Today, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) is releasing the Scientists' Statement on U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy signed by many of the nation's most prominent physicists. Ninety-one signers are members of the National Academy of Sciences and collectively, they have been awarded 23 Nobel Prizes and 10 National Medals of Science.

The statement calls on the next president to profoundly change our country's nuclear weapons policy to reflect post-Cold War realities and to take practical, unilateral steps that will make the country safer and lay the groundwork for a world without nuclear weapons.

The policy recommendations mirror those of UCS's recently released report, Toward True Security: Ten Steps the Next President Should Take to Transform U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy.

SIGN THE STATEMENT

Please join your fellow scientists by signing the statement and adding your voice to the growing chorus calling for bold, urgent action on nuclear weapons. As a follow-up, I will send you some suggestions on other simple, easy actions you can take to help build political support and momentum for policy change as we get closer to the 2008 presidential election and the inauguration of our next president.

Click on the Butterfly Link to add your name to Scientist Statement.

Gronlund, Garwin Testify Before Congress on Missile Defense

Yesterday, UCS Board member, Richard Garwin—one of the architects of the hydrogen bomb and a member of the landmark Rumsfeld Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States—and Lisbeth Gronlund—Senior Scientist and Co-Director of the UCS Global Security program—testified on missile defense at a hearing held by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee's Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs.

They were joined by Philip Coyle—senior advisor to the Center for Defense Information—in discussing the program's status in the 25 years since Ronald Reagan's Star Wars speech. In addition, they spoke about the continuing technical limitations of our missile defense program (e.g. the problem of countermeasures) and how pursuit of some aspects of missile defense technology undermines national security. Click below to view/download their testimony:

If you have any questions or comments about these or other global security issues, please contact me at smeyer@ucsusa.org.

Sincerely,

Sean Meyer
Project Manager, U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy Initiative
National Field Organizer, Global Security Program