Doomsday Is Only 2 Minutes Away

Daniel R. DePetris

Security,

Human civilization can still save itself before a combination of unregulated state-to-state competition, poor leadership, miscalculation, warming temperatures, food scarcity, desires for hegemony, or any of the other frailties of the human race contribute to a global apocalypse. But it won’t occur by the forces of nature.

The scientists, physicists, and nuclear experts at the esteemed and internationally-renowned Bulletin of Atomic Scientists delivered a shot to the world’s gut on January 24. With nuclear states investing large sums of money in nuclear modernization programs, current arms control agreements slowly dying, and the perils of climate change becoming ever more apparent, the Bulletin has set the “Doomsday Clock” to two-minutes to midnight. In layman’s terms, the world is the closest it has ever been to an extremely perilous catastrophe since 1953, when the former Soviet Union exploded its first hydrogen bomb and NATO and Warsaw Pact forces were staring each other down in Germany, missiles ready.

In the words of former Secretary of Defense William Perry and former California Governor Jerry Brown, “a new Cold War is underway - one equivalent to the most dangerous year of the first Cold War. Once more, we're putting at risk the survival of civilization.”

Powerful and downright terrifying words indeed.