In his review of President Obama’s record in
foreign policy, Julian Borger mentions at the time Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize among his main achievements had been aspirational speeches about nuclear
proliferation.”(Obama’s legacy,” 4 January; https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jan/03/barack-obama-president-legacy-policy-issues-wins-fights).
The Norwegian
Nobel Committee citation for the award stressed it had “decided
that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama
for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and
cooperation between peoples. The Committee has attached special importance to Obama's vision of and work for a world without
nuclear weapons.(my emphasis)
(http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2009/press.html)
It added: “The vision of a world
free from nuclear arms has powerfully stimulated disarmament and arms control
negotiations.”
Yet
in October last year at
the United Nations when 123 nations voted to begin negotiations this year on a
new treaty to prohibit the possession of nuclear weapons - the so-called ‘Ban
treaty’- . the US voted "no"; and indeed led the opposition to this
treaty, closely followed by the UK, Russia and France.(“UN votes to start
negotiating treaty to ban nuclear weapons , 28 October 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/28/un-votes-to-start-negotiating-treaty-to-ban-nuclear-weapons)
Instead, the Pentagon under Obama has developed outsize plans to modernize the entire nuclear arsenal over the next 30 years, including aircraft, submarines and warheads, at an estimated $1 trillion (“A Nuclear Legacy Within Reach,” New York Times, 7 August 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/08/opinion/a-nuclear-legacy-within-reach.html)
Just as Bob Dylan declined to collect his own Nobel Prize last year, can Obama return his for hope disastrously unfulfilled?
Nuclear disarmament? No we can’t!
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