Clinton, Sanders right that nuke spending is wrong

Hillary Clinton was asked what she thought of the Obama administration’s proposed new spending on nuclear weapons. Clinton replied that it, “doesn’t make sense to me.”

Senator Bernie Sanders was asked on the Today Show what he thought about the big spending on nukes. He said we have more important things to use our money for. New spending on nuclear weapons would drag us into an expensive arms race, according to Sanders.  

{mosads}We should all be alarmed as the level of spending on nukes rises.  Estimates have at least a trillion dollars being spent on U.S. nuclear weapons over the next 3 decades. 

Meanwhile arms control treaties get pushed aside.  Even the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, banning expensive nuclear testing, has not been ratified by the Senate. 

Very little action is being taken toward nuclear disarmament, but plenty toward funding the weapons. 

Remember what President Dwight Eisenhower said in an 1961 interview with Walter Cronkite that not achieving nuclear disarmament, including a ban on nuclear testing, would “have to be classed as the greatest disappointment of any administration — of any decade — of any time and of any party.” 

Eisenhower told Cronkite it was vital to take the expensive burden of these weapons off the backs of mankind. Yet that burden, even long after the Cold War has ended, is still very much with us. 

What if Congress stood up and said no to nukes? Would they take a 3 billion dollar challenge? 

Congress, in the upcoming budget, should take at least three billion dollars from the 30 billion plus annual nuclear weapons budget and put it toward food for the hungry. That would do us a lot more good if we used this extra money for our Food for Peace program to fight hunger abroad. We can also put money toward food pantries here at home. We really need to have these extra resources for our food aid programs. 

Overseas, we have more hungry refugees than any time since World War II. Wars in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Ukraine, and South Sudan have all created massive hunger emergencies. How can we expect any stability to emerge from this chaos if people are hungry and desperate?

The migration of Syrian refugees into Europe was fueled by hunger. There were ration cuts to Syrian refugees because not enough funding was provided to feed them. 

Severe drought in Ethiopia and Haiti has caused even more hunger abroad. Yet, the Obama administration has proposed reducing spending for the Food for Peace and McGovern-Dole global school lunch programs. At the same time, nuke spending is set to grow. Now this does not make sense.

At home, with hunger afflicting 49 million Americans, the safety net of food stamps (SNAP) are being taken away from those in need.  

Diana Aviv, CEO of Feeding America, says “Any additional cuts to SNAP would increase demand on the nation’s charitable food system at a time when food banks and other hunger-relief groups are stretched to meet sustained high need.” 

But Congress can do the right thing and divert at least 3 billion dollars from nuke spending and place it toward fighting hunger. They can provide the extra support to the food banks that keep Americans from going hungry. 

We have to get our priorities straight and understand the threats of today. The Cold War is over and pouring vast sums into the nuclear arsenal is something that cannot be sustained by society. 

Nukes cannot bring peace to the world, but food can. Remember the World War II slogan, “Food will win the war and write the peace.”

So encourage Congress to take the 3 billion dollar challenge. They must act responsibly and put less into nukes and more resources into feeding the hungry.  We can start a movement worldwide to  phase out nuclear weapons and the end the wasteful spending. Now that would be a policy that make sense. 

William Lambers is an author who partnered with the UN World Food Programme on the book Ending World Hunger.