Statement from the Back From the Brink Coalition – March 3, 2022
Resilience & Resolve: Why We Need to Abolish Nuclear Weapons and How Ukraine’s People Show Us the Way
Russia’s horrific invasion of Ukraine has revealed many truths and displayed for the world the incredible bravery, resilience, and resolve of the Ukrainian people. They are fighting for their homeland, for self-determination, and for a peaceful, secure future free of subjugation. And they are doing it together — showing how much can be accomplished when people join and mobilize together against a common enemy or in pursuit of a common goal.
Russia’s dictator, Vladimir Putin has demonstrated through word and deed the nuclear brink on which the world finds itself and the folly of nuclear weapons as instruments of peace and security. Nuclear weapons appear to have enabled Putin’s war while the West’s nuclear weapons have done nothing to prevent it nor can they be used to stop it. Moreover, this crisis should further reveal to the world the immorality and injustice of nuclear deterrence — the policy of threatening to commit mass murder in the name of one’s security.
For now our highest priority is to stand with and support the people of Ukraine and urge the United States and NATO to renounce the use of nuclear weapons under any circumstance in this conflict, while actively pursuing diplomatic options to bring about a ceasefire and an end to the war. To join this call, Back from the Brink encourages its supporters to sign this global petition being circulated by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear war (IPPNW).
At the same time, people the world over can and should act now to demand the global elimination of nuclear weapons — humanity’s common enemy. We must rise up, mobilize and insist on a new global security paradigm that disavows this existential threat to humanity. We must replace it with a shared pursuit of true human and global security in which all nations eschew militarization and violence, prioritize diplomacy and dialogue, and work together to confront the collective threats the world faces.
In the United States, the Back from the Brink campaign gives voice and agency to people seeking to bring communities together to mobilize to abolish nuclear weapons. Join us. We need you. The world needs you.
Resources
Arms Control Association Fact Sheet/FAQ
Organizations Providing Humanitarian Support
