The rogue states of North Korea and Iran especially the latter I have always said could never be trusted seeing that she is still engaged in clandestine nuclear-weapons research and development. She has always told the world that there is no military dimension to her nuclear programme a claim which the western powers especially the United States refutes. Only last week the cat was let out of the bag that Iran is still hell-bent of building the bomb under President Hassan Rouhani.
Be that as it may, we see the Big-5 namely Russia, China, France, UK and the US either rebuilding or upgrading their nuke arsenals while other nuclear states like North Korea, Israel , India and Pakistan closely following suit. Taking a trip down memory lane two B-29 jet bombers on August 6 and 9 1945 , we were told , flew over Japan dropping missiles equal to 20, 000 tons of TNT each on the two Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki ; the explosive force alone we were told killed over 100,000 people and the effect of the bomb still ravages the region to this day.
It is a thousand pities that the world has still refused to learn from the bitter memories and misery that single incident caused in the Pearl Of The East – Japan. However, I have it on good authority , that the nine nuclear states have over 10,000 nukes in their stockpiles which is more than enough to wipe out all other life forms thereby turning the planet earth to a never-again-to-be inhabited heap of ruins.
While we sue the nuclear states to denuclearize by shifting military planning to conventional response others are busy developing weapons of mass destruction with particular reference to the Islamic Republic of Iran which has been totally undeterred despite crushing sanctions from the West to forgo the bomb.
Hence what is the rationale, if one may ask, behind developing and stockpiling dangerous powerful explosives that now hang over our heads like the ancient sword of Damocles? The United States, for instance, which champions this nuclear non-proliferation crusade has in her nuke stockpile a thermonuclear warhead , designated W88 capable of wiping out New York , Lagos or Moscow and those who might be lucky to survive the huge conflagration would miserably suffer the effect for months and years before giving up the ghost as was the case in the above-named two Japanese cities.
America , the world ethics police together with France, China Russia , UK must first denuclearize their arsenals before extending the campaign to other nuclear states around the world if she is in deed to be taken seriously. The US government has five nuclear submarines on patrol at all times in the high seas carrying 1000 times the destructive power of the Hiroshima bomb. Is it possible to imagine the degree of paranoia represented by such a standing threat?
It remains an open secret at the historic end of the World War 11 , that no fewer than twenty-nine states fought doggedly to remain nuclear-armed but in the course of time eighteen of these countries left this pursuit of its own volition , a well-applauded decision often called the nuclear ”rollback”. What this stands to tell us this day is that countries can be dissuaded from pursuing weapons of mass annihilation when the international community under the leadership of the United States addresses the motivations behind this senseless quest for the bomb.
Conversely, while the campaign for nuclear disarmament is on course , the UK government , reports say , is spending a whooping one hundred billion pounds on rebuilding its Trident fleet of nuclear submarines. Each of these fleets , we understand , has the capacity to incinerate well over forty million people at one blow. A more dangerous situation even stares us ominously in the face as the US and Russia keep over 1,800 nukes on high alert atop long-range ballistic missile. It has become very obvious that the Big-5 pose an intolerable threat to mankind because these weapons could one day either be used by accident or by malicious intent.
However , there is every reason to believe that we already are all walking corpses considering the fact that some abnormal monsters and deranged psychopaths might one day hack into the electronic control systems and carry out the launching of these death machines. The resultant nuclear blast and radio-active fallout would doubtless have global consequences that would kill millions of people, disrupt climate patterns, and threaten global agricultural collapse which would cause nothing short of universal misery.
However, I remain unshaken in my conviction that nuclear weapons are more of an obscenity that should be globally outlawed. They have never and would never do the world any good. The only remedy under the existing circumstances is an enforced world ban on its existence anywhere under the sun. It is very obvious that our security is being threatened and the non-nuclear majority must say ‘NO’ by proceeding independently to enact a treaty outlawing these weapons. Other states which pursue nuclear weapons like the rogue states of Iran and North Korea should be reminded the dangers inherent in putting the survival of humanity in sheer jeopardy all in a senseless bid to feel important and powerful on the world stage. All I crave is a world without weapons and violence.
Iyoha John Darlington , aka Lington Donovan writes from Turin, Italy.
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