I was in grade school in Miami forty five years ago during the Cuban Missile Crisis. I remember vividly the "Atom Bomb Drills" in which the bell rang three times, air raid sirens went off, the teacher pulled the blinds and we got under our desks with our hands over our eyes and our heads between our legs so we wouldn’t be blinded by the flash. Blindness was the big fear that was impressed upon us by our teachers and our parents. We were scared but we were reassured that if we did these things, we would be Okay. I remember also that there were more and more absences from our classroom as students were taken out of school by their parents to prepare to flee for Jacksonville. My family stayed because my Dad said, "No damn commie is going to make me leave my home!" They had special prayer services at church. People stocked up on milk and toilet paper.
Of course, as I learned later, those drills and the preparations were useless because we would all have been obliterated in a second had the missile crisis come down to an actual exchange. It wouldn’t have mattered who started it, or which political system was better, or who was at fault; the world would have died in October, 1962. Those who supported a nuclear strike and those who opposed it would all be dead—long these forty five years.
So words cannot express or even begin to describe my shock, outrage, and outright terror as a result of Senator Clinton’s comments about a swift, nuclear response to a "what if" scenario of Iran attacking Israel. I cannot believe people are even discussing such an event. There will be no survivors in a nuclear exchange. During the Cold War, the deterrent effect was called MAD—Mutual Assured Destruction. The idea was that no one would start a nuclear exchange because both sides would be destroyed and the damage would be global. It is not just a question of surviving the initial blast but of surviving the aftermath as well.
People who want to debate the issue of whether to nuke Iran (or any other country)in a hypothetical essay question scenario ought to first watch two movies: the 1959 version of "On The Beach" and an even more frightening movie "Testament" from 1983. Neither of these movies is hopeful. Neither has a happy ending. Nuclear war does not have a happy ending. Nuclear war should not be romanticized. That stupid and dangerous series "Jericho" does not reflect the reality that isolation in Kansas or anywhere else would not protect the survivors from the result of nuclear fallout and nuclear winter: a long, painful death from radiation sickness and starvation in a never ending, freezing, polluted night.
Nuclear war is not something to joke about (bomb, bomb, bomb Iran--hello John, are you listening?). Nuclear war should never be politicized in a "what if" scenario. One does not pander to a real or imagined interest group for votes by hawking a nuclear response to a hypothetical question--there will be no more elections after a nuclear exchange. One does not show one’s patriotism by promoting a nuclear response to a hypothetical question--there will be no countries left.
Once one side in a conflict politicizes this issue, the other side feels compelled to politicize this issue. I am not talking about candidates here. I am talking about countries. The result is escalation rather than resolution of conflict. If you think the war in Iraq is recruiting tool for Al Qaeda, consider how much more recruitment propaganda Senator Clinton’s comments will provide.
Her comments reflect an incalculable misunderstanding of the effect that a nuclear exchange would have on our country and the world. The fact that Senator Clinton would bring up such a scenario while trying to garner votes in a political context shows that she is desperate, unthinking, and unqualified to be President of a book club, much less the United States. Women who care about their children's futures do not propose nuclear war as a response to any question about security or foreign policy.
To all voters in Pennsylvania who read this diary: Don’t listen to the predictions—just remember that every vote counts and if Barack wins your town or precinct by one vote (as he did in my town Catlett) or by one thousand votes, we will be making the world just a little bit safer. The change we seek is not just political or social. It is also nuclear.