"So called Nuclear..."
A Brief History of Nuclear Weapons & the Attempts to End Them
Rock University High School Critical Issues Forum 2018-19 Mini-Project Transcript
NICK: “So you know there's a good amount of tension between countries and this so-called ‘nuclear’, but what is nuclear and what can we do about it?"
JAMES: "Yeah, there has been a lot of talk about so-called “nuclear” recently due to tensions created by our president's actions and other countries actions."
JAMES: " An example country that has been taking steps towards a nuclear weapons program, that has been angering our president, is North Korea. They have been angry at each other over social media for a couple of years now. And their nuclear weapons program had developed to the point where they so called can strike the United States but its highly unlikely that they can and that's kind of their goal is to be able to strike the United States which, in all fairness to our president, is a concern."
NICK: "Yeah, and another aggressor recently has been Russia. Who is actually trying to develop hypersonic missiles that can pierce US defenses and possibly cause a nuclear strike on American soil, which would definitely cause some tensions between the countries, especially with the current relations between Russia and the United States, and we also are making enemies in the Middle East after pulling out of the Iranian Deal which was where we did not allow them to have a nuclear program and in return we lifted sanctions on their economy, and its actually gotten so bad for our European allies that they are trying to circumvent our sanctions and go behind us to keep money funneling into the government of Iran so that they don't restart their nuclear program."
JAMES: "Yeah, these countries that have been in the news like Russia, The United States, Iran, and North Korea either have a nuclear weapons program or have a developing nuclear program, but they are not the only countries who have a nuclear arsenal.
There's the United Kingdom, France, India, Pakistan, China, and Israel. All of these countries have nuclear weapons programs, it's just they're not in the news as often and they are not conflicting and as aggressive as some of the others. But the most interesting things is all the countries who use them or have access to them say they will only be used for defense. But if everybody is going to be using them for the defense what is the point in having them?"
NICK: "Yeah, what is the actual point of nuclear weapons?"
JAMES: “So, that brings me to the question what are nuclear weapons? And what is nuclear?"
NICK: "Well, nuclear refers to the science that has to do with the nucleus of an atom, and it can be used for peaceful and non-peaceful purposes, as we can definitely tell we focus on the non-peaceful uses of nuclear science which is mainly bombs, but the peaceful applications can be used for many things like more efficient energy production, medical sciences, and medical imaging which can really benefit our society."
JAMES: "Yeah, expanding on the bomb side of nuclear science or the non-peaceful, there are two types of nuclear weapons that are developed today, which are fission bombs which use the splitting of the atom to create a massive explosion and mass release of energy, but then there's also a fusion bomb or a thermonuclear bomb that when it detonates it detonates a fission reaction that detonates a fusion reaction and these bombs get much, much, much, much bigger than traditional fission bombs."
NICK: "Yes, but they are much less practical because you can mass produce a fission bomb but you can't mass produce a fusion bomb."
JAMES: "Exactly."
NICK: "But they were mostly just created during the Cold War to, you know, flex our countries muscles, just show the other countries that we have bigger bombs, we can destroy you better when in all reality it would've been the end of the world for both sides."
JAMES: "Yeah."
JAMES: "After the United States developed a nuclear weapon, came a period of time where the United States and Russia engaged in a Cold War."
NICK: "Yeah, this started when the United States entered world war two, and it truly kicked off in 1945 when the United States finished the creation of the nuclear bomb and dropped it on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which basically started the arms race between the Soviet Union and United States who wanted to get more and more nuclear weapons just so that they could secure their place in the world since they came out as the two major victors of the second world war."
JAMES: "Yeah, and these, as the victors, had the best technology of the time and then they were both pointing their weapons at each other as a “defense”, and then they realized there was a conflict of ideology. There was Communism vs Capitalism and in response, the United States of America presented the Truman Doctrine which was the policy of containment, which was meant to make Russia, essentially declaring war on Russia, a Cold War on Russia saying that we will not let you expand into any other countries, your way of government is bad and we will not let it expand, and then in response they defended themselves with the Warsaw Pact, saying they were going to strengthen their ties to all other Communist nations, and this Communism vs Capitalism, like kind of “Idealogical battle”, kicked off and was the main driving force of the whole war."
NICK: "Yeah, this led to instances like the Cuban Missile Crisis which was, we were at Defcon 2, there was actually a case where there was a submarine that was authorized to fire nuclear weapons and it needed the three admirals on board to fire it and only two of them agreed to it, one person stood between us, one person stood between modern day and the end of the world."
JAMES: "Yeah."
NICK: "And, you know, that threat is still present today..."
JAMES: "Yeah, Yeah, I can't say that the world is not on the brink of nuclear destruction, especially with current events that are happening that, like, if one nuclear weapon is fired you can guarantee that they will not just be a limited nuclear war, there will be a full-scale nuclear war between all nuclear-armed nations."
NICK: "Maybe there's, you know, that one person between us and nuclear war, and maybe this time we won't be that lucky."
NICK: "So, if nuclear weapons are such a big deal, what's been done about it?"
JAMES: "Well, there have been several steps towards nuclear non-proliferation, And the cessation of nuclear weapons to exist. The first step we took was the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Which stopped more countries from getting nuclear weapons, but allowed states who already had them to continue to have them. But, take steps towards eliminating them. And then there was the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty which was used to cover cracks of previous treaties that would allow nations to further develop nuclear weapons and test them. And it was, it banned, formally banned, all nuclear weapons, nuclear weapons explosions of every type everywhere. "
NICK: "More recently this led into the ban treaty, which took six years of debating, between, you know, many countries. None of them were nuclear powers though. And it was opened for signatures on September 20th of 2017, I believe, around that timeframe. And, so far its got 70 signatures and 20 ratifications but it needs 50 to go into effect."
JAMES: "I believe none of these are nuclear weapons states correct?"
NICK: "Yeah, none of these have been nuclear weapons states, they haven't even, they haven't been involved much, not even NATO countries. But, if it passed and we got all the nuclear weapons states to sign it, it would be the final treaty to end the whole saga of nuclear weapons."
JAMES: "Yeah, the only issue is getting those nuclear weapons states to willingly give up their nuclear weapons."
NICK: "That's a real challenge, especially with, you know, like we said earlier rising tensions between many of the countries it's just, its become more and more of an issue and, you know, we need to definitely buckle down for the long haul here, because its going to take a lot more negotiation."
JAMES: "From what I've heard is it's going to be an issue that not going to be solved recently unless we take dramatic action in the coming years, but over generations, I do see this issue being resolved through this treaty."
NICK: "I can definitely see people coming together eventually, and, really pulling through."
"This Podcast was created by the Rock University High School Critical Issues Forum team."
"We would like to give a Special thanks to our editor and Critical Issues Forum (CIF) team member Karl Anderson. Another special thanks go to our CIF teachers Stephanie Villarello and Erin Jensen."
"Thank you for listening!”
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