Nuclear Naivete — We Can’t Just “Get Rid Of Nukes”

20 Feb, 2004 by John Hawkins

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Pity the poor student who happens to be studying “international negotiation and diplomacy at the Fletcher School at Tufts University” because he very well might have the misfortune of being taught by utopian dunderhead Adil Najam. Displaying a level of childlike naivete which is entirely unbecoming in any adult, particularly a professor, Mr. Najam wrote an op/ed for USA Today entitled Get rid of all nuclear arms. Here is an excerpt…

“Perhaps the fathers of our own atom bomb – Robert Oppenheimer and his colleagues from the Manhattan Project – were correct in believing that the only real way of dealing with nuclear proliferation is to ban nuclear weapons altogether. Everywhere.

International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei understands this reality. He recently wrote: “We must abandon the unworkable notion that it is morally reprehensible for some countries to pursue weapons of mass destruction yet morally acceptable for others to rely on them and indeed to continue to refine their capacities and postulate plans for their use.”

We must insist on a nuclear-free world. We must make a sincere commitment to it at home and demand it abroad. Rather than better mousetraps for proliferating nations, we need an approach to eliminate nuclear weapons. Some may argue this is unrealistic. But no more so than the misguided, even naive, hope that a feel-good Band-Aid called PSI will make the world a safer place.”

Now, you’re probably thinking, “Wow, I bet Hawkins is about to say this guy is a fatuous pinhead for writing this piece and then say that USA Today must be run by a bunch of braindead guttersnipes since they ran it!” Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying….but let’s be honest, you weren’t “probably thinking” that I was going to say that. I mean calling someone a “fatuous pinhead” or a “braindead guttersnipe” — when was the last time you heard that in a casual conversation? So there’s no way that you guessed I was going to say that — who do you think you’re kidding?

In any case, simply saying we should “Get rid of all nuclear arms” is a lot like saying “Zhang Ziyi should be giving me a back rub right now”. It’s a nice idea, but there’s no practical way to make it happen.

So am I saying we’ll never be rid of nukes? No, but history tells us that there are only two reasons that the human race will stop using particular weapons; either a defense is devised that makes that weapon ineffective or someone comes up with something better. If nukes ever do become obsolete, let’s hope the former reason, not the latter, is why.