In the face of annihilation

The ongoing flare up in Middle East is dangerously inching towards a war of obliteration. When the residents of the cities – Tehran and Tel Aviv – are asked to evacuate, it is the first signal of that last danger. Shockingly, the inability of the global leader, the greed of military-industrial complex, the madness of narratives and the intoxication of power – all this is now serving us a deadly brew. Years back the US and Iran came close to striking a deal on this nuclear matter, but it didn’t finally happen. Guesswork, ground reports and high end analysis put aside, even a fine reading of the classified documents – whenever they are de-classified – may not conclusively tell us who played the spoilsport. But in varied degrees all contributed to the failure that is now morphing into a threat of extinction for cities. If reports are to be believed just before that fateful day, October 7, 2023, when Hamas carried out a deadly attack into Israel, the US-Iran talks we limping towards some significant progress. But suddenly everything changed for worse.

Between that day and now there were occasions when a likelihood of deescalation seemed real and the world heaved a sigh of relief. But nothing worked till we at hitting a dead end. As Israel struck Iran, killing topnotch military and nuclear leadership, and Iran struck back, raining Israeli sky with drones and missiles, some odd hitting land also, peoples around the globe are watching helplessly turn it all into an insane devastation.

God forbid if the war doesn’t stop, one shudders to even think what would come in its wake. Not that economy will crumble, not that systems will fall flat, not that borders will be violated – the very thing called life might disappear in some of the cities that hold millions of dreams, and carry life in its purity, innocence and absolute guiltlessness. Who is answerable to those people who never wanted this war?

Nukes are not about the pictures we have seen of it. It is something unimaginably devastating. If only someone takes the current lot of global leaders on a trip to Hiroshima and Nagasaki when Little Boy and Fat Man were dropped on these cities. That was the time when the world cried – Never Again. What, then, has brought us to this pass?