Nobel Prize Reminds Us: Nuclear Abolition is Urgent

The 2024 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Nihon Hidankyo, the organization of Hibakusha or nuclear bomb survivors, for their tireless advocacy for abolition of nuclear weapons. Photo: @NobelPeace/X
The 2024 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Nihon Hidankyo, the organization of Hibakusha or nuclear bomb survivors, for their tireless advocacy for abolition of nuclear weapons. Photo: @NobelPeace/X

by Joseph Gerson

This year’s Nobel Prize award could not have come at a more important time. The Hibakusha of Nihon Hidankyo have been among the most courageous and steadfast people in the world, having transformed their intense physical and emotional pains into the strongest force for abolition of nuclear weapons  in the world. Their suffering didn’t end in 1945. They have struggled with A-bomb related cancers and other radiation-related diseases, and numerous other traumas, as they travelled the world – sometimes with still open wounds – to share that testimonies and message that human beings and nuclear weapons cannot coexist.

It is worth noting that in response to the announcement of the award, Hidankyo referenced the terrible assaults on the people of Gaza. The Hibakusha have identified with victims of other holocausts, going back to Vietnam when they identified with the people under the bombs and warned of the danger that the U.S. might resort to a nuclear attack — which the U.S. threatened  during President Nixon’s 1969 “madman” nuclear mobilization, which continued for almost a month and which was finally ended in response to Pentagon fears that stretched as as US nuclear forces were, there was danger of a nuclear weapons accident/catastrophe.

As the Nobel award indicates, this is a moment of increasing nuclear dangers. On the one hand, drawing on the U.S. playbook of having threatened to initiate nuclear war at least 30 times during international crises and wars – from Vietnam, China, Berlin and the Middle East – since the Nagasaki A-bomb, Russia has threatened nuclear attacks during its war with Ukraine. The doctrinal threshold for nuclear weapons use by the U.S. and Russia has lessened to a dangerous point.  In response to an accident, incident, or miscalculation, U.S.-Chinese confrontations in and around Taiwan and the South China Sea could easily escalate to nuclear exchanges. And there is the danger that Israel may attack Iran’s nuclear infrastructure with unknown cnsequences.

Each of the nuclear weapons states is upgrading its nuclear arsenals and their delivery systems, in the U.S. at an estimated cost of $2 billion.

Hidankyo was created in 1956 in the aftermath of the U.S. H-bomb test, 1,000 times more powerful than the Hiroshima A-bomb, which irradiated and eventually killed people in the Marshall Islands, Japanese fishermen, and poisoned Japan’s food supply. Hidankyo has worked closely with other global Hibakusha, including those from the Marshall Islands, U.S. downwinders and atomic vets, as well as with nuclear weapons test victims from the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan, and Pacific Islands.

The award underscores the urgent need to work for nuclear disarmament. In the U.S., the Back from the Brink campaign has been at the cutting edge, endorsed by 43 members of congress and numerous U.S. cities and states. It should be noted that Global Hibakusha testimonies, led by those of Gensuikyo figures, fueled the negotiation of the UN’s Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), and they see the Treaty is their greatest achievement and a critically important path toward nuclear disarmament.

Take Action Now

Take action now.  Stand with the Hibakusha and humanity.   Call on our political leaders to abolish nuclear weapons!

Dr. Joseph Gerson is president of the Campaign for Peace, Disarmament, and Common Security, and a board member of MAPA.  He has worked closely with the Hibakusha and Nihon Hidankyo for decades.