nuclear-news

Fewer nuclear weapons, but we are still not safer?

I think there’s a flaw in this argument . It sounds a bit like the USA pro-gun argument “Guns don’t kill people – people kill people”. But in fact USA has so many homicides, in which if just fists or a non-gun weapon had been used, death would not result. The wide possession of guns means a greater rate of violent deaths in USA. Are you saying that “Nuclear weapons don’t kill people. The person pressing the nuclear button kills people”. Therefore nuclear weapons in themselves are “innocent”?

BC’s Tales of the Pacific: Marshall Islands sues nuclear powers http://www.mvariety.com/cnmi/cnmi-news/editorials/67603-bc-s-tales-of-the-pacific-marshall-islands-sues-nuclear-powers, July 28, 2014 By BC Cook 

BACK in the 1950s the Marshall Islands experienced massive destruction and radiation as the island nation hosted hundreds of nuclear bomb tests.

The United States sponsored most of these tests, though other nations exploded bombs there and throughout the Pacific region. You might assume a current lawsuit filed by the Marshall Islands against the U.S. and eight other nuclear powers has to do with demanding compensation for the testing. But you would be wrong. They are suing in U.S. court and in the World Court at the Hague, Netherlands. What do they want?

So the Marshall Islands is calling them out on the hollowness of their lofty promises. The Marshallese are saying, in effect, “Put your money where your mouth is. You talk a good game but don’t live up to your own hype.”They want the world to disarm its nuclear weapons. Come again? Well, the nine nations named in the lawsuits all signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1968. Part of that treaty committed the signatories to rid the world of nuclear weapons for good, but none of the countries has made any move in that direction. Talks were supposed to have been held, deals were to be made, agreements reached. And while some of those things came to pass we still have huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons.

It is not likely that anything will come of the lawsuits, not in terms of actual change. It is interesting to note, however, that there are fewer nuclear weapons in the world than there were in the Sixties, by a large margin. So the nuclear powers could claim that they have, in fact, greatly reduced the number of nuclear weapons in the world, just as they promised they would. The problem is that none of us feels much safer than they did back then. Why?

Because war and violence are still everywhere. There is constant strife in the world. We all feel like we could be swept up in the violence at any time: a terrorist strike here, a rebellion there, jets being shot out of the sky for simply being in the wrong place. And since the second world war atomic and nuclear bombs have come to symbolize everything wrong with the world we live in, our inability to get along with each other.

I am reminded of a scene in the Terminator movies when children are seen playing war with toy guns. In a profound moment of clarity, a machine explains to a person why humanity is doomed. He says it is in our nature to destroy ourselves. Take away the nuclear weapons and we will find another way to kill each other.

So a lawsuit has been filed, arguments will be had, promises will be made and broken, and people will go on dying. Was the machine right? Can we save ourselves? BC Cook, PhD teaches Pacific history and other subjects at St. Charles Community College. He lived on Saipan and has taught at universities in the U.S., including the University of Missouri.

July 28, 2014 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general