90 seconds to Doomsday, no thanks to those with the upper hand

 

There’s this thing called the Doomsday Clock. No, it’s not a real clock hanging off an old tower somewhere. It’s a virtual one that doesn’t exist physically except in people’s minds.

You would be wondering – who in their right mind would invent and keep a clock with such a macabre name? Don’t they have anything better to do? Is the clock on TikTok (and does it dance)?

It exists in the mind of a bunch of nuclear geeks through a publication called the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. That, by the way, is a brilliant name for a band if you’ve any musical talent – and an even more brilliant name if you’ve none.

The clock now stands at 90 seconds to midnight. If the clock ever strikes midnight, that means the bad stuff has hit the fan and the world is burning: somebody has started a nuclear strike, somebody else has replied, and we’re all in a world of hurt, assuming we’re not lucky enough to perish immediately.

According to the clock we’re now closer to a global conflagration than we’ve ever been since the Korean War in the 1950s. Had the world gone to war then, it would’ve certainly turned nuclear, and it would’ve been MAD – Mutually Assured Destruction, upon all sides.

Since the “clock” was set up in 1947, ninety seconds to midnight is the closest the world has come to doomsday. That is rather unnerving to say the least, even if in reality, if anybody knows at all what reality is nowadays; it could very well be 90 hours, or 90 days, or even 90 weeks, but not 90 months and certainly not 90 years.

Life hasn’t felt as perilous as it is lately, especially for those of us who grew up in the relatively calm times of the last few decades under the Pax Americana, enjoying the “peace dividends” of the triumph of capitalism over communism.

True, there’s the constant low-level worry about the Middle East dragging us into World War III. But most of the conflicts there had been contained within its borders, and when Israel and Egypt, mortal enemies for decades, signed a peace treaty, it felt that perhaps the fever had broken.

Israel has since signed more peace treaties; even those with whom it didn’t sign any treaties, with the exception of Iran and its friends, seemed exhausted by the constant hostility and were amenable to living and letting live.

Where did it begin?

But the original sin (if I may be permitted to appropriate, rather inaccurately, these loaded words) lies in the question of who owns the land between the Jordan river and the Mediterranean sea which hasn’t been properly addressed. And the time to address it has perhaps passed, and may not come around again for a very long time.

There’s never been as much desperation in the region as there is now. In the old days, there would be the occasional conventional wars, mostly won by the Israelis, followed by a period of calm, or as after the latest war in 1973, actually followed by a formal and official peace.

But it’s different now, and there are literally loads of people on both sides for whom a total war is preferable, either out of years of anger and pain, or out of some misguided idea of how humans should conduct their affairs in these holy lands.

I could have said go and fight, and may the best men and women win. But it’s not that simple, as it won’t be a fair fight (especially if there are nukes involved), and there are moral issues involved too, which you’d agree even if your moral issues are not the same as mine.

I remember a person saying regarding the decades long “troubles” between the Catholics and the Protestants in Northern Ireland, that if you were to be born where they were born, and were taught what they were taught, you would believe what they believe.

There’s a satisfying cadence to the words of course, and I think most people would agree with them. If more people, especially those in power, agree with them, then perhaps peace would have a chance, there and in any other flashpoints in the world.

But putting your feet into somebody else’s shoes has never been an easy proposition. We seem conditioned to believe that our own feelings are more important and unique, meaning that even if others walked in our shoes, somehow they still wouldn’t understand us.

As we Malaysians would say, “if like that cannot lah”.

Who should take the blame?

What this particular Malaysian is trying to say is that conflicts are often avoidable if we make the effort to put ourselves in the other side’s shoes. But at the same time, that doesn’t mean we’re all therefore equally guilty, or equally blameless.

In my mind, the guilty one, or the guiltier one, is the more powerful of the two sides. The more powerful are those with the more options, the ones who are able to make concessions because they are strong, and the ones who have less fear of the other side. In other words, the ones who should have been able to think and act more rationally.

When Israel finally became the region’s top dog in the 1980s – when it no longer was in any practical danger of having its existence snuffed out, when “protecting its legitimate borders” meant it could choose to protect any area it chose to call its own, when there were many good people willing to help broker peace – the Israelis chose not to go for peace, but go for land instead.

The result is out there for all to see on our TV screens day and night. Both sides have become feral. Both sides have redefined what humanity is by dehumanising the other, whether civilians or not, making killing them easy and necessary.

And yet one side has overwhelming power, including the nukes. The next time the atomic geeks adjust the Doomsday Clock, expect it to have crept closer to midnight because of bad choices made in the past by the side that then had the upper hand. - FMT

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.