HAVE WE LEARNT ANYTHING?
Days before the eightieth anniversary of the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Russia walked out of the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty signed in 1987.
It was the latest in a series of moves by Russia, and America, to walk out of a series of treaties to limit the threat of nuclear annihilation drawn up in the latter decades of the last century.
We are failing to listen to the testimony of the few survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (where a second atom bomb was dropped) who have talked of their ghastly experience. Many have devoted their lives to the abolition of nuclear weapons.
During the Cold War, the ban the bomb movement had a high profile in the UK. The annual protest marches to the nuclear weapons base at Aldermaston made news. The issue was a major source of tension in the Labour and Liberal parties.
In the nineties with the collapse of the Soviet Union and nuclear weapon limiting treaties in place the Armageddon clock moved back from midnight. But where are we now?
Russia, the United States and to a lesser extent China have laced their sabre rattling with almost casual threats about using nuclear weapons. Whilst one hopes this is bluster there are added components which were not present in the Cold War, nihilistic terrorism and advanced computer technology which could possibly lead to unintended errors.
As we mark the 80th anniversary of the atomic bomb, we need to realise the danger we all face again.
WHAT IS PROPORTIONATE?
There has been a renewed debate on the morality of dropping the atomic bomb. Was it proportionate considering the way Japan engaged in a war of conquest, laid waste to parts of China and treated prisoners of war abominably?
It is almost certain that far more would have died with a conventional invasion of the Japanese home islands considering the loss of life so far in the Pacific war, but the arguments will continue as they do over Israel’s response to the Hamas attack.
ARAB STATES RESPONSIBILITY
It is almost obscene to get into the discussion of numbers of casualties in discussing Hiroshima or Gaza. But there is a widespread view that Israel’s response to the Oct 7th attack has been disproportionate and counter productive to anything but a forever war. One feels that the Netanyahu government actually wants to make life so intolerable in Gaza that everyone will leave.
If conflict is to be ended the surrounding Arab states, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordon have got to use their diplomatic knowledge and wealth to expel Hamas influence in Gaza, empower the Palestinian authority and begin reconstruction.
The pledge of the UK to likely recognise a Palestinian state will be gesture politics if this is not achieved. To be recognised as a state you need a unified government and recognisable borders, the Palestinians, sadly, have neither. A reconstructed Gaza could become that state with the huge complexity of the West Bank parked for the time being.
THE COMING OF ATTLEE
The atomic bombs were dropped in the first weeks of Labour coming to power. In the space of four months Clement Attlee who had worked in Churchill’s shadow was the surprise General Election victor in the UK, whilst a haberdasher from Kansas City, Harry Truman succeeded the giant Roosevelt, who died, as President of the United States.
Truman presided over the United States at a time of its maximum military power whilst Attlee laid the foundations of the welfare state.
Oh! For such leaders now!
