Eliminate Nukes for a Safer World

Thetis Island friends and neighbours listen politely to my plea to voice support for nuclear disarmament and then change the subject.

Mine is not an original or lonely quest. In fact individuals, groups and a majority of all world countries support the United Nations treaty banning nuclear weapons.

Why not Thetis?

Here are some answers I’ve received: 

• The horror of nuclear devastation on civilization and the world’s environment is pure fiction that’s too awful -- worse than climate change -- to think about. Those who predict it will happen are merely the latest nut-case doom-mongerers who show up in every generation.

• Deterrence keeps us safe. There’s comfort knowing that the sort of insanely violent intentions, miscalculations and catastrophic accidents embedded in the human story don’t make nuclear war inevitable.

• The leaders of the nine nuclear nations are led by rational people. Their occasional threats to deliver ‘fire and fury’ and ‘limited nuclear strikes’ are no more than bluffs on behalf of citizens everywhere who put up $119 billion last year for nuclear upgrades that will never be used. Even Donald Trump in a corner licking his wounds for losing his grip on power and reality wouldn’t think of pressing the nuclear button. 

• Even if some doubt attends these declarations, there’s nothing any individual or group can do to reduce or eliminate the risk of nuclear war. Besides, life is to be enjoyed, not to be spent in the grip of grim worries.

These answers fortify the illusion of security. They amount to a prediction of a safe future, one that many accept while ignoring its dangerous absence of a guarantee.

For as long as nuclear weapons exist, some will be used for the purpose they were built -- to kill people, their structures and systems.

The first will be launched by accident, miscalculation or vile intent. Ones that follow will be for retaliation that can’t be contained until the whole world is in ruins.

Thinking it’s too horrible to happen won’t stop it from happening.

Relying on deterrence won’t stop it.

Because it hasn’t happened since Hiroshima and Nagasaki 80 years ago won’t stop it.

Our silence certainly won't stop it.

Every voice counts. If we think and act like we don’t count, we won’t.

In July 2017, the UN adopted the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which forbids all activities related to nuclear weapons: testing, building, funding and even threatening to use them.

The Thetis community could join other Canadian centres that support this treaty. They include Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, Halifax, Winnipeg, and, in BC, Vancouver, Victoria, West Vancouver, White Rock, Langley, North Saanich, Saanich, Sooke and Squamish.

If you’re interested in this initiative or any aimed at eliminating the nuclear menace, I'd appreciate hearing from you at thetisteen@gmail.com .

Dave Steen