Fanatics with Nukes

Since that fateful day in August of 1945, when the land of the free and the home of the brave let the nuclear genie out of the bottle over a Japanese city in southern Honshu. The world has lived with bated breath, in fear of another appearance of that genie, that would set off Armageddon, the last battle of humankind.

We lived in the shadow of the bomb for over 50 years, during what was called "The Cold War," a war that ran hot, but usually in surrogate countries, like Angola, Vietnam, Laos, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, with surrogate people of color doing the dying for the most part. This kind of shadow war between the East and West, kept those missiles tipped with the power to end the world as we know it, in their launchers. Finally, with demise of the Soviet Union, the Cold War cooled off forever we thought, and a new day seemed to have dawned for all of humankind.

One in which the idea of being vaporized in a nuclear strike or dying a slower death in the aftermath of such an exchange was gone. The future instead of depending on the two global 800 pound gorillas, the USSR and the USA, maintaining a peaceful coexistence towards each other, depended on your efforts at making the lives of your family and community a better place to live. We lived without the idea of an external enemy that wanted to destroy our way of life. Even those small conflicts that rose up in the Balkans and other places did not dint our optimistic outlook on the future. When the idea of terrorist attacks started to rise as a specter on our horizon, they were still not in the range of living with the thought of a nuclear exchange in the back of your mind.

Then 9/11 came and went, and with it, the so-called idea of US invulnerability to attack, went with it. After 9/11, the majority of Americans backed the idea of retaliation against those who planned and launched the horrific attacks on the twin towers, the Pentagon and flight 93. We gladly gave away our freedoms as laid out in that document that made the constitution a living thing, the bill of rights, anything to help make us safe. With 9/11, came the thoughts of being attacked with biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. The nuclear attacks discussed were the so-called dirty bomb that would mainly spread nuclear radiation in a large urban center and cause masses of people to become sick and possibly die from radiation poison. Even the idea of these kinds of attacks, did not raise up those old fears. The one thing that we knew as Americans, that these were weapons that others would employ, not us, for we had principles and values that put the idea of humanity before any thought of pre-emptive attack.

Then March 2003, came and our attack on Iraq and the Hussein regime, a 'quick war,' the resulting long and bloody occupation with our troops fighting insurgents on all sides, and no successful conclusion in sight. During this time, we are still fighting in Afghanistan, looking for the architects of 9/11, and that seems to be another black hole in which our treasure and youth disappear in and are never seen again.

Now, we are in discussions with Iran, over their nuclear technology program, a program that was started some 35 years ago, under the former Shah of Iran, with our help. Our leaders and those of other western nations are fearful that the Iranians will make nuclear weapons with the enriched fuel that their technology program produces. And they are right, for the world with only one super power, a super power that has shown itself ready to commit its might, treasure and youth in a 'pre-emptive' attack on sovereign nations to achieve its foreign policy goals, is a dangerous place for the smaller nations who cannot defend themselves against such a pre-emptive attack. That is why the Iranians want the bomb; for they know it is the last defense against an attack on their nation by a larger super power. For verification of this thought, look at North Korea, the other 'axis of evil,' which sits with the bomb and a four million person army untouched.

Our President, in considering options to deal with Iran, is considering an attack on her nuclear technology sites. This would be what many would consider an unprovoked attacked on a sovereign nation. The worst thing is not the idea of the attack, but it is the idea of an attack that utilizes nuclear weapons to 'make sure' that we wiped out Iran's nuclear capability. The administration and others have talked for months about the dangers of having a so-called rogue nation like Iran with nuclear capability. That we could under the scenarios advanced by them, have our forces attacked in Iraq and other places in the Middle East by Iranian nuclear weaponry. Of course, the main concern is that Israel would be in the cross hairs of an Iranian nuclear onslaught too. So the idea of wild eyed Islamic fundamentalist Iranian fanatics waving nuclear tipped weapons of mass destruction is very scary to many people.

So it should be easy to imagine what the average Iranian person on the street feels, when he or she hears of the President of the United States thoughts on launching what they consider to an unprovoked attack on their country with nuclear weapons. It is easy to see those same thoughts in the Iranians' mind of American fanatics waving nuclear weapons, but these would be wild eyed Christian fundamentalist fanatics like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, waving these nuclear weapons of mass destruction, urging our President on, and hoping for the "end times" to come from such an attack.

Any scenario is possible when you have fanatics of any kind in charge of the nuclear genie, and the urge to uncork the bottle beckoning you to save the world from what?