Stop Worrying About Nukes John Mueller, Issues in Science & Technology

Stop Worrying About Nukes
John Mueller, Issues in Science & Technology

Calming Our Nuclear Jitters

An exaggerated fear of nuclear weapons has led to many wrongheaded policy decisions. A more sober assessment is needed.

The fearsome destructive power of nuclear weapons provokes understandable dread, but in crafting public policy we must move beyond this initial reaction to soberly assess the risks and consider appropriate actions. Out of awe over and anxiety about nuclear weapons, the world's super-powers accumulated enormous arsenals of them for nearly 50 years. But then, in the wake of the Cold War, fears that the bombs would be used vanished almost entirely. At the same time, concerns that terrorists and rogue nations could acquire nuclear weapons have sparked a new surge of fear

http://www.issues.org/26.2/mueller.html