Nuclear Nearby

So today i'm reading the news on my ipod touch as usual, and I come across this story about contingency plans for a Nuclear Attack.
I didn't get very far--I'll admit I was interrupted by a friend happening to join me for lunch--but I was shocked and saddened to see that these government officials seem to believe that a nuclear attack is in our near future--as in, in the next 50 years or so. Somewhere in the next century, we will have another attack killing millions, spreading radiation, and perhaps destroying a nation.

It sucks! What's so weird is that all I could think about was this episode of Golden Girls about the Cold War that was going on at the time. In the show, Rose writes this letter about the promise of nuclear war always heavy in the air, and how her girl scouts (or whatever they were) are so concerned that they won't make it; that they won't survive what is sure to come. It ends up being funny, of course, because her letter is mistaken for a child's, but in so many ways the same fears are coming to light today.

I recently did research for the 80s political climate for a TV series I'm working on, and I was so upset to write updates of the Cold War, to see how much fear was generated just, it seems, for the sake of ego or in order to name on final, ultimate powerful country on the planet. Greater and greater threats seem like fights with my sister: we keep one-upping each other, always thinking that the other one started it, but never really knowing who was the initiator, and of course it doesn't really matter. An ego squabble multiplied by billions, and incorporating millions of lives in the booty of who gets to win. If winning means killing, then I don't think it's ever winning.

Of course, terrorism is a different story. If I remember my education correctly (which I fully admit that I may not), Islamic terrorists often see us as not being human--as not being like them. They believe that we deserve to be massacred, and can justify to themselves and their supporters a million times over why this isn't murder, and why it's so intrinsically important that complete strangers, living completely different lives, die for this cause. They think their cause is worth as many lives as it takes to make a point.

Personally, I disagree. All I can do is love them, and hope they see our love as real enough to stop from killing us. And wonder what it could take, what could possibly happen to these martyrs that makes them willing to kill, and die, for it? And again I am reminded of Anne Frank, and the holocaust.

Once humanity has been stripped away, how can you give it back?