Berlin.
This week Barack Obama gave a nuclear disarmament speech at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin from behind six inches of bullet proof glass, enough glass to make it hard to see him in clear focus. I wonder about this choice, what it says to the world about American ideas on security, personal safety, and our trust in other countries. During his speech Obama said that the kind of nuclear threat we face now is not like the one of the fifty years ago, that Kennedy faced when he addressed Berlin, that we live in a safer, more secure world. Regardless of the undermining of his own words by the mammoth security wall in front of him, the world is not a safer place from nuclear weapons than it was fifty years ago. In the cold war era we worried about just two nations, now, we are told not to worry because just two nations have more than 300 warheads. Consider that. How many nuclear warheads does a country need to have before you worry about their chain of command and the decision making of their elected (or not) officials and their ability to make sound decisions? How safe can we be in a world where the President stands behind his own private Berlin Wall?
To learn more about nuclear weapons in the 21st Century visit the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs Website:
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