Probably the most dangerous in today's world politics is the atomic set ilegally now held by Israel, which if used against Iran could easily bring in a very much now fiesty Putin's Russia and possibly China.

Cheers - BB

Tilman

This is a nice wishlist uncontaminated by reality.

So we go the way of that unspoken example, New Zealand, and ban US ships and US aircraft because they may hold nuclear weapons. We lose an ally - our main protection.

Result - we have to radically enlarge our defence force.

There is no way that McCain or Obama is going to strip America of its nuclear defences because Australia (we are SO insignificant to them) talks of disarmament.

The Russians, Chinese, and Indians are not building more and "better" nuclear weapons because they are waiting for moral guidance. They do it because they distrust each other, have occasionally forght and each sees nukes as an effective counter to America's massive superiority in conventional weapons.

So given the value of nukes as an asymmetric defence against larger armies - where do we go from there? Is the solution to abolishh armies so we will all have peace.

Conventional weapons have, after all, killed uncounted tens of millions of people since the 2 nuclear weapons of 1945 killed hundreds of thousands. Grizzly stats but important.

Your ideals are worthy, but the world, politics and human nature, more complex.

Pete

Look on the bright side BB. An Israeli nuclear attack on its oil producing neighbours could have some beneficent consequences:

More than one third of global oil production capacity would vanish in a radio-active cloud. Oil would top $500 / barrel. That's more than $3 / litre just for the crude. The price of refined petrol would head north of $4 litre.

Why is this a beneficent outcome?

Because the consequent reduction in road traffic would finally make the roads of Melbourne safe for cyclists like me.

Then there is the resulting global frost. That would slow down global warming giving us more time to find clean carbon-free alternatives.

Perhaps the occasional nuclear war is the answer to global warming.

On the other hand, as the owner of some South African mining shares I do like the idea of Australia shutting down its uranium mines. The value of my shares would instantly double if not treble.

BTW was this intended as a serious article? Is an academic at Melbourne University really so deluded as to believe that l'il ol' Australia can influence global nuclear policy?

Does anyone connected to the real world believe that Rudd's "..announcement of an International Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Commission to report to an international summit in Australia next year…" is something other than flim-flam?

Sad to say theres nothing we can do about nukes.
All thats left is to pray.
If God hadnt shortened the days on earth no one would have survived...Mark 13:20.

If you want real good hope you have to go to Jesus the Saviour and invite Him in, receiving what He did on the Cross for you.
Born again christians are the happiest people on earth, even with the future Revelation portrays.
The problem is greed and fear. Anything new including n weapons we just have to have.
There will be no peace until Christ Returns.

I don't believe any government can protect the world against nuclear weapons.
Its all about greed.
Who would have thought that uranium mining would get the "go ahead" for the second time in Kakadu National Park. The uranium is being mined by a non Australian company. Who has any control over foreign owned companies, what, if any processes have been put in place to make sure that the uranium is not being "on sold" for military purposes.
The Indigeneous people who own the land could not turn down what would have been a very tempting offer of money nor could the Northern Territory Government miss the opportunity of receiving some of the proceeds coming from the mining of uranium, such as jobs etc.
I think that once the mining has started its too late worying about who the uranium is being sold to.

There is an aspect of stockpiling nuclear weapons which is seldom discussed.

Although national security is often given as the need for secrecy, I believe that the cost and effort of maintaining the bombs at some kind of operational readiness would prove embarrassing if the public only knew how difficult and costly it all is.

These devices have a shelf life. Over time, they lose their potency and reliablity. This applies not only to the fissionable materials, but also to the conventional explosive charges, detonators and triggers.

Lots of stuff about all that here:

http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/index.html

- it's worth keeping as a reference.

I suspect that, like chemical and biological weapons, the greatest penalty is paid in the end by the citizens of the aggressor countries themselves. The sheer mess, pollution and filth that is the intractible by-product of making all this stuff, comes home to bite the very people it is claimed to "protect".

Yet another example of the military making war on their own populations

In our times when rogue states bristling in their apocalyptic beards, like Iran, could produce stealthily nuclear weapons, to set up an International Commission for nuclear disarmament, as Prime Minister Rudd proposes to do, is the ultimate stupidity that any one could suggest. And in the aftermath of 9/11, the magnitude of such stupidity takes astronomical dimensions. Just imagine that countries such as America, Britain, France, and especially, Israel, which could be the targets of a nuclear attack by an Islamist state or by proxies of the latter, would even consider their nuclear disarmament.

Rudd’s proposal limpidly illustrates that Australia does not have a statesman at the helm but a political dilettante and a populist to boot who is more concerned to ingratiate himself with the celestial wishes of its liberal minded constituency than to deal with geopolitical realities.

Moreover, what is rather surprising and amusing is to see that Gareth Evans is willing to underwrite such political buffoonery by accepting the chair of the International Commission for nuclear disarmament. It seems that his Tasmanian “Biggles” days are not over.

http://kotzabasis4.wordpress.com

If the hearts of people are callous enough to murder their unborn babies we have no hope of preventing war. I'm with Gibo on this one.

The author goes from the horror of nuclear weapons to recommending the elimination of all things nuclear.

This will eliminate all nuclear energy to stop climate change, and all nuclear medicine to fight cancer etc.

What then is the answer to conventional conflict (which kills many more) the shutting down of all factories?

Grow up. Nuclear energy production from modern reactors produces no fissible material.

Actually Shadow Minister commercial reactors used in electricity production produce no WEAPONS GRADE fissible material.

Nuclear reactors can and do produce fissible material. Some designs, the fast breeder reactors, produce more fissible material than they consume.

But, for the rest, I agree with you.

Chris Shaw

Your argument against the possession of nuclear weapons is much more practical and effective than the author's high ideals and dooms day projections.

In fact Gates recently sacked the head and deputy head of the US Air Force after one too many close calls - the main one being a B-52 crew flying across the US ignorant that they were carrying nuclear armed missiles.

The fewer the number of nuclear weapons and the lower the explosive yield the better (hopefully). Fewer and lower is actually happening amongst the US, Russia and to some extent France. This has occurred partly due to disarmament negotiations between nuclear states but, I suspect, primarily due to the increasing accuracy of nuclear missiles.

For example nuclear missiles 40 years ago were so inaccurate that they needed to be very big (say equivalent to 1,000,000 tons of TNT) to be sure of destroying their assigned target. Today a target - say an underground bunker - can be destroyed by a weapon equivalent to 500 tons of TNT as it can penetrate precisely on top of the bunker (give or take 10 metres). Vastly fewer people living near the bunker would be killed. Still this is a huge tragedy and little consolation.

The "fewer civilian casualties" slogan may in fact encourage the use of nuclear weapons (say) against Iran. Only some in the US and Israel know how nukes fit into their various attack Iran plans.

I think if idealists combine idealistic prose with an indication they know a little about nuclear weapons technology and use they'll persuade many more people.

Pete
http://spyingbadthings.blogspot.com/

stevenlmeyer

I should be more precise, Modern light water reactors produce no net plutonium.

Also from the Jan 27 edition

How far can a nuclear watchdog's remit to protect human health extend? That's the question raised by the sacking last week of Linda Keen, head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC).

In November last year, Keen ordered the shutdown of a nuclear reactor at Chalk River, 200 kilometres from Ottawa, after maintenance checks uncovered a safety breach. The reactor is also the world's largest single supplier of medical isotopes, used in diagnostic tests for conditions such as cancer and heart disease, and the closure caused a worldwide shortage. On 11 December, the government overruled Keen's decision.

The exact grounds for Keen's removal are not clear, but Gary Lunn, Canada's natural resources minister, says she "was prepared to put people's lives at risk".

I often think that the greens in being driven by an almost religious fervour convieniently forget that nuclear science and medicine has saved many more people than have been lost from all the accidents and explosions incl Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.

Nuclear weapons are bad, but the rest of it is a tool.

Please find extracts from a commentary by Professor Monbiot.

The UN Security Council has suggested to Iran that a promise from it to not go militarily nuclear could bring about a Middle-East free of nuclear destruction.

However none of the UN countries demanding finis’ to Iran’s possible plans for nuclear weaponry' have talked about asking Israel to destroy the 80 atomic warheads it now possesses.

Israel’s nukist position has also caused the UK to change its mind about its own NP promises, preferring to prepare itself with both America, and even Europeans to even make preemptive strikes.

So much easily it will be right now for Russia and China to press truly to try for the nuclear lead.

According to Professor Monbiot, the danger has been more heightened by Condoleeza Rice’s demand that other countries accept her plan to abide by NPT (27,28). The Treaty which grants to countries which conform to 27/28, the allowance for materials for nuclear power on favourable terms. But Monbiot regards this as a flawed incentive, the resultant spread of just civil nuclear programmes still making the spread of atomic military power much more likely.

Further, it is also Condoleeza Rice who insists that India should now have access to US nuclear materials, despite the fact that India’s militarist nuclear venture is still illegal – all for the sake of a few million dollars of US export orders, as Monbiot expresses.

Certainly over the years it is political scientists like Monbiot and Kissinger who have had the insight to purport how wrongful historical moves or halts by people in high places like the US shutting its mind to little Israel going nukisto way back, and even now letting Condoleeza Rice try to singly manage the more dangerous world politics rather than the UN?

Regards, BB, Buntine, WA

MAREE LORRAINE, Wednesday, 30 July 2008 12:12:50 PM

Your claim that there is not much we can do about nuclear issues.

On the contrary I believe there is a lot we as a country could have done and can still do if we have the mind and the strength of character.

We could serve as a role model and use whatever influence we have on the international stage to stop further nuclear proliferation.

Howard’s government, influenced by vested interests and the USA I believe sold out Australia. His enthusiasm and support from the mining interests made him anxious to sell "yellow cake" and serves as a prime example.

It reminds of the story of the Roman governor Pontius Pilate, who handed Jesus over to the Pharisees. Knowing Jesus was innocent he then asked for a bowl of water, washing and wringing his hands disclaimed responsibility for what happened.

Selling "yellow cake" to other countries lets the control of its use go to someone else and little Johnny Howard can then claim it was not his fault it was misused, he only sold the "yellow Cake".

Sorry I do not accept that excuse. His government is the primary supplier of a product that knowingly would be used for nuclear purposes; hence his and any other government accept responsibility for any misuse.

We have seen many examples of the horrors caused by the nuclear bombs and the damage to health and the environment through aging nuclear facilities.

Let Australia lead the world by example showing that greed is not going corrupt Australia. Hand back government to the people.

Gibo,

I note that you are currently on line while I type this. It's actually good to see you back, and I hope that you will entertain us again with some of your views, extreme though they are.

God has spoken to me through Romans 14. I suggest you read this and respond. I found that the main theme of this Chapter is that Christians sometimes have to agree to disagree. That doesn't mean we can't have a debate on any issue, that's what OLO is all about.