North Korea Nuclear Testing

Dr. Helen Caldicott, president of the Nuclear Policy Research Institute, argues that nuclear power is not the answer.

Tavis: Let me start with the North Korea test. What did you make of this when you heard the news?

Dr. Helen Caldicott: Well A, "The New York Times" in a recent article says it may not be a nuclear test. B, it's less than one kiloton. The Hiroshima bomb was 13,000 kilotons. They've measured no radiation yet. They've just got the seismic thing. It could be a big conventional explosion. We don't know. It's certainly destabilizing.

Tavis: What do you make of the fact, though, that North Korea, and not only North Korea, but other nations are determined, it seems, to embrace this capability, and to build a nuclear device? What's that all about?

Caldicott: Of the 30,000 hydrogen bombs in the world, Russia and America own 97 percent of them. Russia's still got America targeted with two and a half thousand, 40 on New York City alone. America's got Russia targeted with 5,000, on hair-trigger alert, ready to go with a three-minute decision time by George Bush or Vladimir Putin. America's still got a policy to fight and win a nuclear war against Russia.

If those bombs go off, we'll create a nuclear winter. The Earth enveloped in a cloud so thick of smoke it blocks out the sun for a year, and everything except the cockroaches die. The real rogue states in America, in the world, therefore, are Russia and America. And of course, all the little countries want to emulate them, because it's powerful to enter the portal of the nuclear club.

So what we should do is what Gorbachev and Reagan almost agreed to do, is to abolish nuclear weapons between Russia and America, and only then, with the little countries, will we be able to police them and say, "Don't you do that;" because we're not hypocritical.

Tavis: You do realize, though, in a post-9/11 world, some folk, respectfully, find that argument a little lacking. That we need to protect ourselves.

Caldicott: How? With nuclear weapons, Tavis? One nuclear weapon could vaporize millions of people alone in L.A., and there are probably 50 or 60 targeted on L.A. How do you stop nuclear terrorists with planes by having nuclear weapons, number one? Number two, terrorists don't need nuclear weapons. You've got 103 nuclear power plants deployed around the country.

I could melt one down within hours. And that could destroy Manhattan, if Indian Point's melted down, 35 miles from Manhattan. In fact, the terrorists had targeted the two Indian Point reactors during their attacks on the World Trade towers. They didn't go into them, 'cause they thought there was a missile battery around them. They haven't increased security at nuclear reactors since 9/11.

Tavis: So your point is it's not just that nuclear weapons are horrible to begin with, but the nuclear plants provide beautiful, wonderful, open targets for terrorists.

Caldicott: Totally. They don't need to steal plutonium and make a bomb. They've got them in the form of nuclear reactors all around the country.

Tavis: Let me ask you what your sense is of the role that the U.S. has given itself as the decision-maker for who has nuclear weapons to begin with.

Caldicott: I think it's terrible. You have to know you're only 2.5 percent of the world's population. I clearly come from Australia, with my strange accent, but we don't like that. We all have to work together as a family of the human race. Not one country saying it's better and more powerful than any other country. You've got the most nuclear weapons in the world; 15,000. You can't stand on a platform of morality and tell other countries what to do unless you rise to your full moral and spiritual height and do the right thing; or I'm afraid the world will not exist much longer.

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