actions Thu, 01 Jun 2006 16:58:01 -0800 House Panel Boosts Bush Plan to Build New Nuclear Warheads I'll leave it to one of my comrades-in-arms -- and it probably shows that I'm a hypocrite for falling prey to the militarization of the English language by using that particular phrase in this context, but I'm still not going to change a word of this sentence -- to contextualize the following article. This is what said comrade wrote on the Coalition to Demilitarize listserve, followed by the article:

Ugh!

And Kimball's comments point toward our most serious problem of all. Voices like his are taken by the press (and population at large?) as the most rational and possible alternatives to new nukes and unbridled militarism. Greg Mello calls this peer review for the weapons complex.

The gist of the article - that the critics believe the massive number of nuclear weapons we now have is suitable - seriously depresses me. Who said thousands of nukes are fine? This discourse has always been dysfunctional, but it's getting ridiculous. Where are the voices of real opposition?

]]> http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/05/house_panel_boosts_bush_plan_t.html http://www.ucnuclearfree.org/blog/2006/05/house_panel_boosts_bush_plan_t.html News Wed, 24 May 2006 18:02:11 -0800