Compiled by Dick Bennett.
https://jamesrichardbennett.blogspot.com/2025/10/omni-war-watch-wednesdays-250-october-8.html
NUCLEAR WAR DANGER
Scott Ritter. Highway to Hell: The Armageddon Chronicles, 2015-2024.
NCTE’s George Orwell Award.
Back from the Brink. “Action Alert: Urge Your Local and State Officials to Show Leadership.”
Nuclear War Danger, Need for Arms Control, Nuclear Weapons Abolition
Scott Ritter. Highway to Hell: The Armageddon Chronicles, 2015-2024. Clarity P, 2025.
The world stands on the precipice of a nuclear Armageddon, the byproduct of a confluence of the demise of the foundational principles of arms control that had served as a check on the world’s two largest nuclear-armed nations, the United States and Russia, and the geopolitical consequences of a failing hegemon clashing with an emerging multipolar reality. Nuclear weapons, once codified as weapons of deterrence intended never to be used, have morphed into weapons that have become integrated in the warfighting plans of the nuclear-armed powers. Deterrence is no longer in vogue—warfighting and war winning are.
There will be no winner in a nuclear conflict.
Critical thinking about the dangers posed by nuclear weapons, the necessity of arms control, and the consequences of nuclear war has never been more urgently needed. Highway to Hell: The Armageddon Chronicles, 2015-2024 affords the reader a comprehensive insight into these critical issues as they were unfolding,
Announcing the Winner of NCTE’s George Orwell Award
For Honesty and Clarity in Public Language. This year’s winner: Sarah Stitzlein.
Stitzlein is a philosopher of education whose work, according to the 2025 award selection committee, “challenges us to adopt a cross-disciplinary inquiry approach within citizenship education and grounds the work in current events that have a direct impact on public schools’ and teachers’ relationships with parents, politicians, and other stakeholders.”
The long history of the George Orwell Award reflects valuable work by educators, journalists, philosophers, podcasters, and more. Previous recipients include Ted Koppel and “Nightline,” Noam Chomsky, Garry Trudeau and the “Doonesbury” cartoon, Arundhati Roy, John Stewart and The Daily Show, Amy Goodman and Democracy Now! and The Onion. In recent years, a scholar advocating for Linguistic Justice, a podcast by educators interrogating the space Black bodies occupy, and an educator and policy advocate demonstrating the need for enhanced educational opportunities for immigrant students have all had their work recognized. Write to Emily Kirkpatrick, Exec. Dir. Of NCTE, about the next recipient!
“Action Alert: Urge Your Local and State Officials to Show Leadership.” Back from the Brink 10-8-25
 Hi Dick, At Back from the Brink, we talk a lot about leadership. We need much more of it in order to make progress toward our goal of a world free of nuclear weapons. We need more of this leadership from within our communities — our governors, mayors, city/town councilors, county commissioners, and state legislators. They are an important voice and have been elected to help keep us safe. And what they say matters to the decision-makers in Washington, including your members of Congress. In that spirit, Back from the Brink is circulating a sign-on letter for local, county, and state elected officials which urges members of Congress to cosponsor H. Res. 317 in the House and S. Res. 323 in the Senate. These two nearly identical “Back from the Brink resolutions” articulate common-sense policies to prevent nuclear war, halt and reverse the global nuclear arms race, support impacted communities, and codify global nuclear disarmament as a moral and national security imperative. We already have dozens of mayors, city/town councilors, county commissioners, and state legislators from around the country who have signed the letter, and we hope hundreds more will join them so we can send an unmistakable message to Congress — that nuclear weapons are a local issue and we demand real disarmament leadership from Washington. We’ve created a one-click action customized for each state so you can contact your local and state elected officials, urging them to sign our H. Res. 317/S. Res. 323 sign-on letter. (Please read the note on the page for people who live in towns with fewer than 10,000 people.) TAKE ACTION NOW Perhaps you know some of these local and state officials or have existing relationships with them. If so, we’d love to hear from you and discuss ways we can encourage more leadership from them. Feel free to reach out to Erick Fernandez at erick@preventnuclearwar.org with any questions. Many thanks, Your friends at Back from the Brink P.S. In just over 100 days, New START, the last remaining nuclear arms control treaty between the United States and Russia is set to expire. The time to raise our voices and demand leadership is now. [One of the best actions you can take is to support the efforts by Scott Ritter to end the ancient hatred of the Soviet Union (now Russia) by the US. Ritter is not only constantly writing and speaking for US/Rus amity, but he has created a peace organization with fellow spirits for peace in Russia. Just google Scott Ritter, or contact me. –Dick] |