Right now the world is shocked at the devastation caused by a massive explosion in the port of Beirut, Lebanon. Hundreds dead and thousands injured, the explosion destroyed the port as these pictures show. Yet the explosion was only equivalent to several hundred tonnes on TNT. 75 years ago the US armed forces dropped nuclear bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima & Nagasaki that were dozens of times more powerful than the explosion in Beirut and tens of thousands died immediately and more in the aftermath. If you want to find out what might happen if such a blast happened near where you live then take a look at the Nukemap.

In 1945 only one nation had nuclear weapons (USA), 75 years later nine nations have them (USA, Russia, UK, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel & North Korea) and at least a few more would get them if they could (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey). This should not be seen as a step forward. Although the world has been lucky (and luck is the right word) to have avoided nuclear confrontation, it seems the threat is growing not diminishing.

Every war is a tragedy and every war is awful because we ask people to kill and be killed. The Second World War changed many things but one significant shift was the decision to treat civilians as legitimate military targets or at least that their deaths were acceptable in light of a military objective. The armed could attack the unarmed and no distinction would be made. No chance now of a Rahab sticking out a red cloth to indicate whose side she was really on when the firebombs or nuclear bombs drop from the sky.

Immoral

I believe the use of nuclear weapons to be immoral because no matter how ‘targeted’ or ‘smart’ they are, they will indiscriminately kill civilians. If a war must be fought then there are ways to fight that war that should not betray our fundamental ethics. This is the Just War theory. It’s why we have war crimes and hold soldiers & leaders to account if during a war they commit crimes such as rape & torture.

These ethics are why we pursue war criminals and why calling some wars – genocides matter. A nuclear bomb is designed and intended to destroy beyond the target it falls on (even the small ones) and because it is nuclear it creates significant damage and death for a long time afterwards – which is why no one sane is rushing back to live in the Chernobyl area. Each person who is obliterated, or has their skin melted off was made in the image of God and their indiscriminate murder is unacceptable. While you can find plenty of war in the Bible, murder was, last time I checked, frowned upon.

As Mark Galli wrote in Christianity Today in 2017,

we stand in that stream of Christians who find no justification for the use of nuclear weapons. This is not a politically radical view. Some of the most conservative of Christians and politicians, including evangelist Billy Graham, have also concluded that nuclear weapons are inherently evil or, to not put too fine a point on it, “totally irrational, totally inhumane, good for nothing but killing, possibly destructive of life on earth and civilization”

https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2017/august-web-only/use-of-nuclear-weapons-is-inherently-evil.html

I think being a Christian compels me to be against nuclear weapons. Jesus took away my option to play real politik and find ways to use nuclear weapons when he told me to ‘love my enemies’ and dropping nuclear bombs on them doesn’t quite fit that notion of love. As I’ve said before,

It shouldn’t be hard to say that we believe Jesus would be against the indiscriminate killing of hundreds of thousands of people, the destruction of the environment and the risk that millions more might die. So let’s say it.

https://thesimplepastor.co.uk/christians-should-not-be-confused-about-nuclear-weapons/

Even if a war must be fought (and I do believe that sometimes they must) then we are to constrain ourselves as much as possible in the execution of the war so that we neither dehumanise or are dehumanised by the choices we make.

Illegitimate

This simply means that we should strive for them to be without justification, that in essence it’s cheating and everyone knows it. We despise the drug cheats in sport and so it seems somewhat odd that we can find ways to make nuclear weapons sounds reasonable when they are in fact anything but.

There are those, like Philip Jenkins¹ who repeat the argument that has been since the bombs were dropped, that not only was the bombing militarily justifiable but also morally justifiable. I think that argument is wrong on both counts.

Illegal

It would help if it was as clear as we could make it as clear as possible that the use of nuclear weapons is illegal. Which is one reason why I’ve begun writing about it but also have signed up to support nuclear disarmament and joined campaigns to make the use of nuclear weapons against international law. 50 nations are needed to ratify the treaty and the current number is at 43. I join this even though I don’t believe any nation that currently has nuclear weapons will ever give them up. I’ve joined a cause I believe, in part, to be futile because it is absolutely the right thing to do.

I want to strongly urge you to take some time to read the stories of the Hibakusha (the survivors of the bombs) and consider their words and think through the implications of these weapons. These remarkable men and women have become lifelong campaigners for peace. We, you, should join them.

1. I’ll attempt a bit of history in another post to respond to his challenges on the alternatives [↩]