• What is IPPNW?
• A brief history of IPPNW
• Goals and strategies

• Nuclear Facts

• Our missions
• The Structure of IPPNW

Nuclear Facts

What is really happening in the nuclear world today?

• Billions of dollars are pouring into new technologies in the nuclear weapons labs as the nuclear weapons states modernize their arsenals, especially the US and Russia, but also the poor countries of India and Pakistan.
• Nuclear weapons expenditures in the US, under the guise of the Stockpile Stewardship Program, are at levels comparable or higher than those during the Cold War.
• India and Pakistan are now openly declared nuclear adversaries, with Kashmir a smoldering potential flashpoint. The use of just one 150-kiloton nuclear bomb over a city like Bombay could cause up to 8,660,000 deaths.
• Israel's suspected arsenal of some 200 nuclear weapons is encouraging other states in the Middle East such as Iran to obtain them, too.
• The US government is committed to deploying a national missile defense system, after already abolishing the ABM treaty and hardening Russia's reliance on its nuclear arsenal.
• The decay in Russia's nuclear command and control, coupled with modern computer problems like viruses and the current economic and political situation, has greatly increased the probability of accidental nuclear war between the two major nuclear powers.
• An accidental launch from just 1 Russian submarine targeting 8 US cities would cause nearly 7 million immediate deaths from firestorms with another 6-12 million deaths from radiation in the aftermath.
• Five thousand nuclear weapons remain on hair-trigger alert, ready to be launched within 15 minutes, still pointing at targets from old, Cold War scenarios. They are not only stationed in nuclear weapons states, but also in countries like Germany or Italy.
• The rise in terrorism combined with loose control over the fissile materials (plutonium and uranium) used to make nuclear bombs have increased the prospect of nuclear terrorism. Pakistani scientist have sold nuclear secrets and several terrorist groups are suspected to plan nuclear attacks.
• Disarmament talks have stalled on all fronts. The Russian Duma refuses to ratify START II, and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is blocked in the US Senate.

When people do think about nuclear weapons and are asked if they favor nuclear abolition, an overwhelming majority (87 percent in the US) says Yes. In fact, a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center for People and the Press found that a majority of people polled rank nuclear weapons as the worst invention of the last century. Despite some gains in recent years, the leaders of the nuclear weapons states are far from carrying out the will of the people.

We find that what our leaders say and what they do are often entirely different. For example, the US government repeatedly states that it favors the elimination of nuclear weapons. Yet it is modernizing its nuclear arsenal, conducting subcritical nuclear weapons tests, and has admitted that reliance on nuclear weapons will remain a cornerstone of national security policy for the indefinite future. The other nuclear and near-nuclear states follow this lead. And even non-nuclear states like Germany appearantly do not have a problem with American nuclear weapons being stationed.

With our affiliated organizations in the nuclear weapons states, IPPNW works to change national government policies, create an open public discourse about the topic of nuclear abolition and raise awareness of the threats nuclear war still poses to the world today. IPPNW is currently very active in South Asia (India-Pakistan), North Asia(the Korean penninsula), and the Middle East (Iran, Israel), where nuclear arms races are in early stages. In these regions, IPPNW is mobilizing physicians, citizens, and policy makers to stop nuclear proliferation.

IPPNW also works to effect change on the international level. As a principal sponsor of the World Court Project, which succeeded in obtaining a ruling from the International Court of Justice on the illegality of the threat or use of nuclear weapons, affiliates were instrumental in obtaining support from the World Health Organization for this effort.

IPPNW helped spearhead the launch of the global Abolition 2000 campaign, which now includes some 1,400 non-governmental (NGO) organizations worldwide. The campaign's goal is to achieve a signed global agreement committing the nations of the world to a timetable for complete nuclear disarmament. The Campaign "20/20 Vision", which aims for a worldwide abolition of nuclear weapons by 2020 is another global campaign, which IPPNW strongly supports.

The major thrust of IPPNW's Nuclear Abolition campaign focuses on promotion, advocacy, and political organizing in support of an international convention to eliminate nuclear weapons - a Nuclear Weapons Convention similar to the treaties banning chemical and biological weapons and landmines. By mobilizing the medical community, IPPNW is working to bring the collective influence of physicians and health professions to help eliminate the nuclear threat.