Politics: MAD? I hope so

One of the things about technology is that you cannot keep it a secret. Like fire, wheels, bows and arrows, lightbulbs, and automobiles, nuclear technology is impossible to keep secret. Long ago it was realized that any physics major in any university anywhere on earth could throw a nuke together. The problem was the laying their hands on the materials necessary. The fall of the old Soviet Union remedied that problem for a great many nuclear hopefuls. But, even before the fall of the USSR, a substantial quantity of fissionable material had gone missing, and a number of nations have developed nuclear weaponry. South Africa, Israel, Pakistan, and India have joined France, U.S.A., Britain, Russia, and China in stockpiling these kinds of weapons and the various methods of delivering them to their respective targets.

The one thing that all these nations had in common was fear. They all had something to lose and their enemies, or suspected enemies, were also racing for parity in arms. Given the events of recent years, and the clash of ideologies that inspired them, it should be no surprise that Iran has added its' name into the hat along with North Korea. This is a tragedy for the whole world and one that I am sure will never go away.

War is not the answer to a problem...it is the problem. Technology does not disappear into the ether. It is superseded by newer and more efficient technologies. The cold-war taught us the lesson that whoever is first to use nuclear weapons, despite destroying their enemies, will also be destroyed. Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) became the saving grace of the modern world. But will it save us again? I don't know.

My generation grew up in an atmosphere of impending doom. The end of the world was something we all suspected, and feared, that we would see. The present religious fascination and belief in Armageddon has, I believe, it's roots in the cold war. This is very dangerous indeed. I am a firm believer in self-fufilling prophesy and I am afraid that I see it all around me in modern geo-politics.

Oh, what did you see, my blue-eyed son?

Oh, what did you see, my darling young one?

I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it,

I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it,

I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin',

I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin',

I saw a white ladder all covered with water,

I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken,

I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children,

And it's a hard, and it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard,And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall.

(Bob Dylan)