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April 27, 2024 Bulletin 343: "Russophobia" panel discussion video; upcoming presentation in SC, "Overview of Pit Production Challenges at LANL" Permalink for this bulletin (please forward). Previously: Bulletin 342 (04/10/2024): "Russophobia, the Ukraine war, and nuclear weapons," panel discussion in Santa Fe Tuesday April 16, 6 pm / Pit production: myths and contradictions (TYPOS FIXED; SLIGHTLY EDITED FOR CLARITY SINCE DISTRIBUTION)
Dear friends and colleagues -- 1. "Russophobia, the Ukraine war, and nuclear weapons," panel discussion video posted It took a while, but a few days ago we finally posted the video from what we think was a pretty good panel discussion with Peter Kuznick, Steven Starr, and myself (Greg Mello), discussing the dangerous phenomenon of "Russophobia" in the context of the potentially widening war in Ukraine, with its attendant nuclear dangers. We urge you to check out the video of that meeting, which we think you will find interesting and informative. Forward it to your friends if you think so! You may also wish to subscribe to our YouTube channel. We anticipate using it a lot more for short topical videos. In the two hours available to the panel we could only scratch the surface of this critical subject, which is corrupting popular minds and federal actions on a scale hardly seen since Vietnam. I know that at least two of us -- Steve and I -- would be willing to speak again on this soon. I think the first step would be an open zoominar, which we will try to do next month. Four days later on April 20, the "Ukraine Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2024" passed the House, with zero Democrats opposing it. Every single so-called "progressive" voted for more war in Ukraine. One hundred and twelve Republicans voted against it. (On a related note, 37 Democrats and 21 Republicans voted against the Israel Security Act. None of the New Mexico representatives voted against it. Only 14 House members, all Republicans, voted against both bills.) For updates on the U.S./NATO war against Russia, see the selected articles and excerpts, often with comments, which we post daily at our Ukraine war page. For now, the neocon plan to subdue and subvert Russia has failed. Congress has fallen, however. We recently stumbled across Bulletin 320 from back at the end of 2022, "Neocon humiliation -- or nuclear exchange / The centrality of war resistance in moral politics." (It's also published on our blog, Remember Your Humanity -- subscribe!). As we said then, "[I]t is now irresponsible to use phrases like 'arms control,' 'nuclear disarmament,' let alone 'nuclear abolition,' without speaking against U.S. policies of aggression against Russia and China." For more, see that Bulletin. 2. Presentation this coming Monday 4/29 in South Carolina, "Overview of Pit Production Challenges at Los Alamos National Laboratory" Trish and I fly out tomorrow to South Carolina and then Washington, DC, for the balance of the week. We are looking forward to providing this presentation to the South Carolina Governor’s Nuclear Advisory Council, which asked me to speak on the subject of LANL pit production, and pit production policy overall. This presentation brings some (not all) of our analysis about pit production policy up to date. The abstract (which only loosely tracks the presentation which follows): If preparations for pit production must occur, it would be better to do this at one adequate site and facility, namely SRPPF, for reasons of cost, safety, risk to other NNSA programs, and environmental impact. The only real “downside” to such a policy is that it would limit warhead deployment on the Sentinel ICBM to the present single-warhead level for an unknown period of time. Despite decades of work, the LANL plutonium facility (PF-4) does not yet meet DOE safety standards and may never do so. PF-4, which is old and was built for R&D, not production, also houses several other NNSA programs, essential to the arsenal. The full scope of required investment at LANL remains unbounded and will grow. Inherent problems of the site and its facilities make success of current highly-ambitious plans doubtful. Even in the most successful case, LANL’s pit production will be time-limited, as NNSA understands, and unable to support the U.S. arsenal. SRPPF, by contrast, could fully support the current U.S. nuclear arsenal or any smaller one. The best and only quasi-sustainable pit role for LANL is one of technology demonstration and training. Please don't be confused. This talk is not an endorsement of pit production in South Carolina -- or anywhere! But the fact is that Congress is going to fund what DoD, NNSA, and the armed services committees believe to be an adequate pit production capability. Such a capability takes many years to build; failing to fund and build it it is tantamount to unilateral nuclear disarmament, which not one single member of Congress wants, or will vote for. We don't want pit production anywhere. We can't stop it everywhere, for all time. Specifically we won't be able to "trick" DoD and NNSA into choosing something they know full well is totally inadequate, namely production only at LANL -- what a ridiculous idea, but some people do think that! We think pit production should be delayed. There is a pretty good technical consensus supporting that. The primary if not the only "national security" purpose for continuous pit production at LANL is the perceived need to provide a multiple warhead deployment option for the proposed new Sentinel missile. It is this which LANL is tasked to provide. We don't want it. As I show in this presentation, LANL pit production can be predicted to cost $35 billion (B) through 2039, when W87-1 production is slated to conclude. If all goes perfectly for LANL -- a laughable assumption -- LANL could produce 400-450 pits up to then, at a unit cost of roughly $83 million each. If the cost of this production was "on the books" in the W87-1 program, the warhead unit cost would go from about $20 million (NNSA's current prediction) to more than $100 million, five times as much. That's the minimum what this warhead will cost taxpayers, no matter what creative accounting is used by NNSA. Halting Sentinel, the warhead, and the otherwise-superfluous LANL pit factory could save nearly $200 billion. But...RussiaRussiaRussia and ChinaChinaChina! Be very afraid, so defense contractors can make more money! Please see the previous Bulletin for more on MIRVing Sentinel and LANL's role in that. Thank you for your attention and best wishes, Greg |
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