Global Zero is an international organization affiliated with the World Security Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank. Backed by many prominent political and military figures, such as former Queen Noor of Jordan and former President Jimmy Carter, its aim is “a world without nuclear weapons,” according to its Web site.

Established at a convention in Paris in December 2008, Global Zero has set up a four-phase plan toward its goal, beginning with a drastic reduction in weapons by the United States and Russia, with this reduction eventually spreading to all countries. Global Zero has also proposed a verification system to ensure enforcement.

While it previously focused on gathering support from world leaders, Global Zero has started to hone in on college campuses. Ten chapters, including the one at Wash. U., will launch this fall across the nation.

Sophomore Parsa Bastani heads the University’s chapter, having completed an internship and student leadership training at Global Zero’s headquarters over the summer.

Bastani was inspired to start the chapter after taking a class on nuclear policy with anthropology professor James Wertsch, which culminated in a conference with a partner university in Shanghai.

“After that whole process, I really started caring about this issue, and I got kind of invested in it, just wondering why we still have these weapons that are so dangerous and can annihilate so many people,” he said.

Much of the problem stems from a lack of discussion and understanding of the issue, according to Wertsch.

“When we want to think about going to zero nuclear arms, [people’s] first reaction is, ‘I didn’t know we had nuclear arms,’” he said. “With the end of the Cold War, people thought, ‘Oh, it’s over, we won, no problem.’”

But nuclear weapons are, in fact, still very much a problem in the world today. Although there has been a reduction from the Cold War high of 76,000 weapons, more than 20,000 still remain, with historically low rates of disassembling, Bastani said.

Complicating the issue is the fact that these already dangerous weapons may be in dangerous hands.

“It’s not just numbers [of weapons] but the number of actors who have these,” Wertsch said. “If Iran gets developed nuclear weapons, it’s not just Iran we worry about, but other countries in the Middle East [as well].”

Additionally, as Bastani said, terrorist groups are also a risk because of the low security on weapons in some areas.

“The fact that a person could get a hold of [a weapon] and explode it in a big city is a huge threat right now,” he said. Herein lies Global Zero’s goal: not only to reduce the number of nuclear weapons, but also to eliminate them completely.

Although the issue is clearly a complex one, Wertsch said he believes that the solution lies in spreading knowledge and awareness.

“If just one nuclear weapon, even a small one, goes off anywhere, 9/11 is just absolutely nothing compared to what a nuclear weapon would do,” he said. “Then all of us…will say, ‘Who’s responsible?’ Well, we all are, if we don’t talk about it.”

“Mostly, we need to have a much more thorough discussion of what the facts are, what the history’s been, how did we get in this situation and what the options are,” he added.

Sophomore Ellie Cooper, a member of Global Zero, agreed, saying that her hope for the group is “to educate the campus about the grave threat still posed by nuclear weapons.”

Bastani noted that the group is not officially recognized by Student Union yet, so its options and membership are somewhat limited. He hopes to plan events and attract speakers like Queen Noor in order to raise recognition and knowledge of the group and of nuclear weapons. “People will really start caring if we can get someone really famous and high policy to come,” he said.

“There are a lot of great ideas, a lot of passion and a desire to really get things done; we just don’t quite have enough people-power yet,” Cooper said.

But they remain optimistic about the group’s and the movement’s future.

“The president and the government respond to people,” Barsani said. “We can pressure them if we can start this grassroots campaign and eventually grow to a huge force around campuses across the country.”

“It’s the ideal time to make headway on this issue…” Cooper said. “There are political leaders in power around the world who are willing to sit down and discuss Global Zero seriously, not just as a crazy fringe movement.”

Global Zero will kick off at 6 p.m. on Thursday in McMillan 149 with a live discussion with Ambassador Thomas Graham, Jr., along with other chapters across the country.

Seniors Hillary Moffet and Meghan Luecke, junior Neehar Garg and third year law student Kay Parish shared their experiences at a presentation titled “Nuclear Weapons and You,” which took place this past Wednesday in the Danforth University Center. The fifth member of the group, University alum Michael Morgan, is still in China.

The University students noted that Russia and the United States maintain the two largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons and that China is rapidly developing their missile delivery systems. While the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty names five legal nuclear states, other states have developed nuclear weapons as well, according to the presentation.

Moffet said that the treaties have been rendered ineffective since other countries developed nuclear weapons despite signing treaties against their development, such as the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), ratified in 1968.

“The success of the NPT has been dwindling, but there’s a real push by a lot of different people to try and get it enforced again,” Moffet said.

Luecke listed a number of reasons why states are willing to eliminate nuclear weapons, such as the threat of terrorism, which has recently become a major concern and is gaining importance, according to Luecke.

“The idea that nuclear technology could get into the hands of a non-state actor, a terrorist group, is pretty powerful,” she said, “The idea of reducing or limiting all nuclear weapons would be in part to make sure there’s nothing available for terrorist groups to get their hands on.”

Moffet said that while there are still thousands of nuclear weapons in existence, there has been significant progress made toward disarmament.

“The good news is that both [the U.S. and Russia] have begun massive scale-downs. There really has been a lot of progress since each of these nations were at their peak,” she said.

According to Moffet, Russia was believed to have 70,000 weapons at one point and is now down to 15,000, while the U.S. decreased their arsenal from 30,000 to about 10,000 weapons.

“The real problems we run into [is] the game theory idea of ‘chicken model.’ No one really wants to get rid of their weapons first because they’re not assured that the other nation would then follow,” Moffet said. “We’re really running into this issue on an international level of ‘who goes first?’”

Members of the presenting group also spoke on the influence of nuclear weapons in Taiwan, North Korea and Georgia.

James Wertsch, a professor and director of the International and Area Studies program, attended the event and is interested in sending another group to the nuclear weapons forum next year.

“[The forum] is kind of an ongoing diplomatic experience,” Werstch said. “We do talk about nuclear arms; we’re very interested in nuclear disarmament. More broadly, it’s about forming long-term relationships with colleagues in China. These relationships are absolutely core if we’re going to make any progress on this and other issues.”

Wertsch said that Fudan University is one of the participating institutions in the McDonnell International Scholars Academy at Washington University, but that this is the first time that University students have attended the forum.

According to the students who attended the forum, many agreed that the United States and Russia would need to act first toward disarmament.

“I think that the United States needs to take the first step. We have France, India, China—a lot of the big nuclear states have very openly said that they would be willing to get rid of their stockpiles if the United States and Russia did,” Moffet said.

Garg pointed to the United States’ large program as evidence that it would need to be the first to act.

“Consider the obvious that the U.S. and Russia have several orders of magnitude more weapons than anyone else, so if you’re trying to convince everyone else to reduce their weapons, they’re not likely to do it,” Garg said. “Even if other countries say they’ll do it, they won’t do it if they feel it threatens their security.”

Sophomore Caitlin Brady attended the event as an extra-credit opportunity for a class.

“[It is important] because of the global consequences of any nuclear device going off,” Brady said. “During the election I think the focus is on Iran or North Korea, so I don’t think [politicians] are focusing on other countries as much as they should, because there are [other countries] that have nuclear weapons.”

You no doubt reacted in one of two ways to the words “nuclear weapons”: uninterested completely or completely intrigued. I challenge you, regardless of your reaction, to take the next few minutes and read this article, thoughtfully and carefully, as this issue, already a large player in global politics, might flare up sooner than we all expect, and it would be advantageous to be prepared.

We certainly have all heard about nuclear technology in many facets: Pearl Harbor and the ensuing attack on Japan, Homer Simpson’s employment in the nuclear power plant, the threats of Iran and North Korea or perhaps from other media outlets such as the TV series “24” or films like “Dr. Strangelove.” Whatever your impression on nuclear technology, it is far more grave than you most likely predict.

Looking back at our only use of the atomic bomb against people, the ten-kiloton warheads that were dropped on Japan are estimated to have each killed about 100,000 people, with about another 100,000 people dying as a result of radiation and other related causes. One ten-kiloton warhead will kill roughly 100,000 people. Current warheads are 10 times more powerful, coming in closer to 100-kilotons. Multiply that by the 100,000 people dead per 10 kilotons, and you’ve got the beginning of a problem. This is only the beginning because if you multiply that by the nuclear capacity of, say, China, a nation with about 200 warheads, you’ve got the makings of a real problem. Multiply again by the number of weapons contained by Russia and the United States, which is upwards of 25,000 weapons, and you have the absolute end to societies and civilizations.

Wait, you think, we really wouldn’t use these weapons on anyone again unless we really needed to. I believe this is true. This is not my fear. The real threat is terrorism and non-state actors who, if given the opportunity, can use these weapons with fewer repercussions than a state. Because they don’t have a people or a land, the threat from mutually assured destruction (the idea that if you bomb us, we will bomb you) is negligible. While whether terrorist groups have nuclear weapons is questionable, it is not something that I want to find out.

A second risk involves sheer human error. How comfortable do you feel knowing that weapons in Moscow and other international cities are pointed at us and, if triggered either intentionally or accidentally, can be launched toward, land in and destroy New York, Washington and yes, even St. Louis in about 15 minutes? Yes, launched from Moscow hitting Los Angeles. Fifteen minutes. That’s about three miles per second. And it’s real.

This is not an attempt to scare you. It is an attempt to provoke thought. The fact is that this issue is one we need to be talking about. Democrats and Republicans and Independents and others.

We need to discuss this issue on a global scale. I certainly have my own opinion as to what should be done, but I will let you make your own. Recently five Wash. U. students traveled to China to engage in conferences aimed at opening a dialogue between young people of the two nations. While they were very successful, I was constantly reminded of the differences in culture, politics, religion and otherwise that might act as obstacles to this deliberation.

We have a very large, looming security threat that has passed under the radar for the last few decades. We cannot continue to discount the security concerns brought forth by the reality that is nuclear weapons. I challenge you as students and young and future leaders (scary as that may sound) to begin to consider the possible effects of nuclear arms on our nation and others and its effects on both national and international security. Discover for yourself: What is your stance on the issue? What needs to be done? And, most importantly, how can you go about implementing that change?