Why are many pacifists anti-nuclear weapons?

Because nuclear weapons are made for mass killing, which we are against. But as long as they aren't used I'm happy.

 

Because although they may deter wars in the short term, eventually one war wouldn't be detered, and the planet gets destroyed. It would be much better if they were banned completely, and if a country did start developing them, to take measures then.

 

What is pacifism?

Is it really good enough that everyone is threatened in to submission? Is that really something that can be called "peace"? Is the fact that the North Korean dictatorship can never be destroyed peaceful? What exactly is peaceful about allowing regimes which torture, murder and exploit their citizens to exist? Is North Korea a peaceful place? Is it peaceful to preserve the status quo?

 

I think it is highly illogical to presume that mutually assured destruction makes us all safer. Look at the Cuban Missile Crisis. It could have ended very differently. Fortunately it was decided not to invade Cuba after a U-2 was shot down.

Also, the mutual assured destruction defense doesn't really work when one of the countries has a crazy leader in power, particularly one that doesn't seem to give a shit about the destruction of his own people.

The very real possibility of false detection of a first strike and taking retaliatory action could also happen. The movie WarGames dealt with this sort of thing. It happened in 1983 when a Soviet sattelite used to detect missile launches falslely reported that several US missiles being launched. Fortunately it was dismissed as being a false detection and also that protocol would dictate that it would have to be confirmed before a response was issued. It still is a chilling thought that it could happen by accident though.

 

Alfred Nobel believed that his invention of dynamite would end war. War was now far too gruesome, too destructive for anyone to contemplate it. He was so horrified to discover he was wrong that he founded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In a similar vein, most pacifists think that if nations have nuclear weapons, one of them is eventually going to call the world's bluff and use it, especially if one of those nations has ideological reasons not to care if the world ends.

 

This, and I also agree with Robert. Submission when faced with the threat of utter destruction is not peace, no more than it is "peace" when you hand over a $5 when a bully threatens to punch your teeth out if you don't give him your lunch money. :|

-No- country should have WMDs, and I think it's highly hypocritical of the USA to demand other countries disarm while having nukes itself.

 

I think the idea is that they are nasty explosive devices of doom which have the power to cause more devastation than ever before and many people feel that the world would be better if they just didn't exist, that way countries wouldn't have to get them because their enemies have them -.- Unfortunately however everyone's always trying to out-do everyone else and create bigger more powerful weapons, all the time, so campaigning against the newest destruction device is rather useless as a larger one will soon come to out-do it. From rock-arrow-catapult-bomb-bigger bomb-even bigger bomb-and onwards.

Also unfortunately however they are starting to become devastating enough to not just wreck something we can rebuild later but to destroy us and everything we have ever known, permanently. =/

 

Can't find a link for you, but there have been multiple instances where nuclear weapons have been accidentally dropped, misplaced or whatever was carrying them crashed or sank. It makes no sense to keep them around when you don't intend to use them and you keep doing stupid things like dropping them. And if you do intend to use them.... we're in trouble.

 

The only 'constructive use' I see for nukes is the fact we have nothing bigger, and in the event of a destructive meteor on a collision course with the planet, they MIGHT be enough to destroy or deflect it.

However, realistically? I have to say I do think MAD works. Those insane bastards in the mideast that already have nukes haven't fired one - YET - because of the risk of they themselves eating one or two of them in return.

 

TBH, the rest of the countries in the world arent very peaceful towards their own citizens either.

---------- Post added 16th Feb 2012 at 04:01 PM ----------

Already happened.

 

Unless I've missed something very significant in current events, then only time a nuclear weapon has been used by one nation on an enemy nation is when the US dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At that time, no one else had nuclear weapons, so MAD didn't apply.

 

Yeah, I know.

 

because there is no positive to nuclear weapons. the fuel is produced in such a way to be useable for weapons, and is not produced the same way one would produce fuel rods for peaceful power productions. You cant simply interchange the two fuels, and use one for the other.

it is kind of like some people, including my republican families, are fine with hunting guns, but not hand guns. a hunting gun was designed for hunting. a handgun was designed for purely one thing: killing people. You really cant hunt with a handgun. thats why it is the weapon of choice for robbers, murderers, and drug smugglers.

 

Over the past few decades we have been dismantling our nuclear weapon stock piles. I would like to see us do it faster. They are useless now. They worked well in the Cold War, because you had one enemy who was on equal footing with us. The MAD principal worked well. Both sides knew that neither would use them, it was all just saber rattling.

The problem with nukes is they kill hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Only a small percentage of the people killed in the attack would be an active part of the conflict. Since conventional weapons are less powerful there is a lot less risk of killing innocent people. Plus with conventional weapons the damage is done much slower, giving the respective leaders time to end the conflict. With nukes you are pretty much committed to total destruction.

It is my opinion that if any country used a nuclear weapon in this day and age, in less than 24 hours it would find its self without any allies and on the losing side of a world war. So I guess in that respect the MAD principal is still alive.

 

The truth of it has been pretty much said.

Why do you need MAD when you can simply have peace without them?

 

From my flatmate: "Because they're weapons."
Can't put it more simply than that....