Issue date: 9/10/01 Section: Campus News

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When Helen Caldicott was 15 years old, she read a book that eventually changed her life.

The name of the book was “On the Beach.” It told the story of a nuclear bomb that killed everyone in the world, except for people living in Melvin, Australia, where Caldicott lived. But eventually, people there got sick and died too.

Caldicott, a pediatrician who has been involved in the anti-nuclear weapon movement for 30 years, will speak as part of the Forum series. She will discuss why she disagrees with the administration of George W. Bush on a policy of nuclear arms.

“I don’t think I’ve seen such an evil administration in my life,” said the 63-year-old Calidcott, in a telephone interview with The Spectator from her home in Australia.

Bush is controlled by corporate and military leaders, she said. She is especially frightened by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who she called “a really scary individual..”

“(Bush) is just a little puppet on a string,” Caldicott said.

Bush is an advocate of a nuclear missile defense system that would be able to shoot down nuclear missiles in the atmosphere, said Ali Abootalebi, assistant professor of political science.

Opponents of the plan claim that it violates the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missiles Treaty, and that it sends a message to other countries that having nuclear weapons is OK, he said.

“That, in a nutshell, is going to lead to a new nuclear arms race,” Abootalebi said. He said threats to the security of the United States aren’t from Russia or China, as some people commonly believe.

Dangers are more likely from smaller countries like North Korea, Iraq and Iran in the future, he said.

Caldicott travels between her native Australia and the United States. She helped found Physicians for Social Responsibility, a group of health care professionals who fight against nuclear power.

She also worked at Harvard Medical School, where she taught pediatrics, and on the staff of Children’s Hospital Medical Center in Boston until 1980. She left after deciding to devote herself entirely to preventing nuclear war. Caldicott said she plans to run for a seat in the Australian Senate as a candidate for the Our Common Future Party in the upcoming election. She has written four books, and is working on her fifth book, titled “The New Nuclear Danger: George W. Bush’s Military-Industrial Psychosis and Its Tragic Consequences.”

Calidcott said she likes speaking to college students, because they are the ones who will work toward change in the future. She said she is encouraged by student protests against the World Bank, and that students need to realize how many tax dollars go to the Pentagon.

“Most countries want to abolish nuclear weapons,” Caldicott said. “The one that’s holding it up is the United States.”

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