International security

Coudert speaker: ‘More weapons will not make America safe again’

The only thing nuclear weapons are good for is assuring mutual destruction, Jonathan Granoff told about 100 people at the Coudert Institute luncheon Wednesday at The Brazilian Court.

The president of the Global Security Institute explained the extent of the threat these weapons posed throughout the course of the Cold War, like in 1983 when a computer error almost resulted in a nuclear holocaust.

“Their computers all showed there was a U.S. launch. It’s a fact that this man indefinitely saved the world,” Granoff said of Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov, who did not pass the information of the launch up the command chain because he knew the computer was incorrect. “We came just minutes away.”

Granoff, who calls himself a lawyer for future generations, is pushing for treaties that will dismantle all nuclear arms and policing that will prevent further proliferation.