Daniel Ellsberg

Dear friends and supporters, I have difficult news to impart. On February 17, without much warning, I was diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer on the basis of a CT scan and an MRI. (As is usual with pancreatic cancer – which has no early symptoms – it was found while looking for something else, relatively … Continue reading “Living on a Deadline in the Nuclear Age. Some Personal News From Daniel Ellsberg”

Reprinted from The Nation with permission from the authors. The single best option for reducing the risk of nuclear war is hidden in plain sight. News outlets don’t mention it. Pundits ignore it. Even progressive and peace-oriented members of Congress tiptoe around it. And yet, for many years, experts have been calling for this act … Continue reading “To Avoid Armageddon, Don’t Modernize Missiles – Eliminate Them”

At a recent talk at the National Press Club in Washington DC, Daniel Ellsberg, who released the Pentagon Papers in 1971, says he believes there’s not one person in the Pentagon who would agree that President Obama can achieve his aim of destroying ISIS in Iraq and Syria with air strikes, along with training and … Continue reading “Daniel Ellsberg Sees Vietnam-Like Risks in ISIS War”

This is a forward to the book Flirting with Disaster: Why Accidents Are Rarely Accidental by Marc S. Gerstein. I have participated in several major organizational catastrophes. The most well known of them is the Vietnam War. I was aware on my first visit to Vietnam in 1961 that the situation there – a failing … Continue reading “Learning from Past Disasters, Preventing Future Ones”

For the second time in two weeks, the entire U.S. press has let itself be scooped by Rupert Murdoch’s London Sunday Times on a dynamite story of criminal activities by corrupt U.S. officials promoting nuclear proliferation. But there is a worse journalistic sin than being scooped, and that is participating in a cover-up of information … Continue reading “US Media Covering Up for Government?”

Daniel Ellsberg, the former Defense Department analyst who leaked the secret Pentagon Papers history of the Vietnam War, offered insights into the looming war with Iran and the loss of liberty in the United States at an American University symposium on Sept. 20. Below is an edited transcript of Ellsberg’s remarkable speech: I think nothing … Continue reading “‘A Coup Has Occurred’”

On the day that Scooter Libby’s prison sentence was lifted by President Bush, Mordechai Vanunu was sentenced to prison, again, in Israel. In both cases, the underlying offense was the same: speaking to journalists. In each case, the nominal charges were otherwise. For Libby, it was lying under oath about the circumstances, thereby obstructing justice. … Continue reading “Libby and Vanunu”

According to recent opinion polls, most Iraqis don’t believe that we’re making things better or safer in their country. What does that say about the legitimacy of prolonged occupation, much less permanent American bases in Iraq? What does it mean for continued American armored patrols such as the one last November in Haditha, which, we … Continue reading “Say ‘No’ to War Candidates”

The following essay is adapted from remarks made at a Capitol Hill briefing on Iraq: The Logic of Withdrawal sponsored by the Institute for Policy Studies and Foreign Policy In Focus. The event was held two days before the 30 th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. I‘m often asked whether there aren’t … Continue reading “The Courage to Talk Withdrawal”