"The dominant mission of Y-12 today is the production of new and
or/refurbished thermonuclear secondaries for existing US nuclear
warheads as part of the Stockpile Life Extension Program [LEP]. These
include life extension upgrades to the W-76 that will result in the W-76
Modification 1, a warhead with new military capabilities."[4]
"All W-76 and W-76-1 thermonuclear secondaries produced at Y-12 are
designed and produced to unleash 100 KT of uncontrollable and
indiscriminate heat, blast and radiation, six times more than the
Hiroshima Bomb." [5]
On 8 July 1996, the International Court of Justice issued the statement:
"The destructive power of nuclear weapons cannot be contained in either space or time. They have the potential to destroy all civilization and the entire ecosystem of the planet."
The ICJ also affirmed the "fundamental, cardinal and intransgressible" rule that "States must never make civilians the object of attack and must consequently never use weapons that are incapable of distinguishing between civilians and military targets."
States have obligations. People have rights.
"If it is a basic human right to be free of threat or violence, if the right to life is a basic human right, if the protection of children and future generations is a basic human duty, international law must unhesitatingly recognize that the right to non violent resistance activities for the prevention of such an international crime is basic to human dignity." [6]
On 1 July 2011, Archbishop Desmond Tutu wrote:
"Eliminating nuclear weapons is the democratic wish of the world's people"squandering billions of dollars on modernization of nuclear [weapons, makes] a mockery of United Nations disarmament pledges. If we allow this madness to continue, the eventual use of these instruments of terror seems all but inevitable.
"The nuclear power crisis at Japan's Fukushima power plant has served as a dreadful reminder that events thought unlikely can and do happen"it must not take another Hiroshima or Nagasaki -- or an even greater disaster -- before [we] finally wake up and recognize the urgent necessity of nuclear disarmament.
"One standard must apply to all countries: zero.
"Nuclear arms are wicked, regardless of who possesses them. The unspeakable human suffering that they inflict is the same whatever flag they may bear. So long as these weapons exist, the threat of their use -- either by accident or through an act of sheer madness -- will remain.
"We must not tolerate a system of nuclear apartheid, in which it is considered legitimate for some states to possess nuclear arms but patently unacceptable for others to seek to acquire them. Such a double standard is no basis for peace and security in the world.
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