Press Release Joe Gerson Talk May 8th

The Walpole Peace and Justice Group is sponsoring a talk by Joseph Gerson on his new book “Empire and the Bomb: How the U.S. Uses Nuclear Weapons to Dominate the World”. The talk will be held at the Walpole Public Library, May 8th, at 7:30 PM. Joseph Gerson will show how the U.S. has repeatedly used the threat of a first strike nuclear attack to bolster our foreign policy and imperial ambitions. This policy of using nuclear weapons to threaten other countries has only served to drive the proliferation of nuclear weapons with these countries attempting to acquire their own weapons. Every U.S. president since President Truman has used the threat of nuclear weapons. Over 12 of these threats have been made in regard to the Middle East. For example, the U.S. has made implicit threats of using ‘bunker-buster” atomic bombs to destroy Iran’s nuclear infrastructure.

In his talk, Joseph Gerson will give a history of the U.S. nuclear weapon policy, from the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the present standoff with North Korea and Iran. He will also give a history of the anti-nuclear movement. He will show the difference between “arms control” and “nuclear weapons abolition” and why it is imperative that nuclear weapons be abolished. The talk is particularly timely given the part that the alleged nuclear weapon threat played in initiating the war with Iraq as well as the current crisis over North Korea’s and Iran’s quest for developing nuclear weapons.

Joseph Gerson is the Director of Programs of the American Friends Service Committee in New England and a leading figure in the U.S. peace movement. He has spoken at over 70 colleges and at international conferences like the World Conference Against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs in Hiroshima, the Japan Peace Conference in Sasebo, and the Swedish Peace Council. He is the author of several books and it is a great honor to have him speak in Walpole. The public is invited. There will be a book-signing after the talk.

Philip