Turner’s last political act was for nuclear abolition, Trudeau should take note and say no to NATO | Op-Ed
Written by: Tamara Lorincz & Glenn Michalchuk
One of the last political acts by former Prime Minister John Turner before he passed away was to add his signature to an open letter calling on current world leaders to abolish nuclear weapons.
Turner was one of 56 former prime ministers, presidents, foreign ministers and defense ministers from 20 NATO countries plus Japan and South Korea who signed a letter that was publicly issued by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) for the International Day of Peace on September 21.
The other eminent Canadians include former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, former Deputy Prime Minister John Manley, former Defence Ministers Jean-Jacques Blais and John McCallum and former Foreign Affairs Ministers Lloyd Axworthy and Bill Graham.
These Canadian signatories are all prominent elders of the Liberal Party. Their letter is a direct appeal to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government to show leadership on nuclear disarmament.
The former leaders write that the continued existence of 14,000 nuclear weapons poses an unacceptable, existential threat to humanity. They declare that “It is time to bring the era of reliance on nuclear weapons to a permanent end.”
They urge countries like Canada to join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) that they describe as a “beacon of hope in a time of darkness.” The prohibition treaty is a landmark global accord that opened for signature at the United Nations three years ago.
Currently, there are 84 signatories and 45 states parties of the TPNW including New Zealand, South Africa and Ireland. The Treaty will enter into force 90 days after it has been ratified by 50 countries, only five more countries are needed.
However, Canada refuses to sign onto this important treaty because of pressure from the United States and our membership in nuclear-armed NATO. In a leaked memo in 2016, the U.S. told alliance members that the treaty delegitimized NATO’s nuclear deterrence and should not be supported.
Yet, Turner and the other former leaders argue that countries should not worry about upsetting their allies. In the letter, they write “friends can and must speak up when friends engage in reckless behaviour that puts their lives and ours in peril.”
Canada’s allies the U.S., France and United Kingdom are irresponsibly upgrading their nuclear arsenals. The American nuclear modernization program that started under President Obama in 2016 will cost $1.2 trillion over the next 25 years. Earlier this year, under the Trump administration, the U.S. navy deployed a new low yield tactical nuclear weapon on its Trident submarines that defence analysists claim is destabilizing.
The former leaders warn that a new nuclear arms race is underway and must be stopped. In the past, Canada took significant steps to reduce nuclear tensions during the Cold War. When Justin’s father, Pierre Trudeau, was Prime Minister and John Turner was Minister of Justice, Canada ratified the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1969. Article 6 of the NPT requires state parties to negotiate in good faith and take effective measures for nuclear disarmament.
At the first UN Special Session on Disarmament in 1978, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau declared, “We are thus not only the first country in the world with the capability to produce nuclear weapons that chose not to do so, we are also the first nuclear-armed country to have chosen to divest itself of nuclear weapons.” He went on to force the removal of the remaining U.S. nuclear weapons stationed in Canada.
While in office in the 1980s, the senior Trudeau also advanced a “strategy of suffocation” to reduce the number and the risk of nuclear weapons worldwide. At that time, there were 60,000 nuclear warheads in existence. He set off on an international tour meeting with leaders in Washington D.C., London and Moscow to promote his 5-point peace and disarmament plan. The plan involved greater dialogue between East and West, an end to the production of nuclear material, a ban on nuclear weapons’ testing and a reduction in defence spending.
In November of 1983, Pierre Trudeau went to India to attend the two-day Commonwealth conference with the leaders of 42 countries and to garner support for his peace plan. The conference’s final statement, Goa Declaration on International Security, acknowledged Trudeau’s influence and adopted elements of his plan. The heads of state declared, “we cannot emphasize too strongly our belief that an ethic of non-violence must be at the heart of all efforts to ensure peace and harmony in the world.”
For his efforts, Trudeau was awarded the Albert Einstein Peace Prize in 1984. At the award ceremony, he denounced NATO’s “macho posturing” and its reluctance to pursue nuclear disarmament. Trudeau argued that the military alliance should be questioned. The previous year, NATO had moved new American Pershing II missiles into West Germany. The deployment of these nuclear weapons sparked mass demonstrations across Europe and led to a major protest outside the annual NATO summit in Bonn.
Through NATO nuclear sharing agreements, the U.S. continues to store nuclear weapons in five NATO countries: Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy and Turkey. Today, the U.S. is planning to upgrade its controversial arsenal in Germany despite the Bundestag, Germany’s parliament, passing a resolution in 2010 to withdraw it.
NATO’s current Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that the alliance’s nuclear deterrence is the ultimate guarantee of security. However, Canada’s former Ambassador for Disarmament retired Senator Doug Roche recently criticized NATO’s nuclear policy as “moribund.” He also claimed that the ICAN letter is “the most serious challenge to NATO’s nuclear orthodoxy in the organization’s 71-year history.”
NATO’s reliance on a dangerous nuclear arsenal is one of the reasons Canadian peace groups such as the Hamilton Coalition to Stop the War, the Regina Peace Council, Peace Alliance Winnipeg, the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace, the Canadian Peace Congress, World Beyond War-Canada, and the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute among others are opposed to the military alliance and want Canada to withdraw.
In the ICAN letter, the former Liberal leaders call on today’s leaders to again “show courage and boldness” for nuclear disarmament and join the new prohibition treaty. They write that the TPNW provides “the foundation for a more secure world, free from the ultimate menace” and that all countries should support it. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government should heed their appeal and prioritize nuclear disarmament over its membership in NATO.
To mark the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons on September 26, over thirty peace and justice groups across Canada have followed Turner’s final wish and have also released an open letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to show the same brave leadership for nuclear disarmament like his father join the treaty to help eliminate the worst weapons of mass destruction.
The former leaders’ ICAN letter can be read here.
The letter from Canadian peace and justice groups can be read here.
Tamara Lorincz, member of the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace, and Glenn Michalchuk, member of Peace Alliance Winnipeg.
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