The Nuclear Summit

There have been some very positive development in the realm of nuclear weapons lately what with the US and Russia signing a new START treaty (although it is not ratified by the Senate yet), and the recent summit that happened in Washington D.C.

I've been reading a lot about safe guarding nuclear materials and waste to prevent the threat of nuclear terrorism. I've also been reading a lot about Iran and North Korea and how they could be nuclear threats in the future.

Iran and N. Korea are trying to get these technologies for various reasons, but they can all be boiled down to the two nations feel threatened and they want to be seen as being on equal footing with the other nuclear powers. The other nuclear powers obviously don't want them to have weapons. In my opinion there is one very simple way to eliminate the threat of nuclear terrorism, and to make sure Iran and N. Korea don't feel threatened by NATO's nuclear arsenal: eliminate nuclear weapons.

These weapons are horrible, terrifying things, and are good for nothing except destruction. They needlessly threaten other countries, like Iran and N. Korea, who then feel the need to develop their own, which simply increases the threat level in a region.

Right now the most volatile nuclear region is the Pakistan/India border. If a nuclear exchange breaks out between those two countries just 2 or 4 detonations is enough to wreck havoc on the global eco-system and millions would die from the resulting fallout and famine that would result. These modern nuclear weapons are a threat to the entire globe, not just a region, like was the case with the bombs dropped on Japan in 1945. The people in the US who are all hot-n-bothered for nuclear weapons are, frankly, lunatics. There is no "winning" if nuclear weapons are used; every one loses.

The only way to eliminate this global threat is to globally abolish all nuclear weapons. The US and Russia and China need to be leaders in this initiative. The new START treaty is a very good start but what is the next step?