If you read my previous offering to this forum (if not, please do), you will have noticed that I made a lot of claims for what would happen if we actually got a ban treaty. Now, we have a ban treaty so we have to make my claims come true. 

We're off to a good start, actually. The Nobel Peace Prize committee awarded this year's prize to ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons--www.icanw.org). ICAN was the organization most obviously and effectively campaigning for the treaty. It deserves the prize, but I didn't think the committee would have the courage to give it to them. I was wrong.

The Nobel committee's generous and courageous act greatly boosted the campaign's finances and name recognition. But now, it's up to us -- all who would like to be liberated from the nuclear threat. We have to use the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons to make everyone in the world hate nuclear weapons and, most important, refuse to elect, respect or admire anyone who still thinks those weapons have something to offer to anyone's security. 

And the country to start with is Japan. Despite the fact that the overwhelming majority (70 to 80%) of the population says over and over that they want to live in a nuclear-weapon-free world, the nation of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Bikini and Fukushima is standing firmly with the nuclear weapon states in opposition to the treaty. The pro-nuclear forces in the government are doing everything they can to make the entire Japanese population fear North Korea (one of the poorest and most bullied nations on the planet); they are even floating the idea of Japan having its own nuclear weapons (to defend against those terrible North Koreans). 

We need a powerful counterforce. We need all the anti-nuclear activists in the world to go to Japan this coming July (2018) and stay through August making sure that every man, woman and child in the country knows that their government is endangering their lives, the lives of everyone on the planet, and all future generations by continuing to act as if nuclear weapons are some sort of answer to North Korea or to anything at all. 

If you are Japanese, we need you to show some courage and cause some trouble for your government. Your government is trying to scare you so you'll let them keep making money from America's military-nuclear-industrial complex. Please don't let them get away with it. The human family needs Japan to take a strong, unequivocal stand opposing nuclear war and in favor of nuclear-weapon-free peace. Please do whatever you can to persuade your fellow Japanese and your government that peace is by far the safest way to deal with North Korea and every other threat we face.

Thank you.