Next August 6th will mark the 80th anniversary of the atomic bomb drop on Hiroshima, Japan.
On that day in 1945, an American B-29 bomber called the Enola Gay dropped the world’s first deployed atomic bomb, and the resulting explosion instantly killed an estimated 80,000 people.
Three days later, a second B-29 named Bockscar dropped a plutonium bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people. Japan’s Emperor Hirohito announced his country’s unconditional surrender in World War II in a radio address less than a week later, specifically noting the destructive force of “a new and most cruel bomb.”
So, as we look back on the remarkable science and military organization that helped the US achieve total victory in this war, it is chilling to note the complete change in priorities related to research and technical advancement that occurred during the Biden-Harris administration.
Case-in-point: A recent hire at the Department of Energy’s (DOE) nuclear security section argues that advancing “queer theory” is essential to that agenda and important to America’s national security.
The Biden-Harris administration announced Sneha Nair had been appointed as special assistant at the National Nuclear Security Administration in February 2024. Nair believes in eradicating purported “White supremacy” in the nuclear field as well as “queering nuclear weapons” as part of a diversity, equity and inclusion push she believes is essential for deterring threats to nuclear energy facilities in the U.S.”Finally, queer theory informs the struggle for nuclear justice and disarmament,” she wrote last year. “Queer theory helps to shift the perception of nuclear weapons as instruments for security by telling the hidden stories of displacement, illness, and trauma caused by their production and testing.”Nair argues that DEI, more broadly, “is essential for creating effective nuclear policy.”
The original article, published in the New York Times, and another, released during Pride Month 2023, described how “disparaging tweets” directed at a 2022 LGBT panel by the Vienna Center for Disarmament and Non-Proliferation showed a public belief that “the relationship between queerness and nuclear policy is intended to push a social agenda rather than to address substantive issues.” Clearly, the public assessment is the correct one.
Here is how Nair responded:
This, Nair said, proved that “discrimination against queer people can undermine nuclear security and increase nuclear risk.”Nair continued, explaining how non-diverse groups of decision makers are prone to “groupthink,” making them “hostile to critical examination of baseline assumptions about how adversaries construct and identify nuclear threats and risks.” Introducing LGBT people in nuclear policy discussions can widen the definition of perceived threats and increases security, she wrote.“Queer theory is also about rejecting binary choices and zero-sum thinking, such as the tenet that nuclear deterrence creates security and disarmament creates vulnerability,” the article reads. “Indeed, queer theory helps us not only see the bad of a world with nuclear weapons, but also imagine the good of a world without them.”
Now, you would think someone hired to the DOE’s national security section would have a background in science and technology. Perhaps he or she is an experienced engineer or holds an advanced degree in physics.
That simply isn’t the case with Nair, whose expertise is in…geography.
Ms. Nair holds an MA (Honours) in Geography and International Relations from the University of St Andrews in the United Kingdom.
The upside: Once our adversaries get done laughing and launch their nuclear arsenal our way, Nair can expertly locate where our cities used to stand based on any geographical marker that may remain.
In a subsequent article for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that she co-authored, Nair manages to bring “white supremacists” into her ludicrous arguments that DEI belongs anywhere near rational and effective strategies on nuclear weapons.
Including a wider range of perspectives in nuclear decision making creates a more comprehensive definition of who or what constitutes a “threat” to nuclear security. An example of this is the threat posed by some white supremacist groups with plans to acquire nuclear weapons or material, which can go undetected when a white-majority workforce does not perceive these groups and their ideological motivation as a relevant threat to their nuclear security mission.Individuals targeted by these kinds of groups—including women, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ community—are more likely to identify these types of behaviors and attitudes as security risks and can play a crucial role in identifying a potential insider threat.
Our bureaucrats hold too much power and not enough accountability, and Nair is only one of thousands whose decisions are based on their agendas and neuroses and not on what is good for the country.
Besides, there has always been a little queer in nuclear weapons.
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