The Nuclear Question

Faith community of some Christians gathered together to declare that their faith such as  belief in God is incompatable with the research, development, production and use of nuclear weapons in Vcouver, Canada, in 1983. In was right in the middle of the Cold War, with a possiblity of nuclear war in Europe between the United States and Soviet Union.

Since there here has been a significant development toward a 'world without nuclear weapons' by the President Regan of the United States and the President Gorbachov of the Soviet Union with series of greements such as the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty(NPT). It was the Presedent Obama who proclaimed a vison of world without nulcear weapons.

However, the situation today is very serious in realizing that such a vision may be beyond human efforts.

The following reports show some aspect of this utter serious situation:
I would like to have an intelligent discussion on this matter!

DISARM AND MODERNIZE

In terms of warhead numbers, the nuclear arms race may
 be over. But massive weapons upgrades now underway challenge the entire disarmament regime.

BY JOHN MECKLIN
ILLUSTRATIONS BY CARL DE TORRES

In the early decades of the Cold War, NATO made arrangements to bury what were known as atomic demolition munitions (in essence, nuclear mines) at key points in West Germany, to be detonated if Warsaw Pact forces ever invaded. Although this plan, if enacted, might have slowed the enemy advance, it also almost certainly would have turned vast West German territories into radioactive wastelands littered with corpses and smoldering buildings—the stuff of hellish alternative-
history scenarios. The West viewed such tactical nukes—NATO fielded 7,000 to 8,000 of these shorter-
range, smaller-yield weapons for most of the Cold War—as tripwires in anticipation of the Soviet Union’s own Strangelovian plans for its thousands of tactical weapons. That is to say, the forward positioning of these nukes was a signal: If the Soviet Union invaded Europe, confrontation would escalate quickly to the nuclear realm, and the United States would intervene.

With the end of the Cold War and the reduced risk of a Russian invasion, NATO eliminated almost all its tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. Today, five NATO countries—Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, and Turkey—are widely believed to host roughly 200 U.S.-owned nuclear bombs at their air bases. These weapons, variants of the B61 warhead, a stalwart of the American thermonuclear arsenal since the late 1960s, are viewed by some security experts as provocative anachronisms. The critics argue that strategic missiles and bombers posted in the United States and the United Kingdom, along with missiles on nuclear submarines, provide more than enough deterrence against any Russian aggression.

But in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the destabilization of Ukraine, the controversy about B61s is being heightened and compounded. In addition to retaining tactical nukes in Europe, the United States plans to modernize the weapons, as well as its arsenal back home, in a remarkably expensive way. This decision has inflamed debate about the depth of the U.S. commitment to the Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which allows the United States, Russia, China, the United Kingdom, and France to have nuclear weapons if they promise to eventually disarm.

Today, weapons innovation threatens to become the new mode for arms competition. Washington’s upgrading of the B61-4 bomb, for example, would equip the device with a tail assembly, making it into a precision-guided standoff weapon. An irony is attached to this redesigned device, called the B61-12: It would be able to attack the same targets as previous gravity bombs in the U.S. arsenal, but would do so more accurately and efficiently, using smaller yields that would create less collateral damage and less radioactive fallout. This means the bombs might be seen as more conceivably usable in a limited or tactical conflict. And this is precisely why the U.S. Congress rejected the Air Force’s requests for low-yield, precision-guided nuclear weapons in the 1990s: Their very accuracy increases the temptation to use them.

THESE TRANSFORMATIONS AND UPGRADES, DESIGNED TO MAKE WEAPONS HARDER TO SHOOT DOWN AND MORE PRECISE AND RELIABLE, ENSURE THAT THE WORLD WILL BE NO LESS DANGEROUS—AND PERHAPS EVEN MORE PERILOUS—THAN IT IS NOW.

Nonetheless, under current plans, approximately 480 B61-12s are set to be produced by the mid-2020s, and they would serve all U.S. gravity-bomb missions contemplated for five different aircraft. In addition to deployment in Europe, the U.S. Air Force also intends to use the B61-12 to arm heavy B-2 and B-52 bombers based in America. Even by the standards of defense budgets, the B61 modernization program is exorbitant: Estimates place its ultimate cost north of $10 billion, or
 more than if the bombs were constructed of solid gold.

But the high cost and questionable utility of the B61 program are not anomalies—nor is the fact that the plan has received little publicity. Countries with nuclear weapons have recently embarked on highly ambitious and costly programs, largely unexamined outside national security circles, to renew the strategic and tactical weapons in their arsenals. These projects include both technological upgrades and entirely new systems; as documented by Hans Kristensen and Robert Norris, nuclear-arsenal experts at the Federation of American Scientists, the modernizations run the gamut, from ballistic missiles to bombers, warheads to naval vessels, cruise missiles to even weapons factories. Russia is in the process of phasing out and replacing all its Soviet-era nuclear weapons systems. The proposed U.S. maintenance and modernization program has been projected to cost some $355 billion over the next decade and $1 trillion or more over 30 years. And every nuclear country is following suit.

While these efforts will not necessarily increase the number of deployed warheads in the world, the programs and the enhanced weapons they are projected to produce will last for decades. The race for ever-more nukes has become, instead, a race for ever-better, -sleeker, and -stealthier ones. And these transformations and upgrades, designed to make weapons harder to shoot down and more precise and reliable, ensure that the world will be no less dangerous—and perhaps even more perilous—than it is now.

In terms of sheer numbers, the nuclear arms race of the Cold War may be over. But the worldwide modernization craze scrambles the calculus of nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation efforts, challenging the aging underpinnings of the NPT itself. Approximately 16,000 nuclear weapons are still on the planet, and the massive, long-term plans that nuclear nations have in place strongly suggest that they have no intention of giving up their nukes anytime soon. All this makes it reasonable to ask: Is the international arms-control regime an outdated charade? That question will be on the minds of arms experts as the 190 signatories to the NPT convene in New York this spring for a review conference they hold every five years. The mood there, it’s fair to assume, is unlikely to be upbeat.

Opened for signature in 1968, the NPT not only allows five states to keep nuclear weapons, but it expressly prohibits the remaining 185 signatories from possessing them. So far, this arrangement has worked reasonably well. At the height of the Cold War in the mid-1980s, for example, six countries (the five nuclear weapons states, as well as Israel) had more than 70,000 nuclear weapons; today, nine countries (India, Pakistan, and North Korea have since joined the nuclear club) possess about 10,000 warheads, with another 6,000 or so “retired” but intact weapons in storage, awaiting dismantlement. The United States and Russia have more than 90 percent of those weapons.

The standard narrative of disarmament asserts that, despite the fits and starts inevitable in international politics, continued arms-control efforts will lead to ever-shrinking arsenals, thereby saving governments enormous amounts of money and improving global security. Among these efforts to date, in addition to the NPT, is the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), which would prohibit all nuclear testing, above and below ground. The treaty has yet to come into force for various reasons. Some states question whether it would be verifiable (even though a body of research strongly suggests it would be), while some officials in nuclear states insist that the option to test should be kept open, to ensure that stockpiles do not become unreliable. Twenty out of 183 CTBT signatory states have not ratified the treaty, including the United States (largely as a result of opposition from Republicans in Congress).

The New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty between the United States and Russia, which took effect in early 2011, does not require the destruction of a single warhead, but both countries agreed to limit the number they deploy on land- and sea-based ballistic missiles to 1,550 each by 2018. In a 2013 speech at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, U.S. President Barack Obama proposed that each country cut its deployed warheads by about one-third, to roughly 1,000. Obama also vowed to seek “bold reductions” of nonstrategic nuclear weapons in Europe and to push for Senate ratification of the CTBT.

THE MODERNIZATION PROGRAMS IN THE UNITED STATES, RUSSIA, AND ELSEWHERE THREATEN TO OPEN THE DOOR TO A NEW ARMS COMPETITION—AND AN EVER-INCREASING NUMBER OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS STATES.

But disarmament efforts have languished during much of Obama’s second term. Almost immediately after the president’s Berlin speech, for instance, U.S. congressional opponents and Russian leaders raised objections. Republicans asked whether such cuts would threaten national security, and Moscow decried U.S. missile-defense efforts, saying they threatened Russia’s strategic missile force and made new arms cuts impossible. With Republicans taking control of both houses of Congress this year, ratification of the CTBT now seems extremely unlikely.

Numbers show the slowdown in arms-control progress: The U.S. nuclear stockpile was reduced by only about 300 warheads from 2009 to 2013, and Russia retired about 1,000 weapons, Kristensen and Norris have written. These reductions were at a much slower pace than those in the previous five-year period, when Washington nixed more than 3,000 weapons and Moscow roughly 2,500 in a spring-cleaning of outdated and unreliable arsenals. Now, the Ukraine crisis seems likely to further slow the arms-control process. And, in general, the relatively sluggish reduction rate suggests that U.S. and Russian arsenals are not so much headed toward zero as plateauing for the foreseeable future.

In the face of this deceleration, the world’s patience is wearing thin. Many of the 185 countries that agreed not to build nukes have become increasingly unhappy. Three conferences held in the past few years on the humanitarian effects of nuclear weapons were seen widely as attempts to force the nuclear powers to move faster on disarmament. The nuclear club largely ignored the first two conferences, sponsored by the governments of Norway and Mexico. But the events had grown to include most of the world’s non-nuclear-weapons countries by the time of the third gathering, held in Vienna in December 2014 and sponsored by the Austrian government; more than 150 countries signed up to attend. In the end, the United States sent a representative, though with the disclaimer that “this conference is not the appropriate venue for disarmament negotiations or pre-negotiation discussions.”

CURRENT STOCKPILESThe United States and Russia have more than 90 percent of the 16,000-plus nuclear weapons on the planet today. North Korea also holds nuclear weapons, though the extent of its program remains unknown. (Source: Federation of American Scientists.)

In Vienna, Ambassador Adam Scheinman, the U.S. president’s special representative for nuclear nonproliferation, recounted a rosy history of America’s support for a world without the bomb. “It is precisely our understanding of the consequences of nuclear weapons use that drives our efforts to reduce—and eventually eliminate—nuclear weapons,” he said, “and to extend forever the nearly 70-year record of non-use of nuclear weapons.” Scheinman acknowledged that Washington’s approach to disarmament remains an incremental one. But that step-by-step orientation, he said, has led to an 85 percent reduction in Washington’s stockpile since the late 1960s, when it peaked at more than 30,000 weapons.

The next day, Richard Lennane, the officially titled “chief inflammatory officer” of the anti-nuclear NGO Wildfire, offered the conference a more acerbic assessment. He likened the nuclear states to alcoholics, addicted to bombs instead of liquor, and urged the international community to stop enabling them. “How long will you listen to the nuclear-armed states expressing their ‘unequivocal commitment’ to nuclear disarmament and then saying that they need their nuclear weapons for ‘stability’? How long will you wait for the mythical ‘right conditions’ for nuclear disarmament?” he asked. “You can remove the ambiguity that supports their habit.… You can negotiate and adopt and bring into force a treaty banning nuclear weapons.”

The disarmament debate is likely to make this spring’s NPT conference a contentious one and just might be loud enough to make the public aware that a new type of nuclear arms race is unfolding around the world.

Under the Obama administration, the U.S. national security establishment has proposed upgrades to all three legs of the nuclear triad of land-based missiles, submarine-launched missiles, and long-range bombers, something not done since the mainstay planes and missiles of the current nuclear force were built in the Cold War’s early years. The Navy, for example, wants a new class of 12 ballistic missile submarines. The Air Force is reviewing options for a new land-based intercontinental ballistic missile (a mobile missile less vulnerable to detection is one possibility), and it is developing a stealthy long-range bomber to be rolled out in the mid-2020s. The plan is to buy 80 to 100 of these bombers, some of which will be nuclear-capable, at a cost of more than $55 billion. Washington also intends to deploy a new, stealthy, nuclear-
capable fighter-bomber—the F-35A Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter—to its allies in Europe, including Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey.

The F-35A is expected to carry the upgraded B61-12 bomb, which, as part of the future U.S. arsenal, would potentially join a program aimed at creating a smaller array of interoperable warheads for submarine and land-based missiles. The planned upgrades to warheads could require that they be tested to ensure they would work, threatening the moratorium on testing that has held since the 1990s. Any tests would undermine hope that the CTBT would come into force. This, in turn, would likely create major repercussions for the international arms-control regime.

To produce the new warheads, the Obama administration has proposed an array of expensive enhancements to what is often called the nuclear weapons complex: eight facilities—three national laboratories, four production plants, and the Nevada National Security Site, where nuclear tests were conducted until the 1990s—that are government owned but run by contractors and overseen by the semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), a part of the U.S. Energy Department. Budget constraints, however, make it unclear whether many of these upgrades will ever be undertaken.

The complex has long had severe management and cost-control problems, as evidenced by multibillion-dollar cost overruns that led the Energy Department last year to suspend work and explore “alternative approaches” to a facility at the Savannah River Site, a weapons plant that would have turned plutonium from retired nukes into fuel for civilian power plants. The management snafus were even more glaringly illuminated in 2012, when three activists—one an 82-year-old nun—penetrated multiple levels of security to protest in front of the United States’ largest storage facility for bomb-grade uranium. This embarrassing security breach and many other management failures led Congress to create an advisory panel that in November 2014 recommended a major overhaul, including elimination of the NNSA and placement of the nuclear weapons complex under the direct control of an Energy Department rebranded as the Department of Energy and Nuclear Security.

It is unclear whether Congress will pay heed to the recommendations of this panel—one in a long line of commissions to study hapless administration of the nuclear weapons complex—or provide the many billions of dollars that would be needed over time to complete all the proposed upgrades to an infrastructure so old that the ceilings of some facilities are actually falling in.

Although Russia is less transparent about weapons than the United States is, reports by Kristensen and Norris suggest that Moscow intends to phase out and replace all its Soviet-era nuclear systems in the next decade. They note Russia is developing three new land-based missiles, including an SS-27 intercontinental ballistic missile modified so it can carry multiple warheads that can be aimed at different targets, thereby expanding the lethality of each missile. Its ballistic submarines are also set to be modernized, with eight new subs that reportedly will be able to launch 16 missiles, each capable of carrying up to six independently targetable warheads—again increasing the number of targets that can be attacked.

And it doesn’t stop there. The Russian bomber force is also being upgraded, with plans for a relatively slow but super-stealthy flying wing, known as the PAK-DA, apparently going forward. A new nuclear-
capable cruise missile, long in development, appears to be nearing operational status; the new Iskander-M SS-26 short-range tactical nuclear missile—a mobile system with two missiles per carrier—is being rolled out, and the Su-34 Fullback fighter-bomber is replacing 1970s-era planes as a platform for tactical nuclear strikes. Meanwhile, a nuclear-powered guided-missile attack submarine is about to enter service, along with a long-range cruise missile that may have a nuclear capability. Production of nuclear warheads for these systems continues.

As is the case in the United States, some of Moscow’s efforts could significantly alter warhead designs, which would raise questions about whether Russia might seek to test the upgrades, in breach of the moratorium on testing. This freeze is central to the international arms-control regime.
Currently four countries that are not parties to the NPT—India, Israel, North Korea, and Pakistan—have nuclear weapons. A resumption of testing could result in more countries trying out and then deploying nuclear weapons. In short, the modernization programs in the United States, Russia, and elsewhere threaten to open the door to a new arms competition—and an ever-
increasing number of nuclear weapons states.

In a multipolar world, tomorrow’s nuclear arsenals could be managed in unpredictable ways by countries whose governments range from fragile to stable and whose approaches to international affairs range from passive to assertive to even aggressive. The United States’ and Russia’s race to modernize their nuclear arsenals is paralleled in China, Europe, and South Asia, with countries all seeking to keep up with former Cold War rivals or compete with the military efforts of neighbors.

China, for one, has long professed a goal of minimum nuclear deterrence—that is, an arsenal that is just large enough to inflict unacceptable damage on any country that attacked China first—and is estimated to have about 250 warheads for delivery by land-based missiles, bombers, and an emerging submarine fleet. But China is also engaged in continuing, low-level disputes with its neighbors—the Philippines, Vietnam, and other countries—over control of the Spratly and Paracel island groups in the South China Sea, where Beijing reportedly has been building man-made islands from reefs and shoals to host military facilities. In the latter stages of an aggressive, two-decade program of upgrading its land-, sea-, and air-based nuclear delivery systems, China is the only member of the five NPT-declared nuclear weapons states increasing its arsenal, albeit slowly.

GLOBAL NUCLEAR WEAPONS STOCKPILES, 1945–2014The number of warheads worldwide has steadily decreased since the mid-1980s. Here, the U.S. and Russian figures reflect warheads in military stockpiles, excluding retired, but still intact, weapons. (Source: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.)

On land, Beijing is significantly upgrading its older liquid-fuel missiles and replacing them with longer-range, road-mobile solid-fuel missiles based at new or upgraded garrisons. This will give a greater portion of China’s future land-based missiles longer ranges and more survivability. At sea, the country is in the process of deploying a new design for a ballistic missile submarine. Three of these so-called Jin-class subs have recently been put into service, each apparently capable of carrying 12 single-warhead missiles. This gives the sub fleet the potential to carry 36 missiles, up from the previous total of 12, which were carried on one submarine that entered service in 1986 and is no longer considered operational. The missiles for these new subs, however, are still in development, and it remains unclear how the submarines may eventually be deployed. U.S. intelligence and military sources have suggested that China is adding a nuclear capability to some of its ground- and air-launched cruise missiles, which could greatly increase the number of nuclear-weapons delivery systems in the country. There has been no official confirmation of such a move or how many cruise missiles it might involve. But any production of nuclear-armed cruise missiles would mark a significant change in China’s deterrence posture and concern neighboring countries, from Japan to South Korea and beyond, that worry about Beijing’s increasingly confrontational ways.

In South Asia, meanwhile, what may be the world’s most threatening nuclear face-off—exacerbated by long-simmering distrust and military competition between Pakistan and India, a continuing border dispute over the Kashmir region, and allegations of Pakistani support for terrorist attacks in India—seems to be spawning a modernization race. Both India and Pakistan are upgrading their weapons complexes to produce increased amounts of bomb-grade uranium and plutonium, which would provide the countries with the ability to build more warheads.

Pakistan’s expansion is notably rapid. Today, the country has an estimated 120 weapons, an increase from around 90 in 2007. At its current pace, Pakistan could have 200 nukes in its arsenal within a decade. Beefing up its tactical weapons, the country is developing a new medium-
range ballistic missile, new air- and ground-launched cruise missiles, and a short-range nuclear missile, the Nasr (officially known as Hatf IX, meaning “vengeance”—a theatrical choice that reflects the nuclear politics of the region). The Pakistani military claims that the Nasr, a mobile system with a range of 60 kilometers (37 miles), is highly accurate and able to carry nuclear warheads. It is designed for “shoot-and-scoot” warfare—that is, firing at a target and then immediately moving to avoid enemy counterfire—and apparently is meant for use in the event of an invasion by India’s conventional forces, widely seen as superior to Pakistan’s.

PRAGUE WAS NEVER A PROMISE OF INSTANT DISARMAMENT.

An analysis of the potential use of tactical nukes in South Asia—relying on the outlines of the 1965 India-Pakistan war as a guide to invasion routes—suggests that Pakistan’s detonation of just one
 30-kiloton battlefield weapon would not only affect invading Indian forces, but also cause the loss of at least tens of thousands and probably hundreds of thousands of Pakistani civilian lives, according to Jaganath Sankaran, an associate at the Managing the Atom project at Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. In turn, India is developing longer-range ballistic missiles, including the Agni-V—agni is the Sanskrit word for “fire”—with a range of 5,000 kilometers (3,107 miles), making it capable of reaching any target in China, its primary regional rival. In addition, India has launched its first ballistic missile submarine, the Arihant, meaning “slayer of enemies” in Sanskrit, which is expected to be followed by several others that will eventually have the capability to launch ballistic missiles. This is significant: Pakistan has long warned that it would consider an Indian submarine armed with nuclear missiles to be destabilizing.

The modernization fervor has also gripped Europe to a degree that could seem unusual for those who view nuclear competition primarily in the historical U.S.-Russia frame. But the nuclear weapons and platforms of European countries are also aging, and these countries continue to have joint defense obligations with one another and the United States. France has undertaken a comprehensive upgrade of its arsenal, deploying an improved submarine-launched missile, the M-51—a multiple-warhead missile with increased accuracy, intercontinental range, and payloads—that will also be outfitted with a new nuclear warhead later this year. An air-launched cruise missile, the Air-Sol Moyenne Portée Amélioré, which has a range of 500 kilometers (311 miles) and an improved warhead, has been integrated into two fighter-bomber squadrons, one at Istres on the Mediterranean coast and the other at Saint-Dizier, in northeastern France.

In 2010, Britain announced its plans to reduce its stockpile to 180 warheads by the mid-2020s, but it is currently bringing out a new class of ballistic missile submarines to replace older submarines scheduled for retirement, starting in 2024. It seems likely that the B61-12 bomb and the deployment of the U.S. stealthy F-35A fighter-bomber in Europe will enhance NATO’s overall nuclear capability across the region while simultaneously raising concerns about a lowering threshold for nuclear weapons use during a time of East-West tension.

Israel, meanwhile, maintains a stance of nuclear ambiguity—neither confirming nor denying that it has weapons—though it has been widely accepted for decades that the country has an arsenal. In the absence of official information, the news media, think tanks, authors, and analysts have given widely varying appraisals of the size of the Israeli nuclear stockpile, from 75 up to more than 400 warheads. (Kristensen and Norris estimate that Israel has about 80 warheads.) The country is also likely modernizing its land-based ballistic missile and a cruise missile for its submarines.

Although North Korea’s nuclear program and bellicose rhetoric have drawn regular media coverage, it is unclear to what extent the country has militarized its nuclear capability. What is clear is that the rhetoric has not diminished. And satellite monitoring and expert consensus suggest that, though the country is not there yet, North Korea is certainly trying to achieve the ability to field deliverable nuclear weapons. It is an understatement to say success could significantly increase tension in the region around the Hermit Kingdom.

It is a well-worn trope in news articles about disarmament to quote from Obama’s stirring April 2009 speech in Prague. “Some argue that the spread of these weapons cannot be stopped,” he intoned to a rapt crowd. “Such fatalism is a deadly adversary.” The speech provides a dramatic contrast to the general disappointment in his administration’s disarmament efforts in the time since it was delivered. But often, a key portion of the speech is conveniently overlooked: Immediately after asserting America’s commitment to a nuclear-weapons-free world, Obama warned that such a goal would be difficult and might not be reached in his lifetime. Prague was never a promise of instant disarmament.

Today, however, even the Obama administration’s complicated, gradual efforts toward controlling nuclear weapons are being undercut, perhaps even being rendered moot. The nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament regime is centered on the NPT, which entered into force in March 1970, the month when the Beatles released the song “Let It Be” and the Concorde airliner made its first supersonic flight. The decades have certainly added up since then; the Beatles and the Concorde are no more. But the NPT still staggers on, now up against a modernization tide that sees the major nuclear countries continuing to spend enormous fortunes improving their arsenals. Unless the United States, Russia, and other powers find a way to agree on reining in their modernization programs, the world’s non-nuclear countries will have increasingly legitimate reasons to ask how they benefit from being part of the NPT—and why they shouldn’t go their own way.

John Mecklin (@meckdevil) is the editor of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

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THEOLOGICAL TASK FOR THE FUTURE OF WORLD CHRISTIANITY IN ASIAN PERSPECTIVE

Signs of Times: Radical Civilizational Crisis

The whole creation and her inhabitants, all living beings on earth, experience the “omnicidal threat.”

Global technocracy of modernity has radically transformed the basic fundamental framework of life in cosmic scale. It has made the triumphal conquest over human and all living beings and their whole abode (earth and cosmos) with epistemological and technological regime. The conquest of nature and exploitation of her resources, the pollution and destruction of earth and the climate change are only symptoms of the global dominance of the technocratic regime. Human society in modern times  has created technocracy; but human beings themselves as well as all living beings are subjugated under the dominance of technocratic regime. The whole life of all living beings is under the reign of the almighty power of technocracy. This power has taken in many different manifestations as symbiotic convergence of the global economic regime, the global military regime and the global cultural hegemony.

Technocracy is the regime through which science and technology dominate the entire society in all its dimensions. It governs not only the natural world, but economic, social, political and cultural life as well. Today the social sciences and social engineering are also integral parts of this global technocracy, permeating the whole world and universe. Cultural sciences such as anthropology, media and communications, education and arts are also integrated into technocratic or tedchnetronic regime. The technocratic powers manipulate global and national political systems according to the interests of the capital market and global hegemony.

1.    The hunger and poverty and economic violence under the global capitalist market regime

The global industrialization that began in the West has integrated the technocratic advances and applied them through the global economic regime. The inherent greed of capital – its appetite for maximum profit through unlimited growth of the industrial economy and the casino market of global financial capital – has “totalized” the global market economy and the entire earth. The consequences of the neo-liberal global market are hunger, poverty and disease caused by the endless exploitation of natural and human resources and destruction of natural economies of life. An economy of life for all living beings is impossible under such total economic disorder, which is beyond control.

2.    The mighty global military regime of total and permanent war

The technocracy has created a global military regime, based on cyber warfare and weapons systems of mass destruction, which is integrated into the global geo-political hegemonic military regime. The history of war and military destruction, including World Wars I and II, has led to a permanent war system that could easily bring omni-cidal war and the destruction of all life. But all such war-making processes are justified in the name of “peace and security.” The most powerful nations currently are pushing their nuclear arms race and development of advanced weapons of mass destruction in our East Asia and West Asia. In the eyes of the global empire, China and the Islamic world are the most intransigent blocks to peace and security. The “Asian pivot” strategy of the United States will bring about a major shift of geopolitical rivalry, to Asia and the Pacific. This is a mammoth geo-political crisis for the 21^st century.

3.    The global cultural regime of hegemony

Western technocracy has taken triumphant control through a process of conquest over Earth and all its living beings.  Western science and technology have eroded Asian cultures to the extent that Asian religions, ethnic identities and cultures that value life have been denigrated and sometimes discarded. Modern civilization, with its neo-liberal global market and global regime of military hegemony undergirded by the Western technocracy, is unsustainable even in the cultural dimension. The global regime of information, communication and media, being intertwined with the technocracy, has colonized the whole cultural order, controlling information, communication and media, and governing the perceptions and values of human community. The global cyber process and audio-visual media should have created a cultural order to serve the community and nation, but instead they have eroded our life-protecting cultures and religions, and reduced the beauty and value of life.

4.     The technocratic thrust to conquer and exploit the earth and its beings has created the civilizational crisis of global ecocide (ecological destruction).

All living beings in the eco-sphere are condemned to conquest by human civilization:  they suffer the fate of pollution, poisoning, genetic manipulation and destruction. Subjugated to the profits-first market machine, living beings are destroyed and their rich biodiversity is lost. Unnatural disasters caused by human tampering with the environment, cause massive damage to the abode of life on earth.

Climate change, biotech modifications such as genetic manipulation, and nuclear fission technology are some examples of this ecocide. The technocracy is currently working to create “trans-human” beings through the convergence of diverse technologies (artificial intelligence, cybernetics, information and communication, nanotechnology and synthetic biology). This new “superhuman being” would redefine all natural human beings as “disabled” beings.

Thus, today’s signs of the times indicate that all living beings are now subject to limitless exploitation by the mammonic greed of the global market, to brutal violence and wars by the global military regime, to cultural hegemony by the global powers, and to technocratic conquest of Mother Earth. Certainly these constitute a grave civilizational crisis.

21^st century may be an Asian century? A century for a new civilization?

Asian has been the cradle for the birth of major world religions and of several civilizations. East Asia, South Asia and West Asia have been birth places of world religions, which are still flourished with rich cultural and religious traditions and civilizational heritages. Central Asia has been an ARCHE of religiosity and spirituality for Asian people and Southeast Asia has been rich gardens of religio-cultural wisdom of life for all living beings. Asia is an abode of all living beings in infinite diversity and peoples in many colored, multi-racial, multi cultural and multi- religious complex, where many civilization mutations took place.

However, Asian history for the past three centuries has been marred by the Western political colonial domination and oppression, economic and commercial exploitation and marketization, and military conquest and domination, cultural penetration and erosion. Christianity has been an integral part of this history of the Western domination. After the WW II the Asian nations and peoples suffered the Cold and Hot Wars. Asian nation states have emulated the “modernization” in political, economic and cultural life, emulating the Western civilization.

Asia is Coming of New Age for New Civilization of Life for All Living Beings on Earth!

From the last century Asian peoples’ struggles for national liberation were not merely political projects of independence and liberation, simple economic projects of modern economy or emulating projects of the modern Western cultures. They are projects to overcome the Western powers of domination and to reclaim and restore their rich historical heritages to forge a creative convergence with the Western civilization. The West looks like the West in Asia; and yet is not a mere replica of the West. It has distinct Asian character of its own. It has embarked consciously and unconsciously a new way for new civilization to open a horizon of new civilization of life for all living beings. Asia is still Asia. But Asia seeks to be New Asia. All living beings are creative sovereign subjects of life together in Asia as well as in all places on earth. This is the foundation of Asia.

Christianity in the 21^st Century in Asian Perspective

Christianity is also an Asian religion in the West Asia, geographically and culturally. Asian Christian community has a long history and heritage (John England et al); and yet it has been overshadowed by the Western Christian mission in the last two centuries. (Kenneth Latourette, History of Mission….)

However, Asian Christianity has distinct characteristics and dynamism. It is not an established religion within kingdoms, nations and empires. It is free of political regimes. It is similar to a pre-Constantinian Christianity in terms of its social and political locations, and it is therefore easy to be linked with the early Christian community, once free from of colonial dependency upon the Western Christianity. The Western Christianity has been “established” religion with principalities and powers that be, imperial and national political, symbiotically fused with the power of the capitalist market regime and with the cultural establishment such as modern technocracy.

It is a distinct characteristic that Asian Christian communities have been in rich intercultural and interreligious encounters and dialogues, experiencing creative and complex convergences with Asian cultural and religious traditions from its beginning and throughout history, bearing rich fruits. This history has been overshadowed thus far. Once free from the Western ecclesial “bondage”, however, Asian Christianity can rediscover rich Christian harvests of wisdom for the life together (Oikonomia Convivencia). This is freedom of Asian Christianity, open for creativity through convergence with Asian wisdom of life contained in many and diverse Asian religious and cultural traditions.

Even in demographic terms for the next decades Asian communities will grow substantially and rapidly in many different places and in many different modes in Asia. Christian population in Indonesia, India and South Korea has the substance and number, which can shape the future of Asia Christianity. Especially notable is the vitality and growth of Christian population in China and central Asia. Some predicted that in the first quarter of the 21^st century Asian Christian population may be larger than the rest of the world Christian population.

In terms of sociological location education level of Asian Christian population is most outstanding and the quality of their faith and life and their social and cultural leadership will be substantially enhanced to play decisive roles in their societies and in Asia community as a whole.

I believe that the very future of world Christianity might be carried on the shoulders of the Asian Christian movement, together with the African Christian churches. At the present the Indonesian churches are the largest Christian community, with the richest heritages in history, culture and religious life. Vitality of Asian Christianity is especially remarkable. Growth of Chinese Christian community and its development such as in the reconstruction of Chinese theology is to be highly estimated. In this context Asian ecumenical movement might have a special role in meeting challenges of the world. It is to open a path to a horizon for new civilization of life in fullness.

Now the question is “What is the Future of the Earth and all its Living beings? What are Challenges to Faith Communities in Asia and in the World

The living words of Jesus ring in our hearts and in the hearts of our faith communities: “ I have come to give you life in its fullness.” (John 10:10)  The Kairotic vision of new heaven and new earth and the new city of life therein has been granted given to all the faithful, inviting all nations and peoples to participate and enjoy the feast of life, overcoming the powers of death and destruction. This vision of new life has been given to nations under Roman empire and now it is being revitalized for the present world. [1]

We confess, therefore,  that Jesus the Messiah is the Life of the World,[2] as Jesus proclaimed, “I am the Life.”[3] Jesus is the eschatological pivot (T’aigeuk (太極) – the Messianic feast of life. Jesus is the Omega point of life of all living beings.

This vision is the ultimate ground of our hope for new heaven, new earth, and new community of conviviality (feast of life). This is the ground of imagination and passion for new civilization to overcome the current civilization. In our faith we are firmly grounded in Jesus, who is Life - the Omega Point of the civilization of life.

Through this scope we read the Bible as the text of the wisdom of life to meet Jesus the Life of the World, who liberates all living beings from the powers of death and destruction; to worship the Creator of Life, who has covenanted with us as the creative partner of all living beings on earth; and to accept the Spirit as the Sustaining Power and Energy of Life throughout the entire cosmos, that is, the Womb and Household of Life. This vision we may want to call as ‘OIKONOMIA CONVIVENCIA’ for all living beings in the cosmos(OIKOS).

Through this scope we also visit all traditions of life in search for the wisdom of life which the God of Life has provided throughout the cosmic history of all living beings. It is in this context that we read the religious traditions of our people as well as ethnic and cultural traditions in search for wisdom of life (Zoesophia). Our search for wisdom of life will be immensely rich and profound, for we see through the Scope of Jesus the Pivot (Taegeuk: 太極) of Oikonomia Convivencia and the Omega Point of Life. Our journey toward a new civilization of life for all living beings on earth leads to paths of rich wisdom of life.

The Story of the Life of All Living Beings in the Cosmos(Oikos) = ZOEGRAPHY

“Zoegraphy” is a story of the whole life of all living beings. It is a story of wisdom of life. It is wholistic and integral study, against reductionist, fragmentary logic or its objectivistic composites. It is a story of life in contrast to technocratic dictates that control, manipulate govern the universe. Zoegraphy is a living story, not an objective description, of living beings. It is a story of living wisdom. It is a rich story of traditional reservoirs of such wisdom, contained in cultures and religions of the people and in the lives of all living beings.

Some contours of the Wisdom of Life:

1.    All living beings are subjects of the life together(OIKONOMIA CONVIVENCIA), blessed by God to live together in fullness on earth. This is the ground of direct participation of all living beings in their livelihood. This is the Messianic politics in which peoples, nations and all other living beings as sovereign subjects participate in the feast of life in the Oikos (cosmos) of life.

2.    The economy of life together (convivial life – Oikonomia Convivencia) in self-reliance, justice and mutuality is grounded in the Sabbath and the Jubilee economy.  All resources are commons for all living beings to share.

3.    Whole and healthy life is blessed, as all living beings are their own preservers and healers of their bodies in person, community and ecology. Rich wisdom for healthy and whole life is found in the story of life in Asian traditions.

4.    Peace and security of life is the fundamental order, based upon justice and the right to life of living beings. This is the Biblical meaning of Shalom and also of T’aiping (great peace). Food, housing, clothing, health, education, environmental protection and cultural life are fundamentals of life for all living beings.

5.    Life in fullness means that all living beings are cultural subjects of beauty, values and communion (communication). Creative arts and values are fundamental for the enjoyment of life (Fiesta of Life).

6.    Life should be free from violence and war, from political domination, from economic exploitation and robbery, and from military conquest and destruction. All living beings are peace makers based upon the covenant of justice and conviviality.

7.    The cosmos (heaven and earth) is the common abode (household) of all living beings, who are co-workers in sustaining the ecological order of life for themselves (OIKONOMIA CONVIVENCIA). Technocratic engineering will not be the solution for the health of the earthly and cosmic Oikos.

8.    All living beings are spiritual beings and partners who worship God and enjoy their spiritual fellowship. This is an ultimate fellowship of all living beings. All religions converge in spiritual life and in ultimate values.

The story of life(Zoegraphy) in East Asia is called as that of Samgsaeing(相生), “Ubutu” in Africa, “Hidup Bersama” in Indonesia and conviviality in English. I am calling this as that of “OIKONOMIA CONVIVENCIA”.

Ecumenical Praxis of Hope for New Civilization among Asian Peoples

The fundamental shortcomings and problems of the Western technocracy can be resolved through the creative process of convergence of the Asian and African other traditional wisdom of life with the Western scientific knowledge and technologies. This may be a creative gateway for a new civilizational horizon. Asian Christian communities and Asian peoples must assess this route of new civilization through internal and external convergence of civilizations, religious and cultural traditions and wisdom of life for all living beings.

Christian communities of New Life in Asia need to link the New Life in Christ clearly and concretely with the struggles for new life of the people in their stories and in their religious, cultural and philosophical traditions. This may be a major missiological and theological task of Asian Christian communities for the praxis of New Life. This may be the way for Christian communities to share their wisdom in Christ with the peoples of Asia, and to inject it into the life of the people and their aspirations, even as Christian communities share the sufferings of the Asian people.  Western progressive thought often has given strong influence to the struggles of peoples in Asia, even though generally Western thought has underestimated Asian peoples’ religious and cultural traditions. Due to the Western colonial influences in Asia, Western thought, being closely associated with the colonial, imperial and economic powers, has functioned negatively in the life of Asian peoples.  Our proposal is for a multi-religious, multi-cultural ecumenical methodology, including linkage between religious and secular, for the praxis of new life. This methodology is not merely for the Asian Christian communities, but for the whole global Christian community. For the praxis of new life should be done in the context of globalization.

OIKONOMIA CONVIVENCIA: The Political Economy of Life in the New Heaven and New Earth Is the New Garden of Life (OIKONOMIA TOU ZOEè Economy of Life).

In the light of the Biblical narrative of the political economy of life (Oikonomia Convivencia), alternatives to the current globalization system may be considered in terms of ways and means to overcome the power of this greed and to transform the global market into the Garden of Life.

The Praxis of Jubilee Economy for the Asian Peoples in the Context of Globalization

Since the praxis of hope is a Kairotic action, or a Messianic movement of the people, we need to deal with the issue of globalization, which is profoundly influencing the life, nations and peoples on earth.

We have already noted the globalized market and its impact, namely, the radical geo-political shift that is erecting a framework of globalized civilization in which the Modern West will dominate. Globalization of capital has made drastic changes in people’s economic life, victimizing most of the peoples in the world, even in the midst of global economic growth. Political institutions, national and local, are seriously weakened; and people are becoming more and more helpless and passive. The market-driven competition is bringing about a new social Darwinism, a correlate of Neo-liberalism, intensifying social violence, and undermining human and life security nets. Market- driven cultural life threatens the cultural identities and values of individuals and communities, and even it is experiencing chaos in the aesthetic life of the people. Religious heritages and wisdom are eroded in the globalization process. The ecological crisis is not merely the question of nature, but challenges the whole of life, human and natural.

A Just and Healthy Life:  Against Starvation, Hunger and Poverty

Economy has undergone its historical development with mixed and paradoxical blessings for life. OIKOS + NOMOS = OIKONOMIA. Originally, economy meant the human activity of caring for life in the home and in the garden. 경세제민 (經世濟民) is the East Asian notion of economy, which means “caring for the people according to canonical scriptures.”

Human greed, manifested in many different forms, has caused starvation, hunger and poverty as the economy has grown and developed into new stages. Riches have been amassed by the powerful in each stage of human history. Now the power of global capital and its transnational corporate institutions dominates the emerging global market. Their monopoly of science and technology enables them to have almost unlimited power and influence, beyond any control. In recent years, money and financial power are victimizing the people mercilessly. All exchanges and dealings among peoples are controlled by the global market agencies so as to satisfy the insatiable greed of capital. Profit maximization and absolute control are the goals of their game.

New life in the cosmos demands a new economic justice. A true OIKONOMIA needs to be articulated according to the needs of life on earth. Now, economy is separated from other dimensions of earth-life. This situation must be overcome through a life-enhancing concept of economy. The orientation toward growth and profit maximization should be transformed, in support of local communities with self-reliant, self-sufficient resources of economic wellbeing and economic justice, based in the “glocal” situation.

A Life of Peace:  Against War and Destruction of Life

Human history has been a history of war among human groups and against nature. Some hold the view that civilization has developed through the process of creating weapons of war. The 20^th century experienced the two World Wars; and now science and technology, with its cybernetic and technetronic developments, has enabled humans to engage in total, omnipotent wars to destroy human and cosmic life in its totality.

A new life demands a matrix of security for the peace of life as a whole, one that is capable of overcoming wars at local, national, regional, international and global levels. Comprehensive peace movements with effective study and praxis on all levels are needed for a new life on earth.

The Biblical vision for peace and life and its ecumenical manifestations in Asia and the world will generate hope and imagination for a new, eternal life in the cosmos.

A Life of Direct and Common Participation in Convivial Networks:  Against Oppression

Political institutions have oppressed the people in many different ways.  Nations and peoples have suffered despotism, autocratic rule, imperial domination, national totalitarianism, state dictatorship, military dictatorship, religious-political symbiosis, colonialism and ideologically rigid rules in many different forms. Western liberal democracy has not brought about the full participation of the people. It enhanced liberal political rights such as human rights and other individual political freedoms, but it also opened the door for the powerful and the rich to dominate the weak and the poor. Recent neo-liberal developments are a sequel to liberal political democracy. Liberal tradition has failed to control either the global market or national markets.

Globalization has made political boundaries of nation states and national security measures obsolete to an increasing degree. Already we have experienced the domination of the super powers; and now transnational corporate powers override all conceivable boundaries that may inhibit their activities. The nation state no longer fully represents the people, preserving and securing their sovereignty. Often it succumbs to the power of transnational agencies and corporate entities.

The people themselves demand direct participation and involvement in the global market, as well as radical democratization of the existing political institutions. For this, they must realize their political selfhood at the local, national, regional and global levels.

Such democratization will require a local-national-regional-global network of participation and solidarity that is commensurate in strength with the global powers and principalities. We will need new political institutions on all levels for glocal participation and solidarity across the boundaries set by the dominant powers. That is, we need a new vision of ecumenical politics for new life on earth.

In fact, a radically new political process of direct participation and solidarity networking is coming into being all around the world. This may be the only way to control and overcome the tyranny and domination of despotism, military dictatorships, imperial and colonial powers, and transnational corporate powers.

Life of Shalom (Secure Well-being with Justice):  Against Social Conflict and Violence

Human history has revealed itself as a jungle where the strong eat the weak and the fittest alone can survive. This process as been manifested in social relations in many different ways. The classical contradictions have appeared where ethnic or racial, class or caste, gender or social-status differences have formed the vortex of social violence. In this jungle there is no justice, no community, no cooperation and no peace.

Globalization has brought a new social process, dictated by the so-called new social Darwinism, in which new conflicts and contradictions, such as between information haves and have-nots, are emerging. Injustice is deepening; and the intensity of conflicts is mounting, to cause greater violence and its cyclical acceleration. Social justice, social security, social peace and social reconciliation are being redesigned in a global process whereby neo-liberal ideology leads people to worship competition. In this ideology the victor is glorified regardless of the means or ways used. The people need a new approach for common living in all their local, national and global communities.

Welfare state social security systems, as well as socialist state social security systems, must be transformed to establish dynamic human community based in justice, peace and harmony. The prerequisite for this may be people’s participation in their local community, as such participation is closely connected with the network of common human security throughout the world.

A Life of Rich Meaningfulness and Fine Beauty:  Against Desertification of Cultural Life

Culture is the soul of civilization. It is the art of common life, through which the people attain their identity, value orientation, aesthetic sensibility, and enjoyment of life. Culture is the art of common life in the cosmos. Culture gives people their perceptual apparatus and orientation of understanding. Culture is the reservoir of the wisdom of life of people in the cosmos.

Globalization has greatly affected the cultures of the peoples and nations of the world, through its accelerating use of technetronics and cybernetics, along with high-tech information and communication.

Ethnic, national and cultural identities—the inner core of life in community throughout the cosmos—are being radically eroded by the impact of globalization. Those affected most are the powerless and marginalised ethnic and national communities.

People’s perceptions, value orientations and world-views are being warped by hi-tech media and communications, dictated largely by the global market forces. Mammonism and consumerism, materialism and hedonism are spreading in the minds and hearts of peoples around the world.  Likewise, hi-tech communications and cybernetic informatics are bringing rapid changes to markets, politics and social processes. What is “beautiful” is redefined in terms of the market-oriented pleasure mechanism; and knowledge is reduced to the level of technical know-how.

Culture, the spiritual home of life, contains the wisdom of life in the cosmos. Spirituality is the vital energy of life. Culture and spirituality are eroded in the globalization process. Modern philosophy, science and technology have reduced and uprooted our spiritual core of life, reducing it to rationality.

The religious dimension of culture, and therefore of life, has been eradicated at its root. Religions are the substance of civilizations, and cultures are forms in which religious truths and spirituality find expression. Modernity has reduced religion to the minimum of what is rational, and suppressed the spiritual mystery of life in the name of rationality. The suppression of religious vitality has been detrimental to the vitality of life.

It is most worrisome that the global market will increasingly be exchanging cultural commodities, which may occupy the main market process. Globalization commercializes popular, mass and indigenous cultures into market commodities. This is causing various problems such as homogenization, cultural desertification, identity crises, and drastic injustices in terms of the cultural powers of communication and information. As information becomes a commodity for the market, information gaps will seriously affect the balance of power, replacing the economic gap between rich and poor.

There is, in the local communities, a demand for new cultural movement that is truly life enhancing. The Asian civilizations enshrine great religious truths and their manifestations, which may the wellspring of wisdom and resources of new life of the people of the cosmos. The Asian civilization may be the cradle of a new global civilization that can counter the current cultural process under the dictates of globalization. Cultural creativity is very much demanded for this new life, not for profit in the market.

A Life of Conviviality in the Macro- and Micro-Cosmos:  Against the Destruction of Life

Modernity has created a fatal split between life in human community and life in nature. It has further reduced the reality of life to bio-chemical processes. This is the epitome of modern reductionism’s understanding of life.

The industrial civilization, based on modern science and technology, has sought progress by conquering the natural forces, thereby creating the current environmental destruction process. Unless the fundamental paradigm of the industrial economy and its civilizational assumptions are radically altered and transformed, there can be no solution to the ecological crisis. The fundamental attitude of modernity is also present in the life sciences. A prime example is the genetic modification methodology in food production, which consistently practices reduction and domination of life, and

seriously threatens the process of life as a whole.

Life is a whole. Life is to be cared for as the Garden of Life. Gardening of life demands respect for life in the cosmos, in its integrity and its entirety. To enhance life in the cosmos we need an entirely new paradigm of life that overcomes the understanding of life as the object of manipulation. Life must prosper, against damnation by death and destruction.

A Life of Bliss in Celebration:  Against a Life of Curse and Tragedy

The peak bliss of life is to glorify God and enjoy life with God. The foundation of such bliss and celebration of life is based upon faith in God. God has made the covenant of life in Shalom. Life is life when it overcomes the power of death. Life is true life when it has the eternal dimension. Life is truly life when it is fulfilled in a whole and full life. This is the foundation of new life according to the Biblical teachings. This reality of blissful life should be realized on this earth in a Kairotic way. This is the beginning and the culmination of the study of life.

The above and more dimensions of new life may be converging in the dynamic movement of all living beings as a whole.

A Concluding Word: from Unity to Convergence

Ecumenical Discourse may be re-composed as a discourse for creative “comic (OIKOKOS) convergences for creative paths of Zoesophia (Wisdom of Life) toward the OMEGA POINT OF LIFE for a new civilization of life, testified in the Jesus the Messiah of New Life in New Heaven and New Earth.

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[1] Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. ²And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. ³And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘See, the home^* of God is among mortals. He will dwell^* with them; they will be his peoples,^*and God himself will be with them;^* 4 he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more;mourning and crying and pain will be no more,for the first things have passed away.’(Revelations 21:1~4)

[2] WCC General Assembly theme in 1983.

[3] The Messianic Movement of Jesus and the early Christian community has created a universal movement, connecting the local, national, global and cosmic dimensions. i. The Reign of God to which Jesus has born witness is the foundation and ground of movement as he has proclaimed in Luke 4. Jesus as the Christ (Messiah) of the people is the direct manifestation of God’s Reign. Therefore, Jesus himself and his cross and resurrection are the foundation of the movement for the life of the people of God as well as his deeds, words and ministry. The community of new covenant is that of Jesus the Messiah of the people. This is the community of faith and hope in the eternal life. ii. The Spirit is the power and energy of imagination, which works dynamically in the life, and koinonia of the early church. The early church suffered various persecutions of “cross,” just as Jesus suffered. The community has had hope in the resurrection of the Messiah, whose Spirit energizes the community for the struggle. The Messianic praxis of Jesus is manifested in the spiritual movement of the early Christian community.