Jonathan Schell, author of The Fate of the Earth, and The Seventh Decade: The New Shape of Nuclear Danger and visiting lecturer at Yale University, discusses the case against nuclear weapons, the destructive power and military obsolescence of America and Russia’s nuclear arsenals, the treaties the U.S. government has signed promising to dismantle our nukes, the administration’s war against the non-proliferation regime, missile “defense” in Eastern Europe and the first strike option, NATO expansion, the arguments that nukes are good for preventing war among great powers or that North Korea or terrorists could “hold us all hostage” if our governments ceased to hold nukes, nuclear winter, the end of the age of empire, what needs to be done to get going on abolition and Hillary Clinton’s belligerence.

MP3 here. (40:36)

Jonathan Schell is the author of The Fate of the Earth, and The Seventh Decade: The New Shape of Nuclear Danger. He is the Harold Willens Peace Fellow at The Nation Institute and a visiting lecturer at Yale University.

Update: Your host’s reference to Hillary Clinton’s denunciation of Barack Obama’s refusal to endorse Harry Truman’s nuking of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was mistaken. I was thinking of this, but that (otherwise wonderful) author was apparently thinking of the time last summer when Clinton denounced Obama for promising not to attack our ally Pakistan with nuclear weapons, “just in time” for the 62nd anniversary of those horrible war crimes against the Japanese.

Sincere apologies to my guest and audience.

Army Lt. Gen. Robert G. Gard Jr. (Ret.), senior military fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Non-proliferation, discusses the possibility of war with Iran in the wake of the National Intelligence Estimate, the unreasonable demands of the U.S. State Department in order for negotiations to even begin, whether the Iranian leadership is too “crazy” to deal with, the hopefully slight possibility that the U.S. would use nuclear weapons in an air war against Iran, the Israeli bombing of Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981 and it’s counterproductive results, the status Iran’s relationship with the IAEA, Iran’s various offers for peace negotiations during the Bush years, America’s relationship with the Mujahideen e Khalq and their front the NCRI, possible consequences for American interests in the region in the event of war and the thin excuses for and enormous costs of putting a “missile defense system” in Eastern Europe.

MP3 here. (36:09)

Lt. General Robert G. Gard, Jr. is the Senior Military Fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation where his work focuses on nuclear nonproliferation, missile defense, Iraq, Iran, military policy, nuclear terrorism, and other national security issues.

During his military career, Gard fought in both Korea and Vietnam, and served a three year tour in Germany. He also served as Executive Assistant to two secretaries of defense; the first Director of Human Resources Development for the U.S. Army, Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, and President of National Defense University (NDU).