Over 100 local assemblies push Abe gov't to join nuclear weapons ban

Abe has to show his sincerity by abandoning his nuclear dream.

Abe is a nuclear salesman on behalf of Keidanren. Flog nuclear plants to anyone who will buy them and then make money out of decomissioning them in 50 years before they fall to pieces, that's the business model. It's just about money. The only thing he's sincere about is Yasukuni.

It's hypocritical if he doesn't. But that's never stopped him.

Abe is wrong in resisting nuclear ban on one hand, while maximizing pressure to force NK abandon its nuclear power on the other hand. It doesn't add up. Abe has to show his sincerity by abandoning his nuclear dream.

100 is not enough but then again, no matter what number, Abe does what he wants.

The wish for a  world free of nuclear weapons is Pollyannaish.                                          The U.S., China, Russia and all the rest, including North Korea,                                         are not going to give them up.

By the way, is she going to China and North Korea?

Since she came to far Asia, she should campaign in Russia, China and North Korea which have nuclear missiles.

 Any country can simply withdraw in the event of a war and there is no enforcement mechanism.

Absolutely.

North Korea proved the U.N is a waste of space. Only when missiles started flying over Hokkaido did we see any real unity at the U.N to punish North Korea.

How are you suppose to police this even when they sign up? China, Russia, U.S are all vast countries. Russia is gigantic beyond belief. The U.S could hide just about anything in Alaska and nobody would know. China's western regions are relatively sparsely populated as well.

I want to hear what economic and technological measures they have to stop countries from breaking the rules, other than pray and hope. When I hear that. ill know their serious

With Russia, China and North Korea pushing into Japan's territory Now is not the time to ditch the Nuke.

Tell that to North Korea or US, will ya!

Tell it to China and Russia as they now possess more advanced nuclear weapons than the U.S.

Matt,

Good post. Spot on

anything less than 100% participation from members of the security council is just a waste time.

At a small town where I am now also has a signboard of "Nuclear Free City" in front of the city hall. A difficult thing is chanting peace does not guarantee peace of the country. As is quoted in the article, It might be a performance of local politicians.

I'm against nuclear weapons because I can't imagine a real world scenario where using them could ever be ethical, but at the same time the treaty is not worth the paper its written on. Any country can simply withdraw in the event of a war and there is no enforcement mechanism. The executive directors of NGOs like ICAN are just misleading their donors and making a comfortable living in the process.

Abe the hypocrite....

Abe: As the only nation to suffer an attack with nuclear weapons, and experience the agony and horror... we're not joining a ban on them.

All weapons of mass destruction should be banned on Earth, not only nuclear weapons, there are certain chemical and biological weapons which can kill more people than a nuclear bomb. But this ban should include ALL countries, including Russia, China and USA.

Abe is correct in not joining this idiotic weapons ban. When u have countries like Iran and North Korea continuing to develop their programs. It makes zero since to tell the countries that can stop these rogue nations, to not be able to defend themselves..Makes no sense....

If anyone is contemplating nuclear war in Japan then they should also contemplate the wind direction also.

Any radioactive fallout from bombs dropped on North Korea may find its way back to Japan.

Any North Korean bombs exploding west of a target here would also mean fallout traveling in an easterly direction.

Doesn't Japan have enough problems with radioactive pollution as it is!

I refer to be protected by AEGIS ASHORE PAC3 than concentrating Abe bashing.

Matt Hartwell, you are not sure ? India cheated the whole world by utilizing commercial nuclear technology from Canada to develop nuclear weapons, worse than NK, in violating all international laws.

I think both Turnbull and Abe are hypocrites in pretending that because India is democratic nation so it could disregard international laws.

I haven't looked into how India developed its nuclear weapons program. Worse than N.K? LOL really? So India has been flying ICBM's over Islamabad? and threatening with the same kind of insane rhetoric as Kim Jong un.

Your comparing apples and bananas. Still fruit, but vastly different.

Abe probably breaks Japan's constitution by refusing to sign on the nuclear weapon ban treaty.

Nope. It may not be in the spirit of the constitution to not sign the treaty, but there is nothing in the constitution that would require signing the treaty.

Interestingly enough, the New START treaty between Russia & the U.S "may" have had the potential to do exactly what this campaign is trying to achieve in the long term although I say may, as its difficult to tell if China would have still continued on with their own nuclear weapons advancement.

Unfortunately Russia did not honor the agreement and now the U.S is also planning on dishonoring the agreement. The Russians would tell you they did this due to threat of NATO and an expanding E.U and you can see that threat from their point of view. Unfortunately the decision they made has lead the U.S to change its tune. China's latest nuclear technology has also upped the ante very considerably.

If you can win over those 3 countries, you have a chance, as I feel the rest would come on board, but without that, its doomed. What makes it even harder is that your talking about the number 1 and 2 world economies among those 3 and so the ability to target them with a global sanctions seems pretty much impossible unless you get never been seen levels of unity among countries that could lose a fortune in trade.

Best of luck.

It’s nice to pretend and imagine how a perfect world might be. That that isn’t reality in today’s dangerous world. Abe can’t afford to live in La La Land.

If you think nuke is a mean to protect from other nuclear powers, do you agree other countries developing their own nuclear arsenal to do so? If Japanese has a right to protect their own country by possessing nukes, others deserve it too. Let's not be a hypocrite.

What a paradox Japan is against the nuclear ban. People really forget easy. Don't they?

Abe is correct in not joining this idiotic weapons ban

Yeah!!! Even though his country was ravaged by the present day weapons prototype. Get em weapons. Arm everyone!!! Who cares about the memory of lives lost during that blatant massacre, right?

The only thing that prevented another global war is nuclear deterrence.

PRIOR TO 1945 the world WAS NUCLEAR FREE. Tell me how "PEACEFUL" the world was at that time. All the major world wars fought right up until 1945 were fought with conventional weapons and war was deemed thinkable.

If nuclear deterrence is so ineffective, *why hasn't there been an all-out total world war between the U.S., Soviet Union and China after 1949? *

Nuclear weapons and the threat of mass destruction have made total all out world wars unthinkable and actually contributed to world peace by forcing countries possessing nuclear weapons and capable of waging total war to settle their conflicts peaceably through dialog and negotiation.

By abolishing nuclear weapons, as ICAN demands, these countries will revert back to conventional weapons and  total war will be thinkable again.

Then there's biological and chemical weapons, which none of the anti-war pacifists and anti-nuclear weapon proponents have addressed. When nuclear weapons are abolished, biological and chemical weapons will replace nuclear as the weapons of fear and mass destruction. Then what?

It's NOT the weapons that is the threat to peace. The seeds of war are everywhere, the conflicts of interest real and deep and will not be abolished by pious platitudes. These conflicts of interests are driven by political, religious, philosophical, economic ideology and government leader megalomania. 

ICAN and other anti-war proponents should concentrate their energy and efforts toward abolishing the root cause of war: abolishing the ideological conflicts of interests.

But even that is a pollyanna pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking and will never be achievable, human nature the way it inherently is.  The best that be hoped for is a precarious "peaceful" balance of power among nations capable of waging total war, while smaller regional conflicts break out here and there and prevented from escalating to total wars.

@akie

And what has India got to do with this article. Speaking of India, there nuclear research started way back in the 1950's and they first tested way back in 1974, you know this right ? And Indian nuclear technology is all indigenous , both civil and military. The sanctions after 1998 test's had exactly zero effect, infact it hurt the nations enforcing those sanctions, which were then subtly withdrawn. They have no hard requirement to import nuclear fuel and can very well do without it, this as such import has more to do with the overall economic relations..

Now the Pakistani nuclear option is all based on smuggled technology, Abdul Qadeer Khan is the number one nuclear smuggler on this planet, and he is also complicit in supplying this tech from among others to N Korea. Given such neighbors India has every right to counter such threat in every possible way.

This must be funny story of the day. Honestly how do you give away your only leverage with a complete ban when you got psychopaths like NK’s Kim Jung Un and China’s Xi trying to send the world in to war in the name of peace.

If Japan again chooses to learn the hard way, so be it.

"Honestly how do you give away your only leverage with a complete ban when you got psychopaths like NK’s Kim Jung Un and China’s Xi trying to send the world in to war in the name of peace."

I, together with most people, am much more worried about the psychopaths on the other side of the Pacific, the ones who regularly start wars in the name of peace and democracy, the ones who fight a war on terror while supporting terrorism in so many parts of the world.

How many wars is the US directly involved in now? How many proxy wars? How many other conflicts are created and supported to create sales for the major US export industry, weaponry?

No nuclear weapons could protect Japan. Peace is the only way to keep Japan peaceful. Abe can't resolve world problems, but Abe can resolve Japan's problem by baning nuclear weapons in Japan. Abe must show the world that Japan isn't a threat to anybody, Japan isn't a trouble maker for anybody. Japan used to be a leading voice in nuclear free world. But Abe changed everything in his 5 years. There are 122 countries voted for the ban, Japan isn't one of them. Basically, 70 years hard working by Japanese people are trashed away by Abe.

Yes the only country that was Nuclear bombed twice, has an ongoing Nuclear disaster refuses to sign,( well the regime refuses ) can only worry exactly what it would take for the regime to make itself a global leader rather than a bizarre opponent of what have been the cause of such national disasters.

By the way, is she going to China and North Korea?

Since she came to far Asia, she should campaign in Russia, China and North Korea which have nuclear missiles.

You now the answer to that. Even if they wanted to go to those 3 countries they wouldn't be allowed through the front gate. They are far too smart for that. Its all designed to isolate the evil U.S empire but it will fail because nuclear deterrence is one area both sides of politics actually agree on.

It was Obama that kicked off the process of modernizing the U.S nuclear system. Trump just upped the ante in response to China and Russia modernization.

You need all three countries to sign on at once and you need absolutely 100% full proof methods of ensuring none of them break any new weapons ban treaty.

US notion of nuclear ban is to ban every nation from having nuclear weapons so that the US has no opposition to its global domination and dictatorship. The US does not want any country to have a deterrent against US aggression.  Does Abe have the guts to stand up to Washington? Do the Japanese people have the guts to stand up to Abe?

Strangerland, what do you know about the constitution ? The Three Non-Nuclear Principles basically is the ban of nuclear weapons, in Japan. Of course, Abe can reject it. There is nothing Abe couldn't do to get rid of peace. Abe is law abuser and violator.

Tell that to North Korea or US, will ya!

Of course, ideally, we all against nuclear weapon.

But imagine,

There is a guy aiming at you with gun.

You prepare yourself and arm with gun to protect your family or your love one.

How would you feel someone comes in and condemn you for not throwing away your gun, cuz it is against humanity?

Matt Hartwell, you are not sure ? India cheated the whole world by utilizing commercial nuclear technology from Canada to develop nuclear weapons, worse than NK, in violating all international laws.

I think both Turnbull and Abe are hypocrites in pretending that because India is democratic nation so it could disregard international laws.

the ones who regularly start wars in the name of peace and democracy, the ones who fight a war on terror while supporting terrorism in so many parts of the world.

damn this cryptic message. USA? France? Uk? How about naming the reckless nuclear powered villains.

G.MAL.O.Q, wrong and wrong. Peace is the only thing to prevent a war.

Halwick, "..abolishing the root cause of war: abolishing the ideological conflicts of interests." Agreed, 100%.

Abe should withdraw his rhetoric to divide the world with his values, though he modulated his tone a little bit recently. Disregarding other nation's values and cultures is the root for conflicts. Japan must learn from the past. Abe should work constructively and seek common interests with neighbors. My wish is that Abe should do something good for Japan, not nothing or bad thing.

and actually contributed to world peace by forcing countries possessing nuclear weapons and capable of waging total war to settle their conflicts peaceably through dialog and negotiation.

I agree with your point about nukes and total war up until this part. War then became "proxy wars" fought in other countries. Granted some countries played both sides for influence and $$, India for example, but others just wanted independence, Vietnam.

Matt Hartwell, India broke the rule and cheated the whole world, are you going to ask Turnbull stop shipping nuclear materials to India ?

Quite honestly, Abe probably breaks Japan's constitution by refusing to sign on the nuclear weapon ban treaty. If that were true, it could be impeachable offense.

Matt Hartwell, India broke the rule and cheated the whole world, are you going to ask Turnbull stop shipping nuclear materials to India ?

Not sure if they broke the rule or not, but to be perfectly honest, in the world of real politics, I am relatively comfortable with Australian exports of uranium to India. We should do what we can to ensure that the worlds largest democracy has the ability to protect itself from the worlds largest authoritarian nationalist dictatorship on one side and what Indians kindly refer to as Terrorstan on the other side.

Although I personally don't see Pakistan in such harsh terms.

Japan would be crazy to sign on to a nuclear ban given NKs erratic behaviour and China's nationalist aggression. Japan can't count on the USA for deterrence. They have to have their own.

What a nice, warm, fuzzy feeling you all will have, up until the point the first missle lands in Japan....whether it’s from North Korea, or for that matter, china....they’ll wait 200years to get revenge on Japan for what they did, but who could BLAME them?