Seventy-seven years ago, a group of scientists created a symbolic Doomsday Clock to measure humanity’s proximity to self-destruction, or “midnight”. The hands move closer to – or further away from – midnight, depending on what existential threats exist at that particular time. Addressing the UN general assembly last year, the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, announced that the clock had moved to 90 seconds to midnight, declaring that humanity was perilously close to catastrophe. “This is the closest the clock has ever stood to humanity’s darkest hour,” he said. “We need to wake up – and get to work.” Guterres named three perilous challenges. One, extreme poverty. Two, an accelerating climate crisis. And three, global nuclear war.
“Lie flat in a ditch and cover the exposed skin of the head and hands.” In 1980, Margaret Thatcher’s government published a pamphlet, Protect and Survive, advising people what to do in the event of a nuclear attack. In what was in essence a DIY handbook, people were instructed to hide under a table, place bodies of dead relatives in another room or, if outside, lie on the floor and hope for the best. Adopting an optimistic attitude toward our extinction, the 32-page booklet was ridiculed by a population that knew there was no survival kit for nuclear annihilation.
The government no longer distributes booklets that advise us how to survive nuclear war. Instead, it buries its head in the sand entirely, turning a blind eye to the fact that we are getting closer and closer to midnight. After a period of gradual decline that followed the end of the cold war, the number of operational nuclear weapons has risen again. There are now more than 12,500 warheads around the world, with 90% belonging to Russia and the United States alone.
Which brings us to Keir Starmer’s most recent speech. “National security will always come first,” he said, as he pledged to increase defence spending and update Britain’s nuclear arsenal. He is right that security is important, but endless escalation is not the answer. What about standing up to the fossil-fuel giants jeopardising the security of our planet? Or abolishing the two-child benefits cap to end atrocious levels of food insecurity across our country? If he really cared about global insecurity, he would defend a foreign policy of peace and human rights, to ensure we get on with our neighbours in pursuit of a more stable world.
Ever since Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, many of us have warned of the rising risk of nuclear escalation – a risk that was heightened last year when Russia announced plans to halt participation in New Start, the last remaining nuclear arms control treaty with the US. In a recent worrying development, Kyiv intelligence sources have reported that a Ukrainian drone has targeted a long-range radar deep inside Russia, the primary function of which is to alert the security forces of a nuclear attack.
It is estimated that a nuclear war between Russia and the US could kill 200 million people in the near term. The former defence secretary Ben Wallace has previously said he expects the UK to be at war by the end of this decade, which is used as a basis for a continued increase in our already bloated defence budget. The Labour party has also signalled it will raise defence spending. But why can’t our media ask politicians some simple questions: what are you doing to prevent the descent into a protracted, all-out-war with Russia? Why can’t you learn from Latin American and African countries and establish zones of peace?
Meanwhile, nuclear threats have loomed over the Middle East because our political leaders lack the ability and willingness to facilitate de-escalation and diplomacy. Our government could have called for a ceasefire in Gaza from the very beginning. They instead ignored warnings from the anti-war movement for de-escalation – and came far too close to an all-out conflict with Iran. Even without the involvement of more global players with nuclear capabilities, the human consequences of such a war would have been catastrophic for the entire world. Remember, doomsday need not be nuclear for it to be an extinction-level event; the first two months of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza produced more greenhouse gases than the annual emissions of 20 of the world’s most climate-vulnerable countries combined. The only winners are the arms companies making huge profits from death and destruction.
Many justify their entertainment of the prospect of mass extinction with the myth of nuclear deterrence. There are several examples that show the threat of nuclear retaliation has failed to deter an invasion. And there are several factors to explain why, when war has been averted, it was not the threat of destruction that got people to the negotiating table. Ultimately, we should not have to debate the failures of deterrence theory. Just speaking to the descendants of the survivors of Hiroshima or Nagasaki – known as the hibakusha – should be enough to dissuade our political class from their red-button grandstanding.
Some may say that war is a bad time to talk about nuclear disarmament. In reality, there is no better time to do so. If the next government wants to be a global leader, it would advance the cause for nuclear disarmament by signing the treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons, which bans the development, production, possession, use or threat of use of nuclear weapons. Currently, it cannot even honour the treaties it has already signed. Our government claims it is still committed to the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons (signed by Harold Wilson in 1968), but its stockpiles speak louder than words.
Security is not the ability to threaten and destroy your neighbour. Security is getting on with your neighbour. It’s giving children a habitable future. It’s ensuring people have a roof over their head. And it’s when everybody has enough resources to live a happy and healthy life. A report from 2020 calculated that the government spent £8,300 every minute on nuclear weapons that year. Imagine if we instead spent that money on renewable energy, social housing, public healthcare, schools and lifting children out of poverty?
Many of us grew up with the real and terrifying threat of nuclear destruction during the cold war. I don’t want our children learning how to duck and cover in preparation for its return. Those who beat their chests in the name of national security must know that, in the event of a nuclear war, nobody wins. If our politicians care about the legacy they leave behind, they may want to consider the following possibility: if they carry on down this path, there may not be anybody around to remember them at all.
Jeremy Corbyn was leader of the Labour party from 2015 to 2020
Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
