(Cambridge) Massachusetts Peace Action and the Raytheon Anti-war Campaign have joined forces to launch a new campaign focusing on how Raytheon Technologies, the weapons manufacturer with an extensive presence across Massachusetts, is playing an integral role in escalating the threat of nuclear war.
As part of the $1.9 Trillion Nuclear Modernization Program that was accelerated under Donald Trump, Raytheon is contracted to produce next-generation nuclear weapons systems like the Long Range Stand Off weapon. The LRSO, a nuclear cruise missile able to correct its path in flight, can disable and/or evade complex defense systems and find targets with pinpoint accuracy. Former Sec. of Defense William Perry considers such highly advanced nuclear weapons make the likelihood of a nuclear launch unprecedentedly high.
“If you wanted to optimize the chances of a nuclear war, these are the kinds of weapons you would design to do that,” according to the campaign’s Paul Shannon. “Under any circumstances they would be unacceptable, but with the Ukraine War at a stalemate and the potential for a hot war breaking out between the U.S. and Russia – the two countries possessing over 90% of the world’s nuclear weapons- surely this is utter madness.”
The most recent assessments by the panel of experts at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists warn that humanity has reached an unprecedentedly dangerous moment, with the threat of nuclear war exceeding that at the height of the Cold War.
