Prolific

Today celebrates the 61st anniversary of the first ever use of nuclear weapons. The United States of America dropped two nuclear weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) and Nagasaki (August 9, 1945). The death toll was monstrous with hundreds of thousands killed. This was the first and only use of nuclear weapons in human history. Will it be the last, a stain on America's self-proclaimed righteousness? This is worth considering as all our small lives happen, still, under the shadow of the atom bomb.

If you're interested in learning more about the bizarre history of nuclear weapons research I urge you to visit PBS's online nuclear proliferation map. It's a bit short on analysis but at least it covers all the major events and times. Though the map omits it, one shouldn't forget that both the United States and the Soviet Union conducted an obscene amount of nuclear tests until the early 1990s.

Did you know that Canada most likely supplied the nuclear fuel needed for the first two explosions? Are we responsible for Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Also Canada had operational control over between 250 and 400 nuclear warheads following the second world war. Canada was therefore a nuclear weapons state. After the US, are we not the second most in denial and self-righteous nation on earth?

According to the map, the second state on earth after the US to open a nuclear weapons program was Switzerland. Yes tiny Switzerland. Protecting all those dictators millions requires the biggest guns I suppose; maybe they didn't want to give up all that looted Nazi gold without a fight. I'm sure this note says more about Switzerland's current openness than it does about the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union's slowness. After witnessing the destructive power of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki blasts, they probably instantly founded programs but, as with all things nuclear, secrecy was the first priority and remains so.

Israel, as I've mentioned elsewhere, challenges the UK, France and China for the third most advanced and prolific nuclear power in the world; this is a fact and one that shouldn't be forgotten. South Africa benefited most from Israel's nuclear know-how, conducting joint tests and even constructing a number of bombs; they dismantled them quickly at the end of Apartheid lest uppity blacks get their hands on them. Sweden even had a clandestine nuclear program well into the 1970s. It's riveting reading.

And if you thought nuclear weapons were part of a by-gone age you can forget about it. Forget Iran and North Korea, George W Bush has declared that he would use nuclear weapons first and his country is modernizing their nuclear arsenal as I type. The nuclear option never wasn't one. The only country ever to use the power of the atom in war is likely to be the next country to do so again. Why not tell him what you think before it's too late?