EDITORIAL: Holocaust in Hiroshima!
By the Editor

DESPITE passage of decades—world community still remembers the holocaust brought to Hiroshima on the neurotic day of August-6 in 1945 by the United States of America.

Sixty years back, bombers of the country [now a solo super power]—which claims to be the biggest champion of non-proliferation dropped first nuclear bomb in the history of mankind to force Japanese to surrender.

As a result 140 thousand people became immediate victim besides lifetime effects for many more. The ‘civilized and most responsible’ power did not stop at that and repeated the experiment at Nagasaki—afterwards.

The havoc caused to the mankind in 1945 should have forced the world community to ponder over ways and means to contain rather eliminate the threat.

However, it is unfortunate that instead of reducing the danger, the countries that matter have spent billions to sharpen their nuclear teeth.

The kind of nuclear devices now available with the different countries is many times more lethal than the bombs dropped on two Japanese cities.

Each nuclear power is trying to excel in sophistication and miniaturization and the number of warheads runs into thousands. It is all the more regrettable that countries like the United States have directed their warheads towards different regions of the world.

This is not a hollow threat but potential danger to humanity as the United States leadership is on record having said on many occasions that it would not hesitate to use them again should there need arises.

It is also a fact that the so-called disarmament talks that were aimed at arriving at an understanding to destroy some of the weapons in the possession of the United States and the Russian Federation (formerly Soviet Union) have also ended as an exercise in futility mainly because of headstrong behaviour of Washington.

We think, it is—by all means, because of the United States that talks on treaties—like CTBT and FMCT had eventually fizzled out.

Seemingly, due to the unipolar nature of the world, the United States feels that—it is for others to exercise restraint and roll-back their nuclear programmes while it has sole prerogative to maintain such perilous gadgets—for use against any poor and weak nation, the world-over.

Under these circumstances, there can hardly be any progress towards the cherished goal of reduction and then elimination of nuclear weapons. Isn't it a reality?● 

 -  Mumtaz Hamid Rao
www.MumtazRao.net