To 10 May – the week in nuclear news
Growing number of Asian countries ravaged by fresh coronavirus waves. World Health Organisation updates its coronavirus advice, acknowledging aerosol transmission as the major source of infection. Covid-19: hopes for ‘Herd Immunity’ fade as virus hurtles toward becoming endemic. Biden’s proposal to waive patent rights for vaccine production has raised quite a storm.
Climate change: how bad could the future be, if we do nothing?
And now – to nuclear issues. There have been a number of important articles this week, on nuclear weapons in space – the militarisation of space. It’s ironic that a big news discussion has also gone on, about an ”out-of-control” Chinese rocket, that could have hit land and caused havoc. Ever ready to put a comforting Western spin on the news, this incident was used by the media to show how very safe U.S. rockets are, in comparison with those reckless Chinese efforts.
Amidst Pandemic and Economic Sufferings, 2020’S Global Military Spending Reached Highest Level in Decades
World military expenditure in 2020 is estimated to have been $1981 billion, the highest level since 1988 and world military expenditure in 2020 was 2.6 per cent higher in real terms than in 2019 and 9.3 per cent higher than in 2011.
Portside, May 6, 2021 Countercurrents Collective
Military spending around the world has increased to unprecedented level since 1988 despite economic suffering due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the U.S. was ahead of all the countries again, finds Trends in World Military Expenditure, 2020, the latest report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
In 2020, nations were struggling to support their economies through the times of hardships and lockdowns caused by the pandemic. Those efforts apparently did not prevent governments from spending more money on their militaries than ever before in more than three decades,