(C) Common Dreams
This story was originally published by Common Dreams and is unaltered.
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Opinion | Nuclear Weapons Are Not a Fact of Life [1]
['Beatrice Fihn']
Date: 2024-12-26
It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the growing risk of nuclear war today. Russia is making regular nuclear threats. America is undertaking a large-scale nuclear modernization program. China is increasing its nuclear arsenal. Tensions are escalating between nuclear-armed states.
But nuclear weapons are not an inevitable fact of human life. They are not impossible to get rid of, and pushing for that can be done by ordinary people like you and me.
Precedent exists for solving the problem of weapons of mass destruction. At one point, the United States and the Soviet Union, then Russia, together had over 70,000 tons of chemical weapons. But on July 7, 2023, the United States announced it had destroyed the last of its chemical weapon stockpiles, under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention. Russia declared it had done so a few years earlier.
When nations violate such treaties — such as when Syria, a party to the treaty, used chemical weapons in 2018 — they see little benefit but can quickly bring on international condemnation. Syria’s strategic position didn’t suddenly improve because it employed a weapon of mass destruction. The world perceives chemical and biological weapons as very dangerous but not as a source of power.
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[1] Url:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/26/opinion/nuclear-weapons.html
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