An Urgent Call

June 9, 2002 5:27 PM

An Urgent Call to end The Growing Nuclear Peril. "A DECADE after the end of the cold war, the peril of nuclear destruction is mounting. The great powers have refused to give up nuclear arms, other countries are producing them and terrorist groups are trying to acquire them. THE DRIFT TOWARD catastrophe must be reversed. Safety from nuclear destruction must be our goal. We can reach it only by reducing and then eliminating nuclear arms under binding agreements." Includes articles, lists of protests and rallies and links to disarmament groups.
posted by homunculus (10 comments total)

Remember: All you need is a binding agreement from a terrorist group...

I'll be happy to encourage my country (the USA) to disarm.

You go first.
posted by hadashi at 5:32 PM on June 9, 2002

Remember: All you need is a binding agreement from a terrorist group...

Right. Nukes are such great deterrents against terrorists and the nations that support them. That's why the nuclear powers like Russia, Israel, the United States, India and Pakistan never have any problems with terrorism.

Properly disarming the cold war arsenals would reduce the likelihood of a terrorist or rogue nation getting a hold of one. That makes a lot more sense to me than hoping to stop them with border guards
posted by srboisvert at 6:42 PM on June 9, 2002

Nearly any nation can design and build its own nukes. Many people already believe Iran and Iraq have nukes. The only thing stopping them from using them is the fear of retaliation. Unlike terrorism where you can hide the culprits, if someone launches a nuke, we would know who. Its because we have a nuclear arsenal that we aren't already a smoldering crater.

We have half a dozen countries that would love to see us gone. Instead they must resort terrorism, which while horrible, has no where near the death toll of say a nuke hitting New York.
posted by madmanz123 at 7:09 PM on June 9, 2002

It never ceases to amaze me how many people persist in believing we can wish away ugly truths.

I'll put my faith in holding a real big stick over mutual promises to play nice.
posted by John Smallberries at 7:28 PM on June 9, 2002

The genie is out of the bottle. You'll never get it back in. A better approach might be something that builds on MAD. That is an agreement between nations not to use nuclear weapons with a STRONG, explicit understanding that any nation that does use nukes would face complete and total retaliation from all other nations.

The problem is that there seems to be a trend toward viewing nukes as limited tactical weapons. It won't take care of the terrorists. Nothing is ever going to take care of that. Still, countries like India and Pakistan would have to think twice if they understood that using nukes in even a limited capacity would lead to their entire peoples and land being removed from the planet.

Still, while you're dreaming, why don't you think about ways we can dissolve nations entirely. I'm not sure that nationalism and patriotism has ever contributed anything good to the world. Nations as an extension of their people, yes, but nationalism, no. The only problem is how do you bring it about, and what do you replace it with? Corporations (the most likely replacement) clearly seem like a bad route.
posted by willnot at 7:33 PM on June 9, 2002

John Smallberries: It never ceases to amaze me how many people persist in believing we can wish away ugly truths.

In related news, leading authors have named 17th-Century Spanish story Don Quixote as the best work of fiction ever written. You have to admit, A nuclear bomb is closer to a dragon than a windmill is.

I'll put my faith in holding a real big stick over mutual promises to play nice.

Unfortunately, many of the people we need to worry about are convinced that if we hit them with our big radioactive stick, it will send them to paradise. MAD doesn't work with that mentality.

willnot: I'm not sure that nationalism and patriotism has ever contributed anything good to the world. The only problem is how do you bring it about, and what do you replace it with?

I'm fond of the ideal of the cosmopolitan myself.
posted by homunculus at 11:39 PM on June 9, 2002

"binding agreement"

= military intelligence, business ethics, jumbo shrimp.

Rotsa ruck...
posted by jfuller at 6:28 AM on June 10, 2002

Unfortunately, many of the people we need to worry about are convinced that if we hit them with our big radioactive stick, it will send them to paradise. MAD doesn't work with that mentality.

No, but preemptive [non-nuclear] strikes work. And if the worst comes, and the US is not destroyed in a nuclear strike and retaliates in whatever devastating fashion against a sponsor state, while there is a high cost, that's one less country that will be allowing terrorists to operate within its borders. I suspect that will lead to other nations sponsoring terrorism to reconsider. Where will terrorists base themselves when nations realize that harboring terrorists is akin to dancing on the very edge of a precipice?
posted by dissent at 7:17 AM on June 10, 2002

Assuming we know which state was the sponsor, or that it was a willing sponsor. But it would be inexcusably stupid to let it come to that. I have to agree with Buchanan on this, there is simply nothing over there worth provoking that scenario for.

"There must have been a moment, at the beginning, when we could have said 'no'. But we missed it somehow."
- Rosencrantz or Guildenstern (quoted from memory)
posted by homunculus at 11:01 AM on June 10, 2002

Assuming we know which state was the sponsor, or that it was a willing sponsor. But it would be inexcusably stupid to let it come to that. I have to agree with Buchanan on this, there is simply nothing over there worth provoking that scenario for.


The problem is, there's no guarantee of safety in withdrawal, only the assurance that our enemies will be able to operate and plan without hindrance...

The magic moment is gone, I'm afraid.
posted by dissent at 11:11 AM on June 10, 2002