Our utter repulsion resulting from Syria’s further immoral use of chemical warfare upon dissident civilians is entirely appropriate, given that its repugnant use was banned worldwide 25 years ago.
However, there are eight nations which store an exponentially worse toxin: nuclear missiles. Of the roughly 7,000 in existence, even a limited exchange of 2 percent, or 140, would result in a global cloud so lethal it would annihilate conservatively two billion, while forever upending the entire environment of earth.
Add just one more percent deployed, and humanity would virtually perish in short order. In the blinding light of this consequence, Assad’s demonic obsession pales by comparison.
Lest you think that this scenario be impossible, consider that two of the countries are led by power-crazed dictators, and another, by a would-be.
We need a rigorous, unrelenting effort by our public demanding that complicit corporations, military, lobbyists, and government leadership initiate a secure plan to persuade all to incrementally reduce the number of warheads by, for example, 10 percent every year. Only then will we be assured to have a planet to bequeath to our children and theirs, all of whom deserve the chance to make the world not only a better, but also a safer, place.
To find out how, join the Back from the Brink campaign or the nuclear ban U.S. movement.
Not to participate is, as Henry David Thoreau said, to “lead lives of quiet desperation.”
Rev. Peter Kakos
Northampton