This event is co-sponsored by Global Minnesota!

Annie Jacobsen’s 2024 bestseller, Nuclear War: A Scenario describes second by second how the launch of a single nuclear weapon could end up destroying civilization in 72 minutes. This new book by Timmon Wallis describes a second by second scenario that leads, instead, to the complete elimination of these weapons – before it’s too late. Maybe not as gripping as an account of nuclear war unfolding in real time, but absolutely essential reading for all who want to avoid one.

Timmon Wallis is a former Executive Director of Nonviolent Peaceforce, founded in the Twin Cities and currently working in 10 countries to protect civilians caught up in violence and armed conflict. He is currently Executive Director of NuclearBan.US, working to build support in the US for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Timmon was directly involved in the negotiations at the UN which led to this treaty, and which won his colleagues in the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize.

Thomas Hanson is a former U.S. Foreign Service Officer with the Department of State whose diplomatic postings included East Germany, France, Norway, the Soviet Union, Sweden, and the former Soviet Republic of Georgia. He also participated in the opening of new U.S. embassies in Mongolia and Estonia, worked on the Foreign Relations Committees of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, and served as Director for NATO and European Affairs at the Atlantic Council of the United States in Washington, D.C.

Mr. Hanson currently is Diplomat in Residence at the Alworth Institute for International Affairs at the University of Minnesota – Duluth and has taught diplomacy at Carleton College. He also serves as Chair of the Minnesota Committee on Foreign Relations and as Co-Chair of the Minnesota International Business Council. He is a past board member of the Oslo Center for Peace and Human Rights and Director at the Institute for Eastern Europe and Central Asia (IEECA). He is also a member of the U.S. Foreign Policy Working Group of the British International Studies Association (BISA) as well as the Council of Advisers at the Museum of Russian Art and the Minnesota Peace Initiative (MPI) at Norway House.

As a member of the Great Decisions speakers bureau of Global Minnesota, Mr. Hanson speaks frequently on international issues and contributes to local and international media.

Mr. Hanson holds a BA degree from the University of Minnesota and graduate degrees from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy; the Institute of Advanced International Studies in Geneva, Switzerland; and the National School of Administration (ENA) in Paris, France.