In Hiroshima's Shadow

By Noam Chomsky, 
Truthout | News Analysis 

Truthout
August 2, 2012

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/10660-in-hiroshimas-shadow

August 6, the anniversary of Hiroshima, should be a day of
somber reflection, not only on the terrible events of that day
in 1945, but also on what they revealed: that humans, in their
dedicated quest to extend their capacities for destruction,
had finally found a way to approach the ultimate limit.

This year, Aug. 6 memorials have special significance. They
take place shortly before the 50th anniversary of, "the most
dangerous moment in human history," in the words of the
historian and John F. Kennedy adviser Arthur M. Schlesinger
Jr., referring to the Cuban missile crisis.

Graham Allison writes in the current issue of Foreign Affairs
that Kennedy, "ordered actions that he knew would increase the
risk not only of conventional war but also nuclear war," with
a likelihood of perhaps 50 percent, he believed, an estimate
that Allison regards as realistic.

Kennedy declared a high-level nuclear alert that authorized,
"NATO aircraft with Turkish pilots ... (or others) ... to take
off, fly to Moscow, and drop a bomb."

None were more shocked by the discovery of missiles in Cuba
than the men in charge of the similar missiles that the U.S.
had secretly deployed in Okinawa six months earlier, surely
aimed at China, at a moment of elevated regional tensions.

Kennedy took Chairman Nikita Khrushchev, "right to the brink
of nuclear war and he looked over the edge and had no stomach
for it," according to Gen. David Burchinal, then a high-
ranking official in the Pentagon planning staff. One can
hardly count on such sanity forever.

Khrushchev accepted a formula that Kennedy devised, ending the
crisis just short of war. The formula, boldest element,
Allison writes, was, "a secret sweetener that promised the
withdrawal of U.S. missiles from Turkey within six months
after the crisis was resolved." These were obsolete missiles
that were being replaced by far more lethal, and invulnerable,
Polaris submarines.

In brief, even at high risk of war of unimaginable
destruction, it was felt necessary to reinforce the principle
that U.S. has the unilateral right to deploy nuclear missiles
anywhere, some aimed at China or at the borders of Russia,
which had previously placed no missiles outside the USSR.
Justifications of course have been offered, but I do not think
they withstand analysis.

An accompanying principle is that Cuba had no right to have
missiles for defense against what appeared to be an imminent
U.S. invasion. The plans for Kennedy, terrorist programs,
Operation Mongoose, called for, "open revolt and overthrow of
the Communist regime," in October 1962, the month of the
missile crisis, recognizing that, "final success will require
decisive U.S. military intervention."

The terrorist operations against Cuba are commonly dismissed
by U.S. commentators as insignificant CIA shenanigans. The
victims, not surprisingly, see matters rather differently. We
can at last hear their voices in Keith Bolender,, "Voices from
the Other Side: An Oral History of Terrorism Against Cuba."

The events of October 1962 are widely hailed as Kennedy,
finest hour. Allison offers them as, "a guide for how to
defuse conflicts, manage great-power relationships, and make
sound decisions about foreign policy in general." In
particular, today, conflicts with Iran and China.

Disaster was perilously close in 1962, and there has been no
shortage of dangerous moments since. In 1973, in the last days
of the Arab-Israeli war, Henry Kissinger called a high-level
nuclear alert. India and Pakistan have come close to nuclear
war. There have been innumerable cases when human intervention
aborted nuclear attack only moments before launch after false
reports by automated systems. There is much to think about on
Aug. 6.

Allison joins many others in regarding Iran, nuclear programs
as the most severe current crisis, "an even more complex
challenge for American policymakers than the Cuban missile
crisis," because of the threat of Israeli bombing.

The war against Iran is already well underway, including
assassination of scientists and economic pressures that have
reached the level of, "undeclared war," in the judgment of the
Iran specialist Gary Sick.

Great pride is taken in the sophisticated cyberwar directed
against Iran. The Pentagon regards cyberwar as, "an act of
war," that authorizes the target, "to respond using
traditional military force," The Wall Street Journal reports.
With the usual exception: not when the U.S. or an ally is the
perpetrator.

The Iran threat has recently been outlined by Gen. Giora
Eiland, one of Israel, top military planners, described as,
"one of the most ingenious and prolific thinkers the (Israeli
military) has ever produced."

Of the threats he outlines, the most credible is that, "any
confrontation on our borders will take place under an Iranian
nuclear umbrella." Israel might therefore be constrained in
resorting to force. Eiland agrees with the Pentagon and U.S.
intelligence, which also regard deterrence as the major threat
that Iran poses.

The current escalation of the, "undeclared war," against Iran
increases the threat of accidental large-scale war. Some of
the dangers were illustrated last month when a U.S. naval
vessel, part of the huge deployment in the Gulf, fired on a
small fishing boat, killing one Indian crew member and
wounding at least three others. It would not take much to set
off a major war.

One sensible way to avoid such dread consequences is to
pursue, "the goal of establishing in the Middle East a zone
free from weapons of mass destruction and all missiles for
their delivery and the objective of a global ban on chemical
weapons," the wording of Security Council resolution 687 of
April 1991, which the U.S. and U.K. invoked in their effort to
provide a thin legal cover for their invasion of Iraq 12 years
later.

The goal has been an Arab-Iranian objective since 1974,
regularly re-endorsed, and by now it has near-unanimous global
support, at least formally. An international conference to
consider ways to implement such a treaty may take place in
December.

Progress is unlikely unless there is mass public support in
the West. Failure to grasp the opportunity will, once again,
lengthen the grim shadow that has darkened the world since
that fateful Aug. 6.

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