Is a nuclear-free world really safer, or even possible?

C4Casey · 07-25-2008, 02:08 AM

So, Obama during his speach in Germany said that "This is the moment when we must renew the goal of a world without nuclear weapons." I think this statement raises two fundemental questions about this goal.

1 - Is a world without nuclear weapons really feasible?

2 - Does eliminating all nuclear weapons really make the world safer?

Personally, I think nuclear weapons have done alot more to end or prevent wars than cause them. We ended WWII by dropping two nukes on Japan. The use of nuclear weapons eliminated the nead to invade Japan, which some experts believe could have cost upwards of a million lives. The threat of nuclear war also kept the U.S and the U.S.S.R from tearing each other apart during the Cold War. I also firmly believe that our current nuclear inventory keeps our potential adversaries like China, Iran, and North Korea from doing anything drastic. Should one of those nations want to do something like annex Taiwan, attack U.S bases in Iraq, or invade South Korea, they must contend with the fact that the U.S may call on its nuclear forces to respond. Therefore, the mere existance of nuclear weapons helps to prevent large scale wars.

As for the first question posed, I think that given the current proliferation of nuclear weapons alone makes it nearly impossible for the world to ever be rid of them. As for terrorists getting their hands on a nuclear weapon, as long as there are nuclear reactors, there will be the threat that terrorists will be able to gain access to radiological material. I really doubt that nations would be willing to abandon nuclear energy technology because of a terrorist threat to their facilities. Given these factors, I find it highly unlikely the world will ever be free from a nuclear threat.

Rouger2 · 07-25-2008, 01:11 PM

Originally Posted by C4Casey

So, Obama during his speach in Germany said that "This is the moment when we must renew the goal of a world without nuclear weapons." I think this statement raises two fundemental questions about this goal.

1 - Is a world without nuclear weapons really feasible?

2 - Does eliminating all nuclear weapons really make the world safer?

Personally, I think nuclear weapons have done alot more to end or prevent wars than cause them. We ended WWII by dropping two nukes on Japan. The use of nuclear weapons eliminated the nead to invade Japan, which some experts believe could have cost upwards of a million lives. The threat of nuclear war also kept the U.S and the U.S.S.R from tearing each other apart during the Cold War. I also firmly believe that our current nuclear inventory keeps our potential adversaries like China, Iran, and North Korea from doing anything drastic. Should one of those nations want to do something like annex Taiwan, attack U.S bases in Iraq, or invade South Korea, they must contend with the fact that the U.S may call on its nuclear forces to respond. Therefore, the mere existance of nuclear weapons helps to prevent large scale wars.

As for the first question posed, I think that given the current proliferation of nuclear weapons alone makes it nearly impossible for the world to ever be rid of them. As for terrorists getting their hands on a nuclear weapon, as long as there are nuclear reactors, there will be the threat that terrorists will be able to gain access to radiological material. I really doubt that nations would be willing to abandon nuclear energy technology because of a terrorist threat to their facilities. Given these factors, I find it highly unlikely the world will ever be free from a nuclear threat.

I Agree with your post. I think Obama is acting naive on this. Nuclear power has kept the world from a world war three. Mutual assured destruction has kept the world from destroying itself. It has made for maddening world with crazy nonwinnable wars like Korea, vietnam, and now Iraq but the world has survived. There is a part of me that wishes we could just get into a war and try to win it instead of worrying about russia or someone stepping in with nukes. The world is probably better off with the nuke threat though and maybe it might even eventually make wars obsolete.

nbiggershaft · 07-25-2008, 01:12 PM

Valid

7960 · 07-25-2008, 01:14 PM

Originally Posted by C4Casey

1 - Is a world without nuclear weapons really feasible?

no.

2 - Does eliminating all nuclear weapons really make the world safer?

if it was possible to do it, maybe.

but it's impossible to do so the discussion would be academic, not realistic.

Ardentfrost · 07-25-2008, 01:20 PM

^^ what he said

Nuclear weapons are here and here to stay. Nothing can happen diplomatically that would get rid of them, and no one dare try to take a country's nuclear weapons with war.

Even worse, it's not the possession of nuclear arms that has caused wars in the past 50 years, but the act of preventing other nations from the same possession (in a lot of cases).

7960 · 07-25-2008, 01:54 PM

Originally Posted by Ardentfrost

^^ what he said

Nuclear weapons are here and here to stay. Nothing can happen diplomatically that would get rid of them, and no one dare try to take a country's nuclear weapons with war.

Even worse, it's not the possession of nuclear arms that has caused wars in the past 50 years, but the act of preventing other nations from the same possession (in a lot of cases).

my sister is totally anti-nuclear weapon....and it's funny because my dad's job in the air force and after as a contractor was to program guided missile systems. thankgiving dinners are so much fun!

Anyway, she wants to get rid of all nuclear weapons and my dad said "ok, you got your wish, they're all gone and we're not going to make any more. you know other countries have smart people who can make them, too, right? so how long before they have them and we don't?"

Her answer ended the conversation........"we can negotiate with them to keep them from making any."

That's now naïve (stupid?) they are.

C4Casey · 07-25-2008, 03:24 PM

^^ Haha. That sounds like my family Thanksgiving dinners. My dad works on spy satellites and some other military stuff, and he's also an ardent conservative and GOP supporter. This makes for happy times when we visit our relatives. My entire extended family, both on my Mom and Dad's side, are Democrats and most of them are pretty liberal as well.

IminWonderland · 07-25-2008, 04:36 PM

That's the shit that left Pandora's box, that no one can shove back in.

Unfortunatley they are here to stay.

But, I often wonder what it says about us, that we dropped the bombs first.

Some scholars argue that the act of us nuking Japan did more harm than good, long term. I agree with them.

7960 · 07-25-2008, 04:38 PM

Originally Posted by IminWonderland

That's the shit that left Pandora's box, that no one can shove back in.

Unfortunatley they are here to stay.

But, I often wonder what it says about us, that we dropped the bombs first.

Some scholars argue that the act of us nuking Japan did more harm than good, long term. I agree with them.

there is no "good" or "bad" in war.

we can sit here now and think "maybe we shouldn't have....." but we're doing it with the benefit of hindsight. AT THE TIME we knew it was going to save more lives than it cost. if you want to argue that's bad, fine. there are plenty of people to disagree with you and those "scholars."

nbiggershaft · 07-25-2008, 05:17 PM

Originally Posted by IminWonderland

That's the shit that left Pandora's box, that no one can shove back in.

Unfortunatley they are here to stay.

But, I often wonder what it says about us, that we dropped the bombs first.

Some scholars argue that the act of us nuking Japan did more harm than good, long term. I agree with them.

If you want to look at long term, consider what the first use of nuclear bombs would have been. Before we dropped the bomb on Japan, the idea of developing but not using super weapons wasn't around. Once people saw what happened in Japan, leaders became committed to not using the weapons offensively. Otherwise you could have seen large arsenals of nuclear weapons used by say, Russia and the US used in war for the first time.

C4Casey · 07-25-2008, 06:24 PM

I think what's really scary is that conventional weapons are approaching the size of nukes. Both the U.S "Mother of All Bombs" and the Russian "Father of All Bombs" have been said to have the same explosive yield as small nuclear weapons. I think the MOAB has something like 1/12 the destructive power of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. I wouldn't be suprised if a conventional bomb with the same explosive yield as Hiroshima is created within the next decade. I think nations would be far more likely to use these bombs in combat since there's no radiation, and I think that prospect is a little scary.

Smull · 07-25-2008, 07:46 PM

I agree with the other posts, nuclear weapons are here to stay. However it is very important to try to secure loose nuclear weapons, particularly the ones that are just kinda lying around in Russia. And we should encourage nuclear countries to be more responsible with their weapons (I'm looking at you Pakistan).

I'm also all for the use of tactical nukes. Why use 500 conventional weapons to take out an enemy position when you can drop one small nuke? Just because its taboo?

The atom bombs dropped on Japan were probably not needed, as the Japanese wanted to surrender on the lone condition that they're emperor would be spared (when they surrendered we let them have this anyway). But what most people don't realize is that we killed a lot more people by conventionally fire-bombing their cities than with the two atomic bombs.

7960 · 07-25-2008, 08:34 PM

Originally Posted by Smull

Why use 500 conventional weapons to take out an enemy position when you can drop one small nuke? Just because its taboo?

sure that.................... and the fact that the area is radioactive for a while but with conventional bombs you can walk through minutes after the explosions and be fine.

Smull · 07-25-2008, 08:40 PM

Wanted to point out that despite their being unrealistic to completely eradicate, nuclear weapons are fucking scary. We almost blew up the world several times over.

1962 Cuban Missile Crisis - everyone knows this one, still it was fuckin scary to think we came that close to all out nuclear war.

1979 - A training error told the US military that the Soviets had launched a full scale attack.
Damn Interesting » The Apocalypses That Might Have Been

1983 - A weather anomaly alerts the Soviet military that American missiles were on their way. Colonel Petrov decided that it was probably a mistake and did not initiate a counterstrike, despite being trained to do so. thus saving humanity.
Damn Interesting » A Hairsbreadth From Utter Destruction

1995 - Norway launches some shit into space, OKs this with everyone, but Russia forgets to tell its missile radar crew. Yeltsin freaks the fuck out, and is less than 5 minutes away from launching a counter attack.
frontline: russian roulette - a close call?: the norwegian rocket incident

And every year since the 90s there have been several cases of stolen nuclear material. NIS Nuclear Trafficking Database

Oh and this happened last year America's loose nukes | FP Passport
And this happened last week Missile crew falls asleep with nuclear code device: air force - Yahoo! News

Scary shit, we can't get rid of nukes but we should definitely get our act together when it comes to nuclear safety and proliferation.

Smull · 07-25-2008, 08:49 PM

Originally Posted by 7960

sure that.................... and the fact that the area is radioactive for a while but with conventional bombs you can walk through minutes after the explosions and be fine.

We have all sorts of low radiation bombs, this is my personal favorite
The Neutron Bomb | Nuclear Fusion | Science | atomicarchive.com

Basically its a bomb that kills people with radiation, but there is very little blast and heat damage. The radiation also dies down very very quickly. The idea was to use it on Russian tanks if they attacked Europe, so we could wipe out all the Russians, but not risk ruining Europe. One plan even called for a neutron bomb to be dropped on advancing Russian tanks, and then NATO troops would take the dead Russian soldiers out of the tanks and drive them back towards Russia for a counter attack. How fucking sick is that?

Hunter S. Thompson said that "it is an ideal representation of capitalism at the time -- a bomb that destroys tissue but not property"

6SpeedTA95 · 07-27-2008, 12:27 AM

The answer is no to the first question

Yes to the second question

Obviously because the answer is no to the first question we must make sure we're well protected from potential nuclear attacks. We must also make sure that our nuclear arsenal is adequate and up to date without being absurd.

I've read a lot of articles on US nuclear stockpiles and quite frankly if you can blow up the planet 3 times or 300 times whats the difference at that point? I think modernizing and streamlining our existing nuclear arsenal would be smart and a way to save money. Nuclear weapons maintenance is absurdly expensive.

7960 · 07-27-2008, 01:35 AM

Originally Posted by 6SpeedTA95

I've read a lot of articles on US nuclear stockpiles and quite frankly if you can blow up the planet 3 times or 300 times whats the difference at that point?

Since there's still open debate on whether all the nuclear weapons combined have enough yield to kill off humanity, there's no way they're enough to blow up the earth even one time.

IminWonderland · 07-27-2008, 03:12 AM

Originally Posted by 7960

there is no "good" or "bad" in war.

we can sit here now and think "maybe we shouldn't have....." but we're doing it with the benefit of hindsight. AT THE TIME we knew it was going to save more lives than it cost. if you want to argue that's bad, fine. there are plenty of people to disagree with you and those "scholars."

The act of dropping that bomb made America THE global Superpower. It put us in the position of Rome, and that shift in attitude has stayed within our cultural construct for 60 years. And now we are suffering vast reprucussions for having to be the "biggest" "baddest" and in the drivers seat of many decisions in other countries.

Good decision, or bad decision, it was a decision that I believe was made with more calculation that lives lost, or money spent/saved. I believe Truman knew that this would create America into a bad daddy on the playground.

ratbastage · 07-27-2008, 12:32 PM

Any country that maintains the attitude that IT is responsible enough to deserve nuclear weapons while actively preventing most of the rest of the world from pursuing the same technologies is effectively imposing its domination. That has nothing to do with democracy and gives the entire process a worse reputation for being involved with such devious manipulation.