Monthly Archives: June 2011

British Duplicity on Iraq’s WMDs

Posted on June 27, 2011 by Martin Hellman

Yesterday’s edition of the British newspaper, The Guardian, cited documents obtained under a Freedom of Information Act to write:

The senior intelligence official responsible for Tony Blair’s notorious dossier on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction proposed using the document to mislead the public about the significance of Iraq’s banned weapons. Sir John Scarlett, who as head of the Joint Intelligence Committee was placed “in charge” of writing the September 2002 dossier, sent a memo to Blair’s foreign affairs adviser referring to “the benefit of obscuring the fact that in terms of WMD Iraq is not that exceptional”. Continue reading →

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NATO’s Growing Irrelevance – and Danger

Posted on June 22, 2011 by Martin Hellman

In a recent address, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates warned that NATO faces “collective military irrelevance” due to inadequate military expenditures by its other members. According to the LA Times, Gates also complained “that the U.S. share of NATO military spending … Continue reading →

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Lessons From Fukushima

Posted on June 6, 2011 by Martin Hellman

The IAEA’s “Expert Mission to Japan” recently released its preliminary summary with important lessons for avoiding another Fukushima. It also has much to teach us about avoiding an even worse disaster involving nuclear weapons. Continue reading →

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How Risky is Nuclear Optimism?

Posted on June 6, 2011 by Martin Hellman

My recent paper, “How Risky is Nuclear Optimism?”, normally lives behind a pay wall at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists web site, but a generous donor bought its freedom. It’s now freely downloadable from my publications list – it’s #75 – or just click here. Continue reading →

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