On the Global Day of Action on Military Spending (April 14) call on governments and parliaments to cut the funding for Nukes!
What would you choose to spend the nuclear weapons budget on? Make your choice at Cut Nukes not…
Approximately US$100 billion per year is spent on nuclear weapons and their delivery systems (See Global Zero: The cost of nukes). These resources are sorely needed for education, health, job creation, environmental protection (including preventing climate change) and supporting sustainable development. Nuclear weapons spending thus impacts negatively on all countries and the world as a whole – not only the ones with nuclear weapons programs.
Take Action
Nuclear armed countries:
Encourage your parliamentarians to cut the budgets for nuclear weapons. Examples:
- USA: Get your congressperson to support the Smarter Approach to Nuclear Expenditures (SANE Act), introduced into the Senate by Senator Ed Markey (Co-President of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament), co-sponsored by Senator Jeff Merkley. Companion legislation has been introduced in the House by Representative Earl Blumenauer;
- UK – Encourage your parliamentarian to support the Early Day Motion on cost of the Trident replacement (£25billion), introduced by PNND Council Member Jeremy Corbyn, calling on the government to scrap such plans.
Each B61-12 bomb costs 1.5 times its own weight in gold
Non-nuclear countries:
- Urge your governments and parliaments to call on the nuclear weapons countries to reduce nuclear weapons spending and redirect this funding towards sustainable development. An example is the resolution adopted in the Bangladesh Parliament introduced by PNND Co-President Saber Chowdhury, on 5 April 2010 (anniversary of President Obama’s Prague Speech), noting that “that the $100 billion spent annually on nuclear weapons should be channelled instead towards meeting the UN Millennium Development Goals as well as the urgent climate change adaption funding needs of the most vulnerable countries.”
- Call on your governments and parliaments to divest public funds from any nuclear weapons corporations as New Zealand and Norway did a few years ago (See Nuclear Divestment), and Switzerland has done more recently with the Federal Act on War Materials;
- Encourage friends and colleagues to ‘Don’t bank on the Bomb’.
Don’t Bank on the Bomb
Other background on nuclear weapons spending:
- Global Zero report on nuclear weapons spending
- Opportunity Costs: Military Spending and the UN Development Agenda, IPB 2012 Report
- Nuclear weapons: at what cost?, Ben Cramer, published by IPB 2009
- The Nuclear Weapons Industry’s Money Bombs, Mother Jones, 2012
- Arms Down Campaign: In 2009, over 20 million youth endorsed the Religions for Peace Arms Down Campaign statement, calling for a ban on nuclear weapons and redirection of 10% of the world’s military budget (a little bit more than the nuclear weapons budget) to meeting UN Millennium Development Goals.
Nuclear weapons: At what cost?