WHAT’S EVERYONE SO WORRIED ABOUT?
I don’t understand, on June 12th a million people were walking together through the streets of New York saying, ‘Stop the Arms Race!” What’s everyone so worried about?
They’re worried about the increasing possibility of nuclear war because at least six nations now have nuclear weapons. And 90% of these are held by either the Soviet Union or the United States—50 thousand in all. It means that if we dropped one Hiroshima size bomb every minute, 60 minutes an hour, 24 hours a day, every day, the explosions would not stop for two years. And missiles carrying nuclear bombs can cross the Atlantic in less than thirty minutes.
They’re also worried because control over nuclear weapons depends on erratic international politics, the stability of world leaders, and the people and computers at Command Headquarters. Computer error has already brought our nuclear forces to a state of alert many times. So, knowing that we are thirty minutes, or less, from extinction by nuclear war—a war which could be triggered by declaration, madness, or accident—makes a lot of people nervous.
But I live in Queens, and if we are attacked I plan to take the
