Pentagon Sends a Message:
Test-Launches ICBM with
3 Dummy Hydrogen Bombs
World BEYOND War California Chapter & Union of Concerned Scientists
(November 7, 2024) — On Election Day, November 5, the Pentagon carried out a night launch of a lethal ICBM loaded with THREE dummy hydrogen bombs while anti-war demonstrators gathered outside the Vandenburg airbase in southern California. Lynn Hamilton of the Monterey Peace and Justice Center and Code Pink was arrested for trespass while protesting the test launch that began on stolen Chumash land and ended at the Marshall Islands more that 4,000 miles away.
Also arrested was MacGregor Eddy of the California chapter of World BEYOND War and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). Sharat Lin of the San Jose Peace and Justice Center spoke at the event as did Scott Yundt of Tri Valley Cares. Leah Yananton, author of What the Air Force doesn’t want you to notice on election night, and Sharat danced to send a message of peace to the world, to counter the actions of the horrible Death Machine our country has become.
Demonstrators protest ICBM launch at Vandenburg AFB.
Tell Congress: Cancel the Sentinel Missile Program
— More Than 700 Scientists Agree
Silo-based missiles are expensive, dangerous, and unnecessary. Despite this, the US Air Force is pursuing a program to develop, build, and deploy new ones, called Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). These would replace existing ICBMs deployed during the Cold War. However, the Sentinel program is already having issues. It is years behind schedule and rapidly increasing in cost. Its price tag is up 81 percent from the 2020 cost projections, and is currently expected to be $141.9 billion.
Earlier this year, the Union of Concerned Scientists organized a letter to President Biden and Congress from more than 700 scientists, including ten Nobel laureates, detailing why ICBMs are expensive, dangerous, and unnecessary. [Read the letter below — EAW.]
A key aspect of the danger silo-based ICBMs pose is that they are vulnerable to a preemptive attack. As a result, the missiles are kept on “hair-trigger” alert so the president can launch them in minutes, before they are destroyed. Past near misses—including false alarms, miscalculations, and misunderstandings—indicate this high alert posture increases the risk of nuclear war.
Additionally, while silo-based ICBMs may be intended to act as a “sponge” to soak up incoming enemy missiles, such missiles would not be harmlessly absorbed. A recent study published in Scientific American indicates that several million people in the United States would likely die from the radioactive fallout from such an attack. These deaths could be anywhere in the contiguous United States depending on the weather.
Despite our scientists’ letter and the massive cost increase, the Pentagon is pushing forward with the program.
ACTION: Share the letter from scientists with Congress today and ask your legislators to speak out and seek alternatives. Members of Congress must oppose the new silo-based ICBM program that is expensive, dangerous, and unnecessary.
THE LETTER
Scientists Call for Canceling
New Land Based Nuclear Missiles
To President Biden and Congress:
As scientists and engineers, we are acutely aware of the grave risk of nuclear war. We are particularly concerned about the needless dangers created by the deployment of expensive, dangerous, and unnecessary land-based, intercontinental-range ballistic missiles (ICBMs).
Expensive
Expensive because in January 2024, the cost of the new US ICBM program, Sentinel, rose 37 percent, to $131 billion for production alone. This represents a “critical breach” of the Nunn-McCurdy Act, mandating a formal re-evaluation of the program by the Pentagon, including an examination of reasonable alternatives. The Secretary of Defense must decide whether to go forward with the program or cancel it, then make that case to Congress.
Dangerous
Dangerous because silo-based missiles are vulnerable to a preemptive attack. As a result, the missiles are kept on “hair- trigger” alert so the president can launch them in less than five minutes, before they are destroyed. Past near misses, including false alarms, miscalculation, and misunderstanding, show how this high alert posture increases the risk of nuclear war, especially because the US president can order the launch of nuclear weapons without consulting anyone else.
Also dangerous because silo-based missiles, deployed in North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska, are intended to act as a “sponge” to attract and soak up incoming nuclear-armed missiles so that they cannot be used on other targets. A recent study published in Scientific American indicated that several million people in the US would be expected to die from the radioactive fallout from such an attack. These deaths could be anywhere in the contiguous United States depending on the weather. In other words, rather than fields of silos harmlessly absorbing an attack, millions of people would die.
Unnecessary
Unnecessary because the United States deploys an assured ability to retaliate against a nuclear attack without land-based missiles. Roughly 1,000 nuclear warheads are deployed on US submarines hidden at sea, essentially invulnerable to attack. Submarine-launched ballistic missiles are as accurate as silo-based missiles, quick to respond, and provide more destructive capability than could ever be employed effectively. Specifically, one nuclear detonation can destroy an entire city; hundreds or thousands of detonations would cause millions of immediate deaths, the destruction of critical infrastructure, and potentially catastrophic climate impacts. The US Navy deploys twelve submarines and is working to replace the entire fleet. Silo-based missiles do not provide any important additional capability.
The Pentagon’s evaluation of the Sentinel ICBM program is expected to conclude in July 2024. Even if the Pentagon fails to provide alternatives, President Biden and Congress should examine this evaluation with a critical eye and incorporate the facts above in their decisions about the Sentinel program.
We call on President Biden and Congress to cancel the Sentinel program and to retire the US land-based missile force. It is expensive, dangerous, and unnecessary. Such a decision will save Americans more than $100 billion and make the world safer.
Sincerely….
Note: All 700-plus signatures can be read online.
