Hardly seems worth talking about the obvious, huh? I can remember in the early ’50’s in elementary school having nuclear bomb drills where we got under our desks; did the clueless adults really think that would help? Maybe it made them feel better that they were doing something, anything, to protect us little ones during annihilation.
Toby Ord in his book, The Precipice; Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity (Hachette Books, 2020), writes about the decreasing risk from strategic nuclear catastrophe in light of lowered stockpiles of such armaments and post-cold war arms agreements. He does exercise concern that US-Russia agreements may be unravelling (he is writing in 2002), and, of course, he was correct. He also saw risk in the context of Indian-Pakistan relationship. His perspective focuses on existential risk of the demise of all humanity, whether from destruction and radiation and/or a nuclear winter and mass starvation. As an aside, when I use the term “existential threat,” I am not referring to complete annihilation of life, but in disruptions (physical, economic, cultural, etc.) that result in significant loss of life, livelihood, environment, species loss, dystopian societies. My concern is less about the total catastrophe of strategic nuclear war (the worst case scenario) and more about tactical armament proliferation and acquisition by non-state actors.
We have recently seen new initiatives by DHS and the FBI to focus resources on getting brown people out of the country and going after lawyers, universities, press, anyone-who-disagrees-is-my enemy. Border control is not just about keeping illegal aliens out but protecting us from terrorist incursions across borders or by sea and air. We should be demanding of our legislators defend their constituents from such threats as opposed to redirecting resources to retribution and keeping America white.
Maintenance of allied relationships in intelligence gathering, democratic cohesion, mutual trust, policing, etc., are critical to the net of protection from nuclear threats, both strategic and tactical. In a period of seven months those relationships have been severely damaged all the while the playbooks of our key adversaries have been gifted a whole new game in their favor. This will only serve to increase the nuclear risk, globally and locally. Nuclear testing is resuming. A few actors rattle their nuclear swords to preserve their national sanctity (Russia, North Korea). Beware the combined power of nation and religion. Each nation prays to their God to deliver them victory (as do high school football coaches). Funny…isn’t there supposed to be one God?
So, where does compassion come into play? Well, you have to start at home, your own person. Can you start each day with an attitude of ease, peace, good will, forgiveness? Then wish that all beings be happy, free of oppression, at ease, free of ill-will. We can’t individually solve the world’s problems born of hate, anger, ill-will, greed, and ego-dominance. But we can at lease, and foremost, look inwardly and turn that outwordly in service any way we can according to our skills and callings. We can call out BS when we see and hear it. We can be informed. We can listen, we can refuse to tolerate ignorance, incessant lies (especially the Big Lie–the one that if told over and over seduces us into believing it); we can stay educated, investigate, not from a limited point of view reflecting confirmation bias, but from a curiosity to understand and a humility to be awed by the gifts of this life.
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