Two days after the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Albert Camus wrote in his newspaper, Combat: “Our technological civilization has just reached its greatest level of savagery.” A month later, in her September 1945 column in The Catholic Worker, Dorothy Day condemned President Truman for having ordered the two atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Ten years later, on June 15, 1955, Day was still among the earliest protesters against nuclear weapons when, outside City Hall in Manhattan, she, A. J. Muste, Ammon Hennacy and 26 others refused to take shelter during compulsory air-raid Civil Defense drills which she considered psychological preparations for nuclear war. Day and the others were arrested, held in jail overnight, found guilty and given suspended sentences.
Fifty-five years later, reading about the Obama administration’s recently released strategy for a nuclear strike immediately brings to mind Dorothy Day’s protests against “rehearsals for death.” The rehearsals haven’t started yet, but officials say “they are moving aggressively to conduct drills, prepare communication guides and raise awareness among emergency planners.”
In 2007, Congress appropriated $5.5 million for studies on “atomic disaster planning” which have revealed that “a bomb’s flash would blind many drivers, causing accidents and complicate evacuation” and that “taking shelter can make a huge difference in survival rates.”
Whether we are being prepared psychologically to believe that we can win a nuclear exchange or simply being told what to do if we are the victims of a nuclear attack, the level of delusion here is striking. One cannot take cover from a nuclear weapon. Only by abolishing them can we make sure that we do not become their victims.