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WHAT'S NEW IN INES? |
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No.9/2004 |
Dateline: April 2, 2004 |
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This is the weekly electronic information service of the International Network of Engineers and Scientists for Global Responsibility
Editor: Tobias Damjanov, e-mail:
WNII is archived at: http://inesglobal.org/archive.htm
INES homepages: http://inesglobal.org http://www.inesglobal.com/
INES International Office
INES Chair: Prof. Claus Montonen,
CONTENTS of WNII No. 9/2004
Editor's remark: Fake emails
Dear WNII readers, It appears, that someone is faking my email address mailing messages including different types of viruses to addresses/persons which I do not know. Please NOTE the following: I never post email messages including any attachments without a specified request mailed to me before. You will recognize my responses to your request by the fact that it will always be a "reply" message containing your initial wording in the inbox of my answer. Especially, I never include any attachments to the issues of WNII.
Tobias Damjanov editor
MEMBERSHIP AND PROJECTS' NEWS
USA: Commonwealth Institute's Project on Defense Alternatives
The Project on Defense Alternatives has substantially updated its international security policy gateway sites with 1,000+ new links to full- text articles, documents, and books from 2003 and 2004. All are open access:
Notable upgrades include:
Also see: the Project on Defense Alternatives home page: http://www.comw.org/pda for recent publications on Iraq conflict and terrorism.
US MISSILE DEFENSE POLICY
9 per cent Canadians oppose government (Source: Steve Staples, Polaris Institute Canada, 31 March 04)
A new Ipsos-Reid poll released on 31 March found that seven in ten Canadians disagree that "Canada should actively support the Bush administration’s missile defence system even if it may require dedicating military spending to the program or allowing US missile launchers in Canada" (69 per cent). In July 2001, an Ipsos-Reid poll found that a majority (58 per cent) of Canadians said that the Canadian Government "should oppose the building of an anti-ballistic missile system by the U.S.", which means that opposition to missile defence is actually growing in Canada, even after Sep 11, 2001.
The new Ipsos-Reid poll contradicts a report in the Canadian "National Post" recently that 7 in 10 Canadians support missile defence. The story misrepresented a Pollara poll, according to Pollara president Michael Marzolini, who said that his poll didn't actually mention "missile defence."
WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION
Abolition 2000 homepage: http://www.abolition2000.org
Grassroots News: http://www.napf.org/abolition2000/news/
Nuclear Basics: http://www.nuclearfiles.org
Pentagon panel calls for update of nuke arsenal (Source: Western States Legal Foundation, USA, abolition-caucus posting, 30 March 04)
An influential Pentagon panel wants to cut back maintenance of the nation's 1970s and 80s-vintage thermonuclear weapons and create a new, more flexible arsenal capable of killing, disarming or influencing a foreign adversary worldwide in a matter of hours.
In a report obtained by the Federation of American Scientists, a panel of the Defense Science Board suggests retooling the nation's strategic forces
"U.S. interests are best served by preserving into the future the half-century-plus non-use of nuclear weapons," stated the board's Task Force on Future Strategic Strike Forces.
Yet for its most lethal and decisive forces, the panel said the United States still should expand its nuclear arsenal beyond late Cold War-era nuclear warheads to add new nuclear weapons tailored for lower yields and special effects.
"This is moving away from anything ordinary people would understand as deterrence," said Andrew Lichterman, an arms researcher at the Western States Legal Foundation, an Oakland-based disarmament group. "This is talking about developing strategic weapons for new purposes, and it's something that should get a deep national debate before it goes further."
The Bush administration's drive for new, low-yield nuclear weapons has been highly controversial. Critics say the new weapons hold little military use, could spur other nations' interest in nuclear arms and could blur the line between nuclear and conventional combat.
"Pre-emptive nuclear war, that's what they're pushing, and it's absolute madness," said Bob Peurifoy, a former Sandia National Laboratories weapons manager. "Nuclear weapons are the absolute weapons of last resort. If we're losing American cities, then we should respond (with nuclear strikes). Short of that, I can't see any use of weapons with any nuclear yield, I don't care how low." Peurifoy and many other weaponeers say the current arsenal of about 7,600 weapons is well-tested and capable against a wide array of targets.
Since 1995, the nation's three nuclear-weapons labs have studied those weapons for aging defects and found the essential nuclear components last for at least 45 to 60 years. Scientists are engaged in the bread-and-butter work of "stockpile life extensions" for all eight basic designs of warheads and bombs, upgrading them and adding decades to their shelf life.
The Defense Science Board said that program is "on the wrong track" and should be scaled back to free up scientists and money for adding new weapons to the arsenal. Echoing the Bush administration's Nuclear Posture Review of December 2001, the Defense Science Board said current U.S. weapons would create so much blast and radioactive fallout that rogue nations or terrorists might doubt a president would use them in response to attack on the United States or its allies.
The panel argued that fielding lower-yield weapons makes the threat of their use more believable. This broader, more capable arsenal also is designed to keep Russia and China from trying to compete with the United States and discourage allies such as Japan, South Korea and Taiwan from seeking weapons to counter North Korea, for example.
"Assuring U.S. allies in Europe and Asia that they need not develop nuclear arsenals of their own in anticipation of deterioration in their security environment remains an important U.S. objective," the task force said.
The panel, composed largely of retired senior Navy and Air Force officers, nuclear-weapons scientists and think-tank analysts, recognized that creating a new nuclear arsenal will demand wholesale political and military commitment from U.S. Strategic Command in Omaha to Capitol Hill.
"Ultimately, the issue requires deep White House involvement and the difficult creation of a consensus in Congress that can be sustained over a number of years if not decades," the panel wrote.
In recent months, however, the Bush administration has softened its rhetoric on new weapons. Top U.S. weapons executives sought to mollify Congress last week with assurances that its new $9 million "advanced concepts" design program will "investigate new ideas, not necessarily new weapons."
Linton Brooks, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, said scientists might redesign warheads for longer life and easier manufacture. So far, the military has not formally requested a specific, new nuclear weapon.
The Defense Science Board called on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to "provide guidance" to the commander in charge of U.S. nuclear forces on the need for new weapons research. STRATCOM's commander would list his needs to the Nuclear Weapons Council, which in turn would assign research into the weapons to scientists in California and New Mexico. These weapons are mostly not new but resurrections of 1960s and 70s thermonuclear designs produced by University of California scientists at Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos labs. None were deployed, primarily due to political opposition or dubious practical utility for the military.
The Defense Science Board envisions using them largely against underground bunkers, to shake, crush or incinerate the leaders or weapons inside. Panelists suggested that by driving the weapons dozens of yards into soil, small nuclear explosions could be contained. But the panel stressed, that doesn't mean the weapons would be used.
"It is, and will likely remain, American policy to keep the nuclear threshold high and to pursue non-nuclear attack options whenever possible. Nothing in our assessment or recommendations seeks to change that goal," the panel stated. "Nonetheless, in extreme circumstances, the president may have no choice but to turn to nuclear options."
Nations, NGOs Resist US-UK Arms Resolution (Source: IPS, 31 March 04)
The United States and Britain are facing strong resistance over their attempt to hastily rush through the Security Council a proposed resolution aimed at preventing terrorists and other ''non-state actors'' from trafficking in and acquiring weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The opposition comes not only from most of the 10 elected, non-permanent members of the council but also from an international coalition of over 2,000 peace activists, anti-war groups and members of civil society representing 85 countries.
''The entire resolution was drafted and discussed behind closed doors by the five veto-wielding permanent members (the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China) with hardly any inputs from us,'' a Third World diplomat representing one of the council's elected members, told IPS.
''We are told it took five months for the Big Five to finalise the draft. Perhaps it could take another five months for us to study and decide on it. We are in no hurry,'' he added, conveying virtually the collective voice of the 10 elected members. The 10 are Angola, Chile, Germany, Pakistan, Spain, Algeria, Benin, Brazil, the Philippines and Romania.
In a letter to the 15 members of the Security Council, Abolition 2000 says, ''while the proposed resolution affirms support for multilateral treaties on nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, it refers only to prevention of proliferation, and is silent, rhetorically and substantively, on ending deployment of existing weapons and on the imperative of disarmament.''
The resolution is flawed, it says, because it fails to acknowledge the disarmament obligation under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and to identify measures to reduce and eliminate nuclear arsenals.
''Proliferation of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, and their potential acquisition by terrorists, will never be effectively addressed so long as nuclear weapons are highly valued by major powers,'' the letter said.
If the resolution is adopted, the coalition added, it would also represent a far-reaching assumption of authority by the Security Council to enact global legislation requiring each state to modify its national legal system and policies.
Parliamentary Network for Nuclear Disarmament: "PNND Update" 8, April 2004 http://www.pnnd.org/
"PNND Update" is a regular e-news service featuring nuclear weapons proliferation and policies, and how parliamentarians globally are engaging in these issues.
Its April issue covers the following:
Ozone Layer: Extraordinary Meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol (Source: Earth Negotiations Bulletin, Vol. 19 No. 34, 29 March 04)
The Extraordinary Meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer (ExMOP) took place from 24-26 March 2004, in Montreal, Canada. Over 350 participants attended, representing 114 governments, as well as UN agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), industry and academia. Parties addressed a series of issues relating to methyl bromide that had been left unresolved at the Fifteenth Meeting of the Parties (MOP-15) in Nairobi in November 2003. Compromise was reached by adopting a double-cap concept distinguishing between use and production for critical-use exemptions, and by establishing an ad hoc working group to review the working procedures and terms of reference of the Methyl Bromide Technical Options Committee. Delegates to the ExMOP also adopted decisions relating to further specific interim reductions of methyl bromide for the period beyond 2005, applicable to Article 5 Parties and conditions for granting and reporting critical-use exemptions for methyl bromide.
A comprehensive coverage of this Meeting can be found at: http://www.iisd.ca/ozone/exmp/
New VERTIC publications
"Trust & Verify" No. 113/March-April 2004 Published by the London-based Verification Research, Training and Information Centre (VERTIC) http://www.vertic.org
Contents:
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Verification Yearbook 2003
Verification Yearbook 2003 continues VERITC's internationally recognised series of independent, authoritative analyses of the past year's developments in verification, monitoring and compliance in arms control and disarmament, the environment, and peace and security. Topics include nuclear safeguards, the chemical and biological weapons convention, North Korea, Iraq, and climate change, as well as verification modalities and technologies. Future trends are also assessed. The preface is by Wolfgang Hoffmann, Executive Secretary, Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO).
You can order copies via: http://www.vertic.org
"Whose Trade Organization?: A Comprehensive Guide to the WTO"
Published by The New Press and distributed by Norton Books, this new publication by Global Trade Watch director Lori Wallach and colleague Patrick Woodall tracks the outcomes of the WTO during its nine years of existence, with chapters on the WTO's impact on the economies and employment of rich and poor countries, as well as on the environment, food safety, public health, service sectors, agriculture and human rights. The book also details the WTO's controversial dispute resolution system and connects WTO rules with U.S. job losses, unsafe food, attacks on domestic laws and burgeoning international inequality that makes headlines daily.
The book also provides insight into the underlying factors that caused the collapse of the 2003 Cancun Ministerial and the ongoing crisis at the WTO. It offers alternatives to the failed WTO model.
You can order copies online at: https://www.citizen.org/trade/forms/purchase.cfm
"The International e-Journal of Abstracts" (IeJACSR) (Source: International Society for the Systems Sciences, announce mailing, 1 April 04)
The International e-Journal of Abstracts for Cybernetics and Systems Research (IeJaCSR) is a collection of bibliography from the field of knowledge in cybernetics, systemics, systems sciences, systems research both scientific, applied and out of practical experience. The IeJACSR is intended as a large meeting place both for peers, scholars, new-comers to cybernetics and systems and young people looking for an interesting devotion in knowledge and education. IeJACSR, as its name says is a journal of abstracts, i.e. it is not designed to publish full texts.
The role of a Journal of Abstracts is well known in many sciences. Especially in natural sciences and medicine they serve a good job to both scientists and practitioners. It has assisted them to collaborate, communicate, exchange knowledge, find joint interests and applications, acknowledge ideas and solve problems since centuries. Systems research is developing and fusing in many domains of life and science, the number of publications grows, research fields differentiate into a growing number, knowledge compounds diverge from one another to meet and adhere to new ones. IeJACSR aims at consolidating scientific and applied knowledge of an emerging young science domain with increasing implementation wherever systems occur and are designed, its database is intended to be both contemporary and retrospective.
A fundamental principle of IeJACSR is that the abstract / annotation should be written by the author him/herself, thus, it is her/his responsibility for content, for personal image making, etc. IeJACSR includes in the database peer-reviewed publications together with abstracts, be it a contribution at a conference (or similar event in science and education) or an article in a peer-reviewed book of articles / chapters / contributions by different authors (the book/proceedings volume is a separate BU) or a peer-reviewed e-publication of any kind, or an article in a peer-reviewed journal.
Except the title, which may include optionally a link to the full text, all other data are optional. But the better the description the broader the audience to find it and to wish to read it. Extended bibliographic data include:
We prefer to receive BUs in the text body of an email or in MS Word (.htm or .html texts may include control signs, which we then have to bug-out.). Later on, a registration form will show the fields. However, it will be for authorized access only.
The IeJACSR team expects authors to inform us, when they have published a (conference) paper (probably after having enhanced it by the results from the discussion there) in a journal of THEIR CHOICE, with or without changes in the title. Or when a link to full texts becomes outdated. Nether can we technically and physically address every single author on this issue, nor is it economically efficient. In parallel, it may happen that by our selection process we come across it. This creates boring duplications and, if we were warned by an email by the author / editor, we will be sure to execute the proper tests, and thus make the process more efficient and secure. The IeJACSR team consists of a few brilliant intelligent young people (besides me), and they are motivated to feel personally needed and respected.
Contact: Magdalena A. Kalaidjieva, PhD, IeJACSR editor, Bulgaria <> http://abstracts.ifsr.org/bdbss2.php
CONFERENCES, MEETINGS, SEMINARS
Towards a World without Violence
As part of the Barcelona Forum of Cultures 2004, this international conference consists of a 5-day Dialogue will discuss a range of topics falling under 5 main themes:
Through seminars, round tables, workshops, and theatre presentations, the organizers plan to create an interactive and stimulating arena to discuss these vital issues at local, national, regional, and global levels.
For details, visit: http://www.peacedialogue2004.org or: http://www.ipb.org
The Future of World Society http://www.future-of-world-society.org/
This extraordinary symposium focuses on historical and contemporary trends of social, political, and economic disintegration and integration, related to processes of internationalisation. More specifically, the subjects being addressed by the symposium include phenomenon such as long-term trends in world politics and world culture as well as changing patterns of inequality in gender relations, income, power and education. However, these patterns of (global) change are contingent in their consequences, and the latter need a qualified assessment: on the one hand, increasing internationalisation and interdependence may lead to increasing levels of conflict, on the other hand creative and unexpected responses may evolve. The Future of World Society therefore explores not only the current problems of disintegration, such as state failure, political violence or global terrorism, but as well mechanisms and actors of global (re-) integration – e.g. the role and limits of the transnational social movements, labour solidarity, and the global civil society.
No new or changed email or web addresses in this issue. All INES e-mail addresses and homepages are available upon request from:
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