[ "The climate crisis, stark inequalities, conflicts and human
rights violations, and the personal and economic devastation caused by
the COVID-19 pandemic, have put our world under greater stress than it
has faced in our lifetimes."]
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WHY THE U.N. CHIEF SAYS WE ARE ‘ONE MISCALCULATION AWAY FROM
NUCLEAR ANNIHILATION’  
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Bill Chappell
August 2, 2022
NPR
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_ "The climate crisis, stark inequalities, conflicts and human rights
violations, and the personal and economic devastation caused by the
COVID-19 pandemic, have put our world under greater stress than it has
faced in our lifetimes." _

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres says we are facing "a time
of nuclear danger not seen since the height of the Cold War." His
remarks came at the 2022 Review Conference of the Parties to the
Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons at the, Ed
Jones/AFP via Getty Images

 

The world is now enduring greater stress than any time in recent
decades, according to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres. And
while humanity has so far avoided "the suicidal mistake of nuclear
conflict," he said, tensions are hitting new highs at a time when many
lessons of the past seem forgotten.

"Today, humanity is just one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away
from nuclear annihilation," the world's top diplomat said
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a U.N. conference on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons in New
York City.

It's not the first time such a dire warning has been issued about the
catastrophic risks posed by nuclear weapons. Here's a brief look at
why Guterres and others are raising the alarm now:

Global politics are in dire shape

"The climate crisis, stark inequalities, conflicts and human rights
violations, and the personal and economic devastation caused by the
COVID-19 pandemic, have put our world under greater stress than it has
faced in our lifetimes," Guterres said.

The U.N. leader also highlighted Russia's invasion of Ukraine, saying
we are facing "a time of nuclear danger not seen since the height of
the Cold War."

Russia has repeatedly threatened nuclear retaliation
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any country that directly interferes in his country's brutal invasion
of Ukraine.

Judging Russia's willingness to use a nuclear weapon, Fred Kaplan,
author of _The Bomb: Presidents, Generals, and the Secret History of
Nuclear War_, told NPR in March
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"there's a higher chance of something like that happening maybe than
any time since the Cuban missile crisis."

Nuclear arsenals are growing and being modernized

The high tensions make it more likely countries will look to increase
and modernize their nuclear holdings rather than reduce them,
according to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons,
or ICAN [[link removed]],
which won the Nobel Peace Prize
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2017.

"At the same time, all five nuclear-armed NPT
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treaty] member states are violating their disarmament obligations
under the treaty and increasing the risk of catastrophic nuclear war,"
ICAN executive director Beatrice Fihn said in a statement about the
U.N. conference.

The increases in weapons stockpiles are reversing years of progress
following the Cold War, Guterres said.

"States are seeking false security in stockpiling and spending
hundreds of billions of dollars on doomsday weapons that have no place
on our planet," he said, noting the prevailing atmosphere of
competition and distrust.

"Almost 13,000 nuclear weapons are now being held in arsenals around
the world," according to Guterres.

Even before the Ukraine crisis, the trend was well-established and
wide-ranging. Late last year, for instance, India tested a newly
updated version of its nuclear-capable ballistic missile — one of
several advances in its nuclear arsenal, as noted by the Nuclear
Information Project
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the Federation of American Scientists.

The Hiroshima anniversary is approaching

Guterres is poised to travel to Hiroshima this weekend to mark the
anniversary of the world's first nuclear attack, by the U.S. on Japan.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who is from
Hiroshima, addressed
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U.N. conference on Monday, calling on all nuclear-armed countries to
act responsibly.

Kishida voiced Japan's support for U.S.-Russia talks on potential
stockpile reductions, and he said his country "encourages the U.S. and
China to engage in a bilateral dialogue on nuclear arms control and
disarmament."

Kishida brought with him a folded paper crane, an homage to Sasaki
Sadako, the Japanese girl who survived the Hiroshima attack when she
was two years old but died of leukemia 10 years later. Her origami
cranes have become a symbol of the wish to live without the threat of
nuclear war.

Since the first U.N. non-proliferation conference in 1975, the roughly
month-long meetings have normally been held every five years. But the
pandemic forced the 2020 sessions to be postponed until now.

_Bill Chappell is a writer, reporter and editor
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leader on NPR's flagship digital news team. He has frequently
contributed to NPR's audio and social media platforms, including
hosting dozens of live shows online._

* nuclear power
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* international affairs
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* annihilation
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