Slaying the Atomic Dragon: In Favor of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons

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November 12, 2019

Today, September 26, is the International Day for the Total Abolition of Nuclear Weapons.

This day, first proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 2013, draws attention to the international commitment to global nuclear disarmament by the majority of the world’s nations as expressed in Article 6 of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It also highlights the lack of progress by the nine nuclear nations who hold the rest of the world hostage with their nuclear arsenals.

Albert Einstein said in 1946, “The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our mode of thinking and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.”

This drift has perhaps never been more perilous than at the present time. With careless rhetoric of threatened use of nuclear weapons, fire and fury, and total destruction of other nations, the world has recognized that there are no right hands to be on the nuclear button. Total abolition of nuclear weapons is the only response.

opening day of the UN General Assembly last week on September 20, the Treaty was opened for signature. There have now been 53 nations who have signed the Treaty, and three who have ratified the Treaty. When 50 nations have finally ratified or formally adopted the Treaty it will go into force 90 days thereafter thus making nuclear weapons illegal to possess, stockpile, use or threaten to use, test, develop or transfer, just as all other weapons of mass destruction have been.

Robert Dodge is a family physician practicing in Ventura, California. He is the Co-Chair of the Security Committee of National Physicians for Social Responsibility. He is the President of Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles.

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