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Reality and Nuclear Weapons Elimination13/08/05
http://www.newagebd.com/2005/aug/29/oped.html
The two most brilliant minds of the 20th century had correctly recognised the futility of urging nuclear nations to get rid of their modern weapons or prohibit them in situations of war. Yet, they had pointed to the most plausible solution which will not only avert a nuclear war but also might result in elimination of these dangerous weapons, writes Alamgir Hussain
The devastatingly destructive capacity of nuclear weapons which was manifested in the United States’ dropping of two atomic bombs on the Japanese city of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9 (1945) respectively, has left a morbid fear in the minds of men. Since then a great many campaigns have been launched demanding the abolition of nuclear weapons from our world. However, the call for the total elimination of nuclear weapons has never been as loud as it has been on the event of the just-concluded 60th anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing. The demand for the abolition of nuclear weapons started right after its first use 60 years ago. Amongst an illustrious array of proponents, was 20th century’s greatest scientist and thinker Albert Einstein, who himself had encouraged the United States and United Kingdom to develop it in the early 1930s when Hitler was becoming increasingly menacing prior to the WWII. It appears that the destructive power of the atom bomb had had stunned even Einstein, the major brain behind its creation. Fearing that these weapons might one day destroy the entire human race, Einstein and Bertrand Russell collaborated to write a manifesto on July 9, 1955 (just days before Einstein’s death) whose theme was to abolish nuclear weapons or avoid wars or those will eliminate us, the human race. The resolution of the manifesto, which was signed by nine other mostly Nobel laureates, read: ‘In view of the fact that in any future world war nuclear weapons will certainly be employed, and that such weapons threaten the continued existence of mankind, we urge the governments of the world to realise, and to acknowledge publicly, that their purpose cannot be furthered by a world war, and we urge them, consequently, to find peaceful means for the settlement of all matters of dispute between them.’ Other than the USA and Russia, UK (1952), France (1960), China (1964) and India (1974) became nuclear nations. Pakistan also developed nuclear weapons (1998) whilst Israel is known to have such weapons too. Yet, the worry about the danger of nuclear weapon has never been greater since the so-called rogue and vicarious states, such as Libya, Iraq, Iran and North Korea, etc., have actively sought to develop nuclear weapons or have obtained them already. The recent turbulent events on the world stage, particularly the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the worldwide scourge of Islamic terrorism have naturally given the pacifists strong reasons to make a forceful demand for the abolition of these dangerous weapons. The devastating power of nuclear weapons is capable of eliminating the human race from the face of the earth. With the spread of these weapons in the so-called rogue states (Iran, North Korea etc.) and the fear of falling these weapons at the hands of the terrorist groups, like bin Laden’s al-Qaeda through black-market trading (which became a real fear after revelation of Pakistani scientist AQ Khan’s selling of nuclear weapon materials to Libya, Iran and North Korea), the fear of the nuclear weapons have become greater than ever before. The latest call demanding elimination of nuclear weapons has been spearheaded by the mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as the world observed the 60th anniversary of the bombing of those cities by the US. A worldwide community of humanists, which includes eminent scientists, philosophers and social thinkers, have joined this call. However, it is evident that these calls would only fall on deaf ear. No single human being on earth would like to see the world getting destroyed for any reason and the existence of worldwide stockpiles of nuclear weapons is the only danger that can exterminate the living beings including human race many times. Yet there is this clear apathy towards getting rid of these dangerous weapons. But why? Are those people or states that are holding the nuclear weapons want the destruction of our world? We must also investigate how wise it is for the world to get rid of these weapons. Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy, Pakistani nuclear physicist and a passionate anti-US campaigner vis-à-vis nuclear weapons, whilst blasting the United States on its stubborn stance of keeping the nuclear weapons, as deterrence against other nuclear powers, wrote: ‘But there is a downside to this. And the long-term consequences will not be to the advantage of the US because the nuclear monopoly is breaking down. The making of atomic weapons – especially crude ones – has become vastly simpler than it was at the time of the Manhattan Project. Basic information is freely available in technical libraries throughout the world and simply surfing the internet can bring to anyone a staggering amount of detail. Advanced textbooks and monographs contain details that can enable reasonably competent scientists and engineers to come up with ‘quick and dirty’ designs for nuclear explosives…’ No doubt, the famous Pakistani scientist and a prominent secularist have painted a valid downside of the United States’ losing nuclear monopoly although he has forgotten that the US lost that monopoly in 1949 when USSR developed nuclear weapons and many more times subsequently as other nations became nuclear powers. However, his note of ominous warning has painted another downside which, for quite a valid reason, would stop the current nuclear powers from getting rid of these dangerous weapons, which they call deterrence against future nuclear aggression. And that downside is the ease of developing nuclear weapons, which Prof. Hoodbhoy has precisely described. The question would easily arise: If developing these weapons have become so easy and can be achieved in a hidden underground lab without the world noticing, how Prof. Hoodbhoy or anyone else would guarantee that another nation would not develop such weapons without the world knowing? The classic example is Iran’s effort to develop nuclear
capability in a secret underground lab which they had hidden for
18 years, despite signing the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT).
However, fortunately for the world community, an Iranian dissident
to Tehran’s Mullah Regime disclosed information about Iran’s
hidden nuclear laboratory and a Pandora’s Box was opened up. Next
time, there may not be an insider to inform the world about such
secret facilities. The same is true for North Korea, who despite
intense international scrutiny and signing a deal against
developing nuclear weapons, had continued to pursue nuclear
weapons in secret facilities and is now known to have obtained
nuclear weapons already. Reality and nuclear weapons elimination–II http://www.newagebd.com/2005/aug/30/oped.html One can argue that if other nuclear powers would not have such weapons, Iran or North Korea would never have sought to develop them. But how much water does such argument hold? Does it mean that if United States had not developed nuclear weapons in 1945, other nations would never have developed them? One may argue so but this can at best be termed silly. History of humankind gives every support to the notion that human beings have always been intent in devising the most lethal weapons based on its capability. With nuclear weapons, it could have been different? The knowledge of nuclear science was just becoming mature in 1930s and if not the US, USSR, China and France, another nation or more would have developed these weapons anyway. It was just about time, not the lack of intention. Be it the so-called war-mongers US president Bush and UK Prime Minister Blair or Russia’s Putin or North Korea’s dictator Kim Jong II or any leader, nobody would want the annihilation of the human race. But it is also true that if Hitler had the nuclear weapons in his hands in the 1940s, countries like the UK, the US, Canada, Australia and USSR etc. would not have existed today, unless they would have gone for a complete submission. Also if Saddam was the sole holder of nuclear weapons, the complexion of our world would have been very different today. And history tells us that world has always produced people like Hitler, Nero, Saddam Hussein and Genghis Khan from time to time and would continue to produce such psychopaths. It must also be realised that had the Christian crusaders or the Islamic invaders would have had monopoly in nuclear weapons in their triumphant days, the demography of the world would have been very different. It also remains an almost infallible likelihood that if the Talibans, Osama bin Laden or the Mullahs of Iran would become the sole owner of nuclear weapons tomorrow, Israel and the US would be destroyed at the first blow whilst the entire world would have to submit under the nation of Islam or face terrible destruction. Under such circumstances, when our world is still driven by various devastating ideological passions (forget about man’s instinctive craze for power), it will be impossible to convince the nuclear powers to eliminate their stockpile of nuclear weapons. Although the Russell-Einstein manifesto was driven by the fear of nuclear weapons’ ability to eliminate human race, it did not explicitly demand the abolition of all nuclear weapons. The manifesto clearly defined the hope for prohibition or elimination of nuclear weapons unrealistic as it read: ‘This hope (for prohibition of modern weapons) is illusory. Whatever agreements not to use H-bombs had been reached in time of peace, they would no longer be considered binding in time of war, and both sides would set to work to manufacture H-bombs as soon as war broke out, for, if one side manufactured the bombs and the other did not, the side that manufactured them would inevitably be victorious.’ The two most brilliant minds of the 20th century had correctly recognised the futility of urging nuclear nations to get rid of their modern weapons or prohibit them in situations of war. Yet, they had pointed to the most plausible solution which will not only avert a nuclear war but also might result in elimination of these dangerous weapons. They made an emotional plea in the concluding clause of their manifesto: ‘There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings to human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if you cannot, there lies before you the risk of universal death.’ So to Einstein and Russell, the only panacea to human conflicts
and to avoid an earth-shattering confrontation involving modern
weapons was to think all of us as human beings, discarding all
existing manmade divisions. They urged us to think ourselves not
as Muslim, Christian or Jew, not as Bangladeshi, Indian or
American, not as Communist or Capitalist, not as Asian or European
but only as human beings. They further wrote: ‘Most of us are
not neutral in feeling, but, as human beings, we have to remember
that, if the issues between East and West are to be decided in any
manner that can give any possible satisfaction to anybody, whether
Communist or anti-Communist, whether Asian or European or
American, whether White or Black, then these issues must not be
decided by war. We should wish this to be understood, both in the
East and in the West.’
Reality and
nuclear weapons elimination–III
http://www.newagebd.com/2005/aug/31/oped.html
Russell and Einstein had clearly understood the futility of
demanding the elimination of modern weapons under the
circumstances. Those pacifists, who are tiring themselves by
shouting on the streets demanding elimination of these weapons,
should instead work on the fronts urged by Russell and Einstein,
which is to promote the idea of thinking the entire human race as
one, irrespective of cultural, national, ideological, political
and religious differences. Let us consider all human beings as
brothers and sisters and this indeed is our true identity. All the
plethora of divisions, which exist amongst us, were created by
human beings only in the course of our history, often
unnecessarily, to serve self-interest of small number of people.
And there also lied the genesis of Einstein’s political vision
which urged for establishing federalist world government. Einstein
also abhorred nationalism or patriotism which has been the cause
of the greatest human tragedy in the history of mankind. He wrote
about patriotism: ‘Nationalism (patriotism) is an infantile sickness. It is the
measles of mankind.’ ‘Heroism on command, senseless violence, and
all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism –
how passionately I hate them!’ Thus Einstein had realised that only through the creation of a world government, the world could be rescued from the curse of the devastating instinct called nationalism or patriotism. If people can forget their religious, ideological, cultural as well as national identity and put more emphasis in valuing human lives whichever geographical location or racial group they belong too, there is every possibility that human kind can create a sense of belonging to one human family and to one nation under a world government. Such a situation will definitely help avert devastating conflicts. That may truly be a world what Russell and Einstein termed ‘paradise’ in this life, where all the people on earth would enjoy similar kind of governance, human rights, justice and prosperity. In that kind of world only, nobody would need weapons of mass destruction nor would their existence pose a great threat to the human race. Until a significant progress is being made in pushing our world towards unification as a single human family (like the EU) from all sorts of existing divisions, the existence of modern weapons would continue to exist, so would the threat of extermination of the human race by these weapons. Einstein said, ‘Mankind’s desire for peace can be realised only by the creation of a world government.’ On the 60th anniversary of the end of the world’s most devastating conflict (WWII), the world community needs to contemplate hard on this. Shouting for the elimination of destructive modern weapons alone is not going to bear any fruit. |
