President Obama has stated that he desires a “world without nuclear weapons.” Do you believe it is truly possible to accomplish this goal? I am in favor of trying to initiate global peace and reduce nuclear arsenals but I think that suggesting we could have a world without nuclear weapons is somewhat naive. There is always going to be rogue nations developing / procuring nuclear weapons. If we were to stop our weapons development two important innovations would occur: the first is that we would no longer have the weapons to make us the world superpower. We could not flex our muscles at other nations in order to get other things done. This would be a dramatic change from current administration and a likely unsuccessful one. The second thing that would happen from no more nuclear weapons development would be that we would lose our ability to protect and develop defensive systems. If we are on the cutting edge of nuclear development, we will be able to better understand how our enemies could attack us and put in measures to prevent such occurrences. However if we throw nuclear development to the wind, we will have no idea what are enemies are developing and will therefore be helpless.
Have I missed something here, is there really a way we could shy away from nuclear weapons? It is worth noting that the pentagon is not exactly encouraging Obama in his plans for a nukeless world. Rather they are petitioning for new innovations and more research for nuclear weapons.
