school have ended up at the university of vermont. a couple kids went to syracuse. and they've there have been rept schools that now know what it means to get an international high school student. i think that all --...

week where people ask of themselves, boy, how did things get any worse. our speaker tonight is an expert about having to get -- how things to get terrific the worse and more specifically how to keep them from getting significantly worse. that is his value added as we

said to the very important discussion of nuclear war, nuclear accident, nuclear disaster, nuclear holocaust, avoidance thereof. yesterday former republican senator from oregon, mark hatfield died, almost the last of a vanished race, a liberal republican. and in reading his obituaries i was always cognizant as a young man that hath filled was elected to the senate back in 19 qaeda 6870 as an anti-war republican, introduced legislation to end the vietnam war co-authored by george mcgovern, but what i either had not known or had totally forgotten, the obituary made clear was that hatfield had served in the pacific during world war two, had been at

okinawa, eugene meyer, and then had visited hiroshima. his strong already strong anti-war fervor was clearly put and so they kind of understandable overdrive by that visit, and i think it has in fuse the core of that, much of the rest of his life's work. tad in the course of career of anti nuclear activism and scholarship, he worked for some time with one of hatfield's colleagues, another united states senator who not only was opposed to nuclear war, but to devoted the entirety of his retirement after 1992 to that

cause which is wind had worked for him. that was alan cranston, former senator from california. who will work for a very long time ago as a young man when he was still in the senate. and that kind of perspective and dedication, but also real smart, real strategic and tactical smart that someone like alan cranston brought to this cause is abundantly there on every page of apocalypse now. not only talks common-sense on the whole panoply of nuclear possibilities, each more terrifying than the next. we have gone, of course, from being afraid of the kind of nuclear conflagration that was always implicit and there in the cold war to other fiers said,

including things that we have seen just in the last half year, nuclear accidents and where they can go. but even as all kinds of people who have been associated with nuclear strategy and nuclear war, many of them at some point in their life have sort of torn up their hands and say this is crazy. why we doing this? why we not reducing nuclear arsenal. even as they have been saying and doing this, the results have been far less than the changes and sentiments made. and the question therefore is how do you get from here to there? gabba you get from zero world which is still written with thousands and thousands of nuclear warheads and all the possibilities that that creates

for accident, mischief, r hughes miscalculated strategies, have dwindled from that world to give this a for one where instead of a nuclear deterrent we are talking about nuclear elimination? tabs but, apocalypse never, i think makes a real world plausible brilliant and well written case from how we get to year for there. very important book, and i'm delighted to welcome them here tonight. >> well, thank you very much. i wanted thank andy. the two separate entities. by the way. the bookstore which is just a tremendous contribution to our cultural life here in d.c.,

especially the cultural life of the left. and i also wanted to use something about harold meyerson. harold, for many years, was the progressive political stays at stage at the l.a. weekly. he is now the wednesday op-ed columnist for the washington post. many people know that bernie sanders is the only socialist member of the u.s. senate. fewer know, but more should know that harold meyerson is the only socialist columnist with the washington post. [applause] but that -- [inaudible] but that is not really heralds most important incarnation. he is also editor of the american prospect. here is my copy of a recent edition. the american prospect is really something. it really offers a vision of what a holistic and inclusive,

progressive and most important economically just society would look like. and every issue offers a really practical political messes and tactic. we are moving in that direction. so i often pick these up at the newsstand at union station, but i'm not going to do that anymore why? because i have a present for you. here is my subscription and my subscription check. finally decided to subscribe to the american prospect magazine, a magazine very much deserving of your support, and i hope some of you tonight will consider supporting it as well. so, i suspect many people in this room know that tonight is the 606th anniversary of the american obliteration of the japanese city of nagasaki. by may, please raise your hand if the effort of the japanese city of mecca sunday.

good. pretty much everyone. please raise a hand if you heard of the japanese city called hiroshima. thank you very much. please raise your hand if you're a part of the japanese city of kokura. a few. a few, but not nearly as many people with like to tell you something about this japanese city. it is very unremarkable, medium-size city, maybe about 750,000 people. it has a well-preserved, and before 500 year-old temple near the city center, but not all what is remarkable about it. it is pretty much like most medium-size cities elsewhere in japan and even we could say other medium-size cities elsewhere all-around world, except per one thing, one episode in history which makes it completely unique in all the history of the human race. on the morning of august 9th,

1945, for an american b-29s bomber called boxcar carrying the world's third atom bomb. the first was the does a tustin in mexico, the second was hiroshima and the third was in this plane. perot was the target. nagasaki was not the target. kokura was the target. the mission was bedeviled by problems of the outset. the south pacific with one other b-29s carrying instruments and a fuel pump failed immediately. the commander, he decided to proceed. with the arrival of the coast of japan, supposed to be up with a third be 29, of photographic plane and never showed up. they waited for about an hour of major sweeney, again, decided to proceed. a few hours after that they arrived over the city of coker itself.

there was one small problem, they couldn't see it. the city was completely covered over by klaus, hayes. how is this for historical argument, the smoke from american fire bombing. several cities away several days earlier. the twin beech 29 made three long passes over the city. think about that moment. think about a citizen who is going about their business on the morning of august 9th. there is a b-29s overhead. an atom bombs is looking for a break in the clouds so they could visually confirmed a target. as the cloud cover broke for even a moment, that would have been the moment of their dim. it did not. the major decided to proceed to the designated secondary target, the japanese city of nagasaki. we all know the rest.

not a lot of americans know the story. everyone in japan does. even have a phrase. kokura luck. and the reason that i like to talk about the crow is because it seems to me 66 years later to the state that it can be taken to represent every city in the world. escapes its nuclear state totally bio roll the dice, totally by the most capricious one of the gods. i think it's fair to say that so too has every city in the world, so too has the whole of the human race now for 66 years and counting. and sunday i fear our c-span2 luck is going to run out. so i have written this book.

my will summon up to you. apocalypse never is about the many facets of the immediate nuclear peril. two, the vision of banning and dismantling every last atom bomb on planet earth and plausible pathways by which we might a send it toward. that was a long sentence, but it was, and back, is single sentence summary of my entire book. thank you for having me. [laughter] maybe i can offer a few more comments. there's one other thing that i say about the book itself, which is that i set out. my aspiration was very much to write a book about the nuclear picture that was not, perhaps, not for scholars, not for policy bus, but for ordinary women and men, ordinary citizens who care about the fate of the human race why? because my goal and the goal of the work that many of us to in this field is to build a mighty movement that focuses on nuclear disarmament that will climb up

on the ramparts and become so powerful that our politicians we will find it impossible to ignore. i cannot promise that either my book or the other work that many people in this field to will have the results, but as wayne gretzky lexus a, you always miss 100 percent of the shots that you don't take. i think in this room than any other room it's important to give it a shot. so let me try to open by making the case that we are all her at this very moment living in kokura. sunday that cloud cover is going to break. you know, i almost, especially in recent weeks want to apologize for having to go through this. we have this horrible debt ceiling thing. apparently just yesterday morning the whole world is apparently according to some on the brink of a horrible recession or depression. we all have so many of our own

micro problems to worry about, so many of the macro problems. daily comes along and says people say to me, you don't have to worry about atom bombs going off as well. i feel terrible. they have to bring that up. yes. we do have to worry about atom bombs going off in our cities. indeed, we still have to worry about bringing about the end of the world why are on hand. the paradigm from the book is that i examined four different scenarios.ggk i think we have come veryñi cloe to nuclear cataclysm in the past and by which i think it is very likely that we will eventually be some kind of nuclear cataclysm in the future. chapter three is the nightmare of nuclear terror, and i thinko you are all somewhat familiar. she bombers, underwear bombers, and someday we are going to hav a nuclear bomber.

my chapter really makes the case that i don't think nuclear terror will be terribly difficult to pull off, and i don't think nuclear terror will be terribly easy in the long term to prevent. it pains me a great deal to say that, but i'm kind of surprised it hasn't happened already. surprise that at least one person at one time hasn't gotten their hands on an atom bomb or man is to build a primitive atom bomb and managed to set it off in some major world city. in my chapter i talk about the union castle the consequences and the economic and psychological consequences, the civil liberty consequences. i don't think our bill of rights to survive an atom bomb going off tomorrow morning. how reactions in the international arena. we have to strike back somewhere. isn't that the kind of sentiment that we are likely to hear in the aftermath of losing thin rope philadelphia or seattle to back the clock is ticking, and

the handwriting is on the wall. that is only one facet of the immediate nuclear peril. we are also living in kokura because of what i call nuclear crisis management. the scenario where some kind of international political bees between one or more nuclear arms nation unfolds. the leader is the sweating and has and slept in three days and is giving advice. the politics or the whether or the murder of his mistress and begins to engage in this insidious logic of the other side is probably thinking about what -- wants a nuclear first strike. i think it's only a matter of time before that's going to happen. most people in this room know about the cuban missile crisis of 1962. i suspect your nobody able larger crisis in 1983. maybe out to save that for q&a. was a situation of, again, but paradigm nuclear crisis

mismanagement and misinformation and misunderstanding where i think we can even closer to bringing about the end of the world totally misunderstanding. we are also, i think, living and kokura which the b-29s ever had because of what i call simply conscious intentional use of the cold, sober, rational the clear weapons employment doctor. there are nine nuclear arms nations on the planet. each one of them as some kind of formal defense doctrine with a say in a set of circumstances, this kind of geopolitical situation we will wants a nuclear for strike. we will start in nuclear war. that does include this nation, and, yes, this does include this a ministration, even the l.a. and in many ways administration of barack obama still have

something called a nuclear posture review that says here are the circumstances under which we will start a nuclear war. we can talk about that a little bit more afterwards. if you don't think that's terribly possible, president rick perry, president michele bachmann. you know, if we hang on to these things long enough sunday there is going to be a leader who says our national interest will be served well launching a nuclear first strike. the fourth of these four scenarios that i talk about, the scenarios by which i maintain we are living in kokura is what i call aaa, the possibility of accidental atomic apocalypse. if any of the chapters in the book which exist to your boehner id is this one. they're have been dozens and dozens of documents it episodes

where some kind of nuclear mishap, maybe even an accidental launch of nuclear weapons has come about by accident, by computer, by computer mistake. and on at least three occasions, one in 1979, when in 1983, and once in 1995, the human, twice in the soviet russian tastes and once in the american case, we came within three minutes. when i say we i mean the human race. we came within three minutes of launching a full-scale nuclear war totally because of computer. and now there are nine nuclear-armed nations on the planet and their likely will be more before there will be less. god knows that all those other countries don't have the same computer sophistication that, perhaps, we do. how long can we wait before one of those computer mishaps is resolved not with a reason to spare, but instead three minutes

too late. so i invite you to consider that -- i invite to consider the decades to come. three, four, five. estes said the next 66 years. the anniversary a market tonight, how likely is it that we will continue to dodge everyone of those nuclear bullets, every single time. the macro pieces of apocalypse never is that parliament -- permanent human fallibility combined with infinitely dangerous technologies will eventually, i can't say when, but i can say over a long enough time absolutely certainly will yield infinitely catastrophic results. that to my friends to my fear is our appointment with nuclear destiny sunday, perhaps one day quite soon. artie port like this point to run out. let me shift gears here slightly

i would like to remind us all, especially at i may sum of the younger people in the room to grow up with the recognition and knowledge of the nuclear peril, would like to remind you what it is exactly that nuclear-weapons do. i think it's fair to say that they do two things. above all with extreme unparalleled necessity. one is now clear weapons kill a lot of people. nuclear-weapons more than anything else can kill an extremely large number of people in an extremely short time. an atom bomb can destroy a city in the second. think about that. a whole city in one second completely disappeared because an atom bomb goes off. and a clear weapon until a hundred thousand people. and it their weapon with a large enough yield did kill more than

a million people just like that in the blink of an eye, the snap of a thinker. a single bee of the human heart. and one might think that would be enough for us to let these things and say, you know, maybe we need to come up with some other better idea for maintaining our national security. of course that isn't the only thing that nuclear-weapons do because they also, the second great thing they do is give of this thing called radioactivity. the form of actual rays, gamma rays and beta rays and it's in the form of debris. if an atom bomb went off in washington and the city was destroyed in the second this building in the cars outside and everything around it would all be converted into radioactive dust. be hurled dozens of miles into the sky and then depending on the prevailing winds to drift hundreds of miles away and then

finally ran down like an atomic fairy dust and sprinkled on unsuspecting victim's. of course, nuclear-weapons have only been used in anger twice. we have a fair bit of evidence about the second peril because there have been many other nuclear detonations, primarily 1950's and 60's, there was the sole heir of atmospheric nuclear testing, primarily by the americans, to a lesser extent by the british and french and chinese, and they always try their best. they always try their best to figure out how the wind was going to go and how far away the fallout might drift. they didn't always get it right. so i have asked one of our patrons tonight, lisa sanchez is going to come up here and share with the some testimony. this is the testimony of a woman

who was a very young girl in the 19 , now, 1954 at the time of the bravo hydrogen bomb. i think it was 200 miles away. many years later testified about the effect that the hydrogen bomb test data on her community and on her, and i would like and how to share with us the testimony. >> i was a years old at the time of the protests in 1954. i woke up with the bright light my eyes. they're is a huge, brilliant light in the sky. soon after we heard a big, loud noise and the earth started to swim in sync. a little later it began to snow. we have heard about snow from the missionaries, but this was the first time we saw white particles fall from the sky.

kids are playing in the powder, but later everyone was sick and we couldn't do anything. my own health suffered as a result of radiation poisoning. i cannot have children. i have had seven miscarriages. one was severely deformed. it had only one i. many of my friends keep quiet about the strains things they had. they gave birth, not to children as we like to think of them, but the things we could only describe as octopuses, turtles, and other things. the most common have been jellyfish babies. these babies are born with no bones and their bodies and transparent skin. we concede their brains and hearts beating, no legs, no arms, no heads, no nothing.

>> your country did that to those women in the name of your national security. thank you very much for sharing with us that excruciating testimony. i think it's so important to really talk about the human soul because that not only is what nuclear-weapons do, but that is what nuclear deterrent is. when you hear some intellectual in this town say we need to rely for many decades to come on a strong nuclear deterrent what they're saying is we need to threaten to do that to millions of a year-old girls because that is with nuclear deterrence is, and i just think that we can come up with some better idea for maintaining america's national security. i just insist that it is within the policy of human imagination to come up with some other better idea for maintaining.

so now i would like to shift gears from the message of fear to the message of hope. not one of us has enough knowledge to be a pessimist. there are several things in my book that i hope will encourage you to some day regarding the abolition of nuclear weapons. we should instead be optimists. tempted to of my book is on the nuclear double standard, what i call america's nuclear hypocrisy the notion that some country contain dozens of nuclear weapons for decades and decades to come while others cannot be permitted even one. argue that there is a growing sense all around the world that it is militarily unnecessary and most importantly politically unsustainable. chapter seven is on the grand bargain of the nuclear non perforation treaty, the reality that the vast majority of the

states of the world promised to remain forever not nuclear, our country formally and legally place to get rid of our entire nuclear arsenal in 1968. forty-three long years ago. our country and all the other nuclear weapons states, and there is increasing perception all-around world growing every day among the hundred 90 non-nuclear nations on the planet that we are not upholding how are end of the deal. chapter nine is the chapter where i try to present the oliver thinking that has already been undertaken by international lawyers, diplomats, scientists on the global government architectures both to bring about and to maintain a nuclear weapon free world. i would be delighted to talk about the more. we actually have a pretty good idea of what an actual nuclear weapons enforcement convention might look like. we just need people like you to

join us on the ramparts to make a reality. chapter 11 of the truck chapters is my own personal favorites. transforming abolition from a utopian fantasy into a concrete political goal. does the chapter where i am really trying to remind people that social movements have moved history over and over again. the abolition of slavery, women's suffrage, fundamental rights for workers on was my colleague spend some much of his life. all of these have come about an improved because people marses trees for decades and decades to make that come about. and even -- and this is even true, and they're really get into this in this chapter. in the nuclear realm one reason i am so optimistic that a social movement can at last bring about the abolition of nuclear weapons

is the social movements already have had a dramatic impact on the history of the nuclear age. there was something signed on august 5th 1963 called the limited as ban treaty. you know what it did? there is no a year-old girl. irradiated or nuclear tests. it has banned all those tests in the air that would bring down reelected connectivity. what did that come about? a social movement mobilized and demanded that about. it 210 are 12 years from early 1950's until the treaty was signed in 1963. how -- people like albert einstein and pablo and elders what's really got on board the train. remove the nuclear age in the right direction. the other great example let's talk about in this chapter is reagan.

incredibly dangerous nuclear rhetoric. but the time he left office in 1989 he became the first president to actually reverse the nuclear arms race and start building it down and moving in the opposite direction. why? honestly there are many variables that we can offer to explain that, but when surely is the mighty nuclear freeze movement. did you know that nearly 1 million people gathered in central park on june 12th 1982? did you know that it is the single largest political demonstration in american history? that had a huge impact on moving -- unfreezing the arms race and actually starting to reverse and senate train back to the station. most importantly, here we are, 66 years and 606 years today we can say so far there has been no

nuclear war. one reason for that in large measure is because of the universal public movement that emerged and has continued consistently since then. so what my book is about is the work that some many of us, the organizations have worked on the nuclear issue. the notion that now it is time to build a movement, not just for at this rate nuclear testing or to freeze the arms race that is spiraling forever out of control. now at this time to build a movement for banning and dismantling every last atom bomb on planet earth and ensuring that they never entered the history -- re-entered the history of the human race again. after all, no army can withstand this bank of an idea whose time has come. just a couple more things. people sometimes ask me, well, why do you really do this?

what really motivates you on this issue as opposed to many others? my answer might surprise you. the had an official answer for a while, but you know what my real answer is? its cosmology. right here. there are only two alternatives. one is that we live in the universe that is teeming with intelligent life. the cosmos full of wonder civilizations. who knows? may be out there there are waiting for us to achieve a minimum level of social and political maturity before we are invited to join the collective community. and i don't know that nuclear deterrence would meet that test. i don't know the granny gown radiation on in a year-old girl would meet that test. there is another possibility, and it's far from trivial. it may be that we are utterly alone. it may be that the emergence of life and in the emergence of sentient light so that the universe can become aware of

itself is such a rare event that it has only happened one time in in all the 13 billion years since the big bang. may be that we in all of space and time are utterly and completely alone. i told you tonight that five times in 50 years, twice by nuclear crisis mismanagement, three times by computer when nearly brought about our own extinction by our own hands. by this incredible stupidity me nearly possibly brought an end to the only place where life is ever existed in all of the universe. my friends, the state of our quest could be no less an infinite, and it's up to us to come up with some national security doctrines that don't pose this possibly internet rest

all of god's creation. some better ideas for maintaining peace on earth. so before i close i want to do a little commercial. reckitt university press has published my book. they are very brave, very intrepid, and the head of marketing staff of two women working for 99 operas. they told me that i should engage in guerrilla book marketing. there are three things that i would, if you will indulge me, invite you to do. one is become a fan of the book on facebook if you would. there is a facebook pace. if you like it you know how that works. all your friends will see it and check it out themselves. you can write a customer review on amazon. you can even do it tonight before you have read the book. you can go home and said haven't read the book. i heard in speak tonight and he was compelling and charismatic and irresistibly handsome. he convinced us that the only possible solution to the threat of nuclear annihilation is the

abolition of nuclear weapons. then in the third, i'd hope he will consider buying the book here tonight to support this wonderful institution, the teaching for change bookstore. i will give you an elaborate inscription. you see things as they are, says george bernard shaw. use a wide. i see things that never were and i say one not. one not. i like to say that my book is all about abolishing nuclear weapons, but in a sense it's about something else entirely, and i think what i'm about to say is true wall thus who work for some mission, some cause, all of us to strive to improve the human condition, strive to build a better future for the humanity. we simply make a statement that we have hope. we say that we have optimism.

we say that we believe in measureless impossibility. we toil in the vineyards of peace and justice. we say we are not doomed to become the victims of our own folly. we say that the human race will have to live forever under this dark shadow of fear terror. we say that we can create a better world for the grandchildren of our grandchildren. we say that human destiny lies in the human hands. all of us who work at peace and justice and hope, i think that is really what we are about. saying it is within our power to build a better world. so i had a you should come up here and do a reading. perhaps no one will close with the reading of my own if i can find my glasses. here they are. i came across this news clipping maybe two or three months ago.

for some reason it really moved me. it was an art @booktv of excellence "discovery. either in siberia or alaska. said. when humans were migrating from what we now call the old world and the new world. maybe 12 or 13,000 years ago. and it was just a simple thing that they had discovered a settlement that had lasted for a few centuries, obviously through a few generations, and there was a little bit of remnants of the stone building in the steinhardt. you know, they can see the ashes, i guess. they could see two or 300 years worth upper ashes. at the very top was the remains of a baby, probably a baby who had died maybe because of climate change and the conditions there were not as good as they might bin. so they gave a little funeral fire to their little children and then left. that's the last we know about is the community.

and it just kind of move me because i say this about my work under their abolition, and i say this about all of our work to build a better world. it seems to me that what we're doing with that kind of undertaking, what we're doing with that kind of toiling in the vineyard is not just how to build a better world today, not even just to build a better world for our descendants. it is also kind of a tribute to our ancestors. it is an obligation to our ancestors. i mean, that family, 13 dozen years ago, one of the reasons that i'm here today. i don't trust me biologically and genetically. i mean those people in countless others toiled to build the civilization that we now live in and of the temporary storage of. so with that i will close by reading to you -- i guess this is the closing chapter of the opening passage. i'm sorry, the closing passage

of the opening chapter. in the end the possibility of nuclear apocalypse was not just the rise of our descendants, but also the legacy of our ancestors. think about how they toiled to build the art, science, and civilization that all of us now temporarily enjoined and use. could anything degrade their memory more than to dance with this kind of disaster? theodore sturgeon calls upon us to honor the main current which created you and wish you will create bit -- greater things still reverence and those who bore you with a once aboard them . back in back to the first wild creature who was different because his heart leaped when he saw the star. keep ourselves from blowing up of world, our obligation to our predecessors.

those who invented writing and before that languish and before that rational thought, the geniuses who took us slowly step by step by step from preaches not so very far from our and origins to something a little bit closer to our divine destiny we must abolish nuclear weapons and keep them abolished forever because that is the debt we owe it to jane addams and dorothy day. to gutenberg and galileo, to magellan and laszlo. it is our debt to display the great pyramids, considered by their builders to be stairways to have an, pointing toward the internet sky. it is hard debt that the cro-magnon men and women and men, our grandparents to pay to this press state -- breathtaking landscapes

some÷ññññy 200 long centuries ago. and to held in their hearts the various clans of a human destiny of and finance possibility. it is up to us to carry on their work. thank you for having me tonight. [applause] [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> twenty-one. >> the question of nuclear elimination raises the question of nuclear weapons and the nuclear power. to relate it -- to related but distinct entities.

can you eliminate nuclear weapons without eliminating nuclear power, the power plants that are all over the world, the power that generates power for warships distinct from the weapons on them. is that possible, realistic? >> well, thank you. they are distinct questions. my book is about nuclear-weapons. it is not about nuclear energy, but i do tackle the precise question that you asked. my answer is yes. i think if we can get rid of all the nuclear energy in reactors and everything else around the world tomorrow it would be infinitely easier to verify and enforce the ban on nuclear weapons. in that chapter that much about i really tried to tackle the

question of if without being for or against nuclear power can we imagine being able to of verify and enforce a ban on nuclear weapons. i think we can, and the way to do it is to turnover control and authority of all things nuclear, nuclear energy, nuclear materials to some kind of international authority that would really make sure that individual countries could not have their own facilities for making the nuclear fuel. of course that is the connection between the two, the facilities that are used to make the nuclear fuel for nuclear reactors and nuclear power plants of the same facilities that can be used to enrich uranium to a higher level or to reprocess plutonium at the other end to use an atom bomb. i do think it is possible. let me answer a question.

i would like to state for the record. in the book i call myself an agnostic. i say, i am neither strongly for or strongly against the continuation of nuclear energy. the book came out last summer, and something's happened since last summer. but think of changed my mind. the fukushima disaster is really a game changer. germany is a game changer. germany, as i think many of the people in this room know, decided that they're going to totally get rid of nuclear power, phase it out showing how quickly the political wind can change. and i am a scientist on these matters, but i think it is fair to say that nobody really knows it the ultimate physical and radiological damage. for all i no they're is a little bit b.c. horse out there in the ocean off the coast of japan right now giving birth to godzilla. and the thing about nuclear energy is that it can go right for many decades, but when something goes wrong with it it can go really, really wrong,

both in space and in time. i think it is one of the best. many people call nuclear energy crime against the future. i think i have a chance to mind, and i now think that we should aspire not just the nuclear-weapons free world, which is what my book is about, but indeed to all world free of nuclear activities of any kind. it's going to be hard to get from here to there, but i think that ought to be the mountain top to which we aspire. >> a wants to make sure that everyone, and bring in around. [inaudible] >> come from the caribbean. completely and continually.

small enough to remember. [applause] [inaudible] >> unremembered walking. i was very small. the radio, and i can remember. i didn't understand what was going on, but you know,. [inaudible] it became clear that this was not happening. so.

[inaudible] [inaudible] to questions. that was clearly. [inaudible] [inaudible]

the united states, the growing power of china. [inaudible] it would seem to me that the exceptional is an. [inaudible] and what i'm thinking is that if he really wants it. [inaudible] that would seem to me a novel.

[inaudible] it's only a matter of time. you could really, really get. [inaudible] >> thank you very much. he didn't say where you come from in the caribbean, but wherever it was, that surely anywhere in the caribbean would have been victims of the atom bombs as started falling during the cuban missile crisis. i don't see that fundamental rethinking happening a lot either. that is kind of why i tried to write this book. i, too, like you, sea and in

exorable engine of proliferation . one thing i'd did mention in my remarks, but that i do write about in the book is the presence, and i think likely to continue for many decades, a few decades to come, the overwhelming conventional military superiority of the united states. if there is any country that can threaten massive retaliation, not a term we use anymore, but it is still kind of a concept, they can threaten to impose unacceptable damage on some adversary through conventional retaliation on loan, it's the united states. if there is in the country to which we can make the case that we can protect our national security without resort to nuclear weapons and without the need to rely on a nuclear deterrent, it is our country. but they're is a real paradox in there, and it's funny that this is the first question because i just sort of hinted in the book. i must tell you that, to me, it

is the most fundamental paradox on the road to zero, i myself don't really feel like i can result in and not sure anyone else has. if a powerful country like the united states can rely on this conventional military superiority and consequently say we don't need nuclear arms to defend ourselves to deter aggression against us, the opposite is true of smaller and weaker states like pteron, north korea. we can talk more about this if you wish, but i don't think north korea and ron are perfectly responsible actors on the international stage. i don't think their leaders are perfectly predictable or rational. but if i were a defense planner and the army of north korea or the army of ron i would be saying, the way for us to deter aggression against us is to acquire a small nuclear deterrent to deter the mighty

power us, most especially the united states, and that is true even if the united states get rid of all its nuclear weapons. so with this i will stop, but this gets to your fundamental rethinking. i actually "mchale gorbachev in the book on this. he says i'm happy to hear of the stock in american circles and elsewhere about nuclear abolition, but unless we fundamentally rethink the conventional, overwhelming conventional military superiority of the united states far beyond any reasonable security need whenever going to convince any of the other countries of the world to go in the nuclear-free direction, and then we will end up with the world of 19 are 29 or 39 nuclear power nations instead of nine her. what do you think the chances that america can avoid kokura look running out? >> thank you.

[inaudible] one thing i can tell you, so. [inaudible] on the other end of the political spectrum, he was a republican.

my question,. [inaudible] >> you know, i -- maybe it hasn't been mentioned. one of the things i've had in the past, i have worked for congressman dennis kucinich. i was the key policy block of his first presidential campaign. one might think that kucinich and paul are exact opposites, but they're really not in a lot of ways. in fact, i "ron paul. this is not exactly your question. "ron paul very admirably in the book. i think it was a debate in the 2008 presidential primaries when he was running for president. he said, you know, the terrorists up their, nuclear or otherwise, they don't hate us

because they hate freedom and they hate what we stand for. they hate the actual activities that we are doing around the world. ron paul said, what was the ," something like they're not out to get as because they want to get this over here. there route to get us because we are already over there. this does get to your question because i think one of the ways, certainly the nuclear terror round to diminish the likelihood of nuclear terror is not only to secure nuclear materials, not only to move toward nuclear weapons abolition, but to try to reduce the motives the people might have in the nuclear terror case for getting their hands on and wanting to use to commit the heinous act. in the case of states for wanting to convince them their arsenals of their own. i think the best answer i can get is that what i feel like you have presented, and nations

ultimately act in their own individual interests. america, to choose our example, might see that we have some hot -- some kind of national interest, some kind of national security benefit from having a clear weapons of our own just from our perspective. but if we keep nuclear weapons of our own, that since the new clear message to both states and not state actors around the world that they should acquire them, they should rely on them for their own national security. if there a difference there did for them, and that means we live in a world where we don't have nine nuclear-armed nations, but we have 29 or 39. and the chances that america will finally suffer a nuclear state becomes infinitely greater, and i think ultimately the case wendy to make is that individual states we will find it in their individual national interest to live in a world

where no state has nuclear weapons rather than a world where our state has them, but so to the many others. that is the fundamental choice. i think the way we should go is pretty clear. .. >> [inaudible] >> well -- >> [inaudible] >> yeah, no, a big -- thank you

very much. there are people out there who want to get their hands on atom bombs and set them off in denver today, and i feel quite confident that, let's say half a century from now there will be people who want to get their hands on atom bombs and set them off in ken very as well. -- denver as well. let's assume there's always going to be people out there who are out to get us, always going to be people out there who would like to do it. one scenario is to have the nine nuclear-armed nation that we have now and essentially let the engine of proliferation to run unchecked and have lots of nuclear materials around the world and that many more opportunities for the nonstate actor to get their hands on the atom bomb. you point out that distinction very well, yes. it is my hope that a half century from now, actually, i hope it happens a lot sooner. i don't think we have that much

time to spare. most, if not all, individual states will find it in their individual interests to not have nuclear weapons. but those nonstate actors who might want to get them, the challenge for them is simply keeping not just the know how because the know how is already out there. keeping the materials and mechanisms for building the things out of their hands. and i think there's no question that it would be almost infinitely harder for our hypothetical nonstate actor, our hypothetical cousin to try to get his hands on the materials for an atom bomb in the world that i and the other abolitionists who work in this field really advocate which is strict international controls over all things nuclear which is a worldwide inspection regime. i think in that world it will become as close to impossible as we can with imagine for those malevolent creatures for

actually getting their hands on and committing the ultimate dastardly deed. >> we'll take questions. one in front andal in the back. -- and also in the back. >> i don't know how quite to say this, but it seems like it's very optimistic that we can get people to change their fundamental view points the metaphor that harry truman used when he went to pope town to negotiate the fate of europe, he and jimmy burns talked about carrying a six gun on their hip. and, basically, that's a reference to the old west view that the six gun was an equalizer. it made a 100-pound weakling as powerful as a 250-pound heavy

have been weight. and -- heavyweight. and it's going to be hard, i think, to ever overcome that viewpoint. maybe you could speak to that. >> well, i'm more optimistic than you, sir, because i have perhaps more faith in human rationality than you, perhaps. because, sure, we've got the six gun and, sure, it's the great equalizer. but as i've sort of suggested a couple times tonight, if we insist on keeping that six gun on our hip forever until the end of time, it insures that lots of other people are going to have them as well and lots of other people are going to seek to them as well. and that, to me, makes it a virtual certainty that it's eventually going to come back and haunt us. i think we need to recognize that we will be safer in a world -- i've said it before --

where we don't have the six gun and nobody else does whether than we have one but so do lots of other small states and, indeed, the nonstate actors. you say i'm overly optimistic and, you know, i think we ought to be optimistic in order to at least aspire to the mountain top. but it's worth saying that, you know, i've said a few times tonight, there's nine nuclear-armed nations on the planet who are, that means there's 190 who aren't. i refuse to threaten to inflict unimaginable obliteration on some other state. right now 190 states on the planet -- some of them are big, strong states, some of them are small, weak states, but 190 of the roughly 200 states on the planet have said we can come up with some way to feel safe in the world without needing to

rely on a nuclear deterrent, without needing to resort to these weapons of the apocalypse, and i think that provides a pretty good model for the others to aspire to follow their lead. >> [inaudible] in the military industrial complex -- [inaudible] and they would remain there, and that -- [inaudible] [inaudible] >> well, the -- >> [inaudible] >> yeah, believe me, i'm well

aware, thank you, of the late george f. cannon is one of the seven people to whom my book is dedicated, and he called it the tent calls of the military industrial complex. that, of course, exists in both the nuclear and the non-nuclear realm. and eisenhower, as everyone in this room knows, warned against it. and so far few of us have been able to do anything about it. but that hardly means that we shouldn't sound the alarm bell. that hardly means we shouldn't say if this persists especially in the nuclear realm that eventually something's going to go wrong. you heard me at the beginning of my talk talk about nuclear terror, nuclear crisis mismanagement, conscious use, accidental atomic apocalypse. maybe we can get through the thick skulls of the military industrial complex honchos who are making so much money off

this that when -- i do not say if, i say when -- one of those eventualities eventually comes to pass, that's probably going to effect the value of their portfolio. that's probably going to effect their financial prospects. ultimately, we will all be safer and i dare say perhaps even richer in a world with no nuclear weapons rather than in a world awash in nuclear weapons. >> [inaudible] last question for the evening, and i want to invite you to purchase the book if you have not already done so in the bookstore. again, all the way through the restaurant into the bar. [inaudible] sign the book and have individual conversations. i want to thank all of you for coming out and all of you for participating in your conversation this evening. thank you very much. [applause] >> is there a nonfiction author or book you'd like to see featured on booktv?

send us an e-mail at booktv@cspan.org or tweet us at twitter.com/booktv. >> we have this book called the deal from hell. um, what's it about, basically, and why should we care, especially why should people watching as far away in bangor, maine, portland, maine, utica, new york, why should they care? >> i mean, really this book talks a lot about the differences between journalism today and journalism when i started. when i got into the journalism, the newspaper business was really largely controlled by families. not all of them were angels by any means, but they really had kind of a public service mantra that they followed. and it, basically, was no one could ever have put it better than mike cowles who was a leading member of the family that owned the first paper i worked for, "the des moines

register". and mike only said the only thing a newspaper really has to worry about is that it's -- the public respects it. because if public respects it, you will have readers, and if you have readers, you'll have advertisers, and that's the main source of income and revenue for newspapers. so you really have to be respected by the public to be in a successful business. and then around the 1960s and the '70s that sort of got turned on it head when the families wanted to get out of the business, and be they started selling off their newspapers. and a lot of times they sold them to people who, to corporates that were owned by stockholders, and the people that ran those corporations had a duty to journalists -- to journalism, but they also had a fiduciary duty to stockholders. and at first they worked fine because we all had a lot of money rolling in, and it was pretty easy to balance those two things.

but then sometime after september 11th that changed, and we began struggling with revenues. and as we've tried to maintain the profit margins which were considerable, we began cutting, and we gandhi minishing -- began diminishing our journalism, and i suspect all of us were a little bit guilty of subordinating the interest of the public to our fiduciary duties to produce the kind of returns that wall street and others expected. and i really think that that kind of led us down this path to where we are today. and in the case of the tribune company, it led them to bankruptcy court, and a great institution that was a fixture in here is today an institution in trouble. and i think it has, it's an institution that has -- and all newspapers like it are, i don't think people understand the fundamental role that newspapers play in giving voters and people in a democracy the information and news they need.

and they're under threat today, and it's, i think it's a really troubling, it's troubling to me, it's troubling to a lot of people. and i think we, you know, that's -- so everybody, i think, should care about this story. not just because it's about me or not because it's about "the chicago tribune" on the l.a. times, but it's about journalism. and that's something that i think is vital to a democratic society. >> though this book is called "the deal from hell," it's really about two deals. the first comes in the year 2000 and involves the purchase by tribune company venerable, chicago-based owner of several dozen very respected television stations and newspapers. its purchase of los angeles-based times mirror company. give us succinctly sort of the economic backdrop at the time, the newspaper industry backdrop and the rationale for that first of the two big deals. and if you want to mention a

fellow somewhere along the line who became known, i think, as the serial killer finish that's not -- that's not serial like john wayne gacy, it's cereal like cheerios and smart starts, tell us a little bit about him and why he was critical to the tactics and strategy in executing this deal. >> well, i think the deal with sam zell was the deal from hell, and the tribune made a stop in purgatory first when it bought times mirror. [laughter] and it was, it was, you know, basically, the atmosphere at the time was buy or be bought. and everybody, the aol and times, time warner had just merged, and things were going quite well so when the tribune decided to buy this, things looked pretty good. the future looked pretty bright. we paid a lot of money for it, and it was -- and the way the

deal was structured was we bought the company even though mark willis, the cereal killer who was the ceo of times mirror -- and by the way, he got that title, he used to be the co-chairman of general mills where they made all the cereal. and the staff at the l.a. times was phenomenal. if staff at the l.a. times would have done as well at journalism as they did at coming up with nicknames, we wouldn't be talking about this because they did a great job. [laughter] so they nicknamed mark the cereal killer because he came in right away and started cutting things, cutting staff. he went and closed new york newsday and, therefore, he got that name. but when the tribune bought it, mark willis didn't know that the tribune was buying the company. they bought it when he wasn't even looking. it was kind of a nice little back stabbing drama at a place where they literally made