[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 76 (Tuesday, May 31, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E997-E998]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        NUCLEAR AGE PEACE FOUNDATION'S SANTA BARBARA DECLARATION

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. LOIS CAPPS

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, May 31, 2011

  Mrs. CAPPS. Mr. Speaker, I rise to enter into the Congressional 
Record the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation's Santa Barbara Declaration, 
drafted February 17, 2011.
  The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, a non-profit and non-partisan 
organization based in Santa Barbara that has worked for peace and the 
abolition of nuclear weapons since 1982, hosted a conference in 
February 2011 on the dangers of nuclear deterrence. The statement, 
drafted by experts from around the world, outlines many reasons to work 
toward the eradication of nuclear weapons.
  I urge my colleagues to read the Santa Barbara Declaration and strive 
to build a more peaceful world.

          Reject Nuclear Deterrence: An Urgent Call to Action

       Nuclear deterrence is a doctrine that is used as a 
     justification by nuclear weapon states and their allies for 
     the continued possession and threatened use of nuclear 
     weapons.
       Nuclear deterrence is the threat of a nuclear strike in 
     response to a hostile action. However, the nature of the 
     hostile action is often not clearly defined, making possible 
     the use of nuclear weapons in a wide range of circumstances.
       Nuclear deterrence threatens the murder of many millions of 
     innocent people, along with severe economic, climate, 
     environmental, agricultural and health consequences beyond 
     the area of attack.
       Nuclear deterrence requires massive commitments of 
     resources to the industrial infrastructures and organizations 
     that make up the world's nuclear weapons establishments, its 
     only beneficiaries.
       Despite its catastrophic potential, nuclear deterrence is 
     widely, though wrongly, perceived to provide protection to 
     nuclear weapon states, their allies and their citizens.
       Nuclear deterrence has numerous major problems:
       1. Its power to protect is a dangerous fabrication. The 
     threat or use of nuclear weapons provides no protection 
     against an attack.
       2. It assumes rational leaders, but there can be irrational 
     or paranoid leaders on any side of a conflict.
       3. Threatening or committing mass murder with nuclear 
     weapons is illegal and criminal. It violates fundamental 
     legal precepts of domestic and international law, threatening 
     the indiscriminate slaughter of innocent people.
       4. It is deeply immoral for the same reasons it is illegal: 
     it threatens indiscriminate and grossly disproportionate 
     death and destruction.
       5. It diverts human and economic resources desperately 
     needed to meet basic human needs around the world. Globally, 
     approximately $100 billion is spent annually on nuclear 
     forces.
       6. It has no effect against non-state extremists, who 
     govern no territory or population.
       7. It is vulnerable to cyber attack, sabotage, and human or 
     technical error, which could result in a nuclear strike.
       8. It sets an example for additional countries to pursue 
     nuclear weapons for their own nuclear deterrent force.
       Its benefits are illusory. Any use of nuclear weapons would 
     be catastrophic.
       Nuclear deterrence is discriminatory, anti-democratic and 
     unsustainable. This doctrine must be discredited and replaced 
     with an urgent commitment to achieve global nuclear 
     disarmament. We must change the discourse by speaking truth 
     to power and speaking truth to each other.
       Before another nuclear weapon is used, nuclear deterrence 
     must be replaced by humane, legal and moral security 
     strategies. We call upon people everywhere to join us in 
     demanding that the nuclear weapon states and their allies 
     reject nuclear deterrence and negotiate without delay a 
     Nuclear Weapons Convention for the phased, verifiable, 
     irreversible and transparent elimination of all nuclear 
     weapons.

         Blase Bonpane, Ph.D.*, Director, Office of the Americas; 
           Theresa Bonpane*, Founding Director, Office of the 
           Americas; John Burroughs, Ph.D.*, Executive Director, 
           Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy; Jacqueline 
           Cabasso*, Executive Director, Western States Legal 
           Foundation; Ben Cohen, Co-

[[Page E998]]

           Founder, Ben & Jerry's; Kate Dewes, Ph.D.*, Co-
           Director, Disarmament and Security Centre, New Zealand; 
           Bob Dodge, M.D.*, Coordinator, Beyond War Nuclear 
           Weapons Abolition Team; Dick Duda, Ph.D.*, founding 
           member, Nuclear Age Peace Foundation--Silicon Valley; 
           Denise Duffield*, Associate Director, Physicians for 
           Social Responsibility--Los Angeles; Richard Falk, 
           J.S.D.*, Chair, Nuclear Age Peace Foundation; Commander 
           Robert Green (Royal Navy, ret.)*, Co-Director, 
           Disarmament and Security Centre, New Zealand; David 
           Krieger, Ph.D.*, President, Nuclear Age Peace 
           Foundation; Robert Laney, J.D.*, Secretary, Nuclear Age 
           Peace Foundation; Kayo Maeta, Chair, Women's Peace 
           Committee, Soka Gakkai; Kenji Shiratsuchi, Chair, Youth 
           Peace Conference, Soka Gakkai; Diane Meyer Simon, 
           Founder and President Emeritus, Global Green USA; Dr. 
           Jennifer Allen Simons, C.M., Founder and President of 
           The Simons Foundation; Steven Starr*, Senior Scientist, 
           Physicians for Social Responsibility; Hirotsugu 
           Terasaki, Executive Director, Peace Affairs, Soka 
           Gakkai International; Rick Wayman*, Director of 
           Programs, Nuclear Age Peace Foundation; Bill 
           Wickersham, Ph.D.*, Adjunct Professor of Peace Studies, 
           University of Missouri.

       *Initial signer from The Dangers of Nuclear Deterrence 
     Conference, hosted by the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, Santa 
     Barbara, February 16-17, 2011.

                          ____________________