The other reality is that we can’t trust many leaders who have nukes to actually go through with removing all their missiles from their arsenals. It is interesting to see the nuclear proliferation between the US and the Russians after WW2. I think it is inherent in the heart of mankind to lean toward destruction, sadly. And being a US citizen and serving in the US Air Force, working with spy planes, we must be ready to confront evil dictators with the help of our allies.

When you study WW1 and how it started, you get the sense that nations like Germany, with all their cultural achievements, had leaders at the time who were just waiting for the right moment to strike. When Austria began shelling Serbia the Germans knew it was just a matter of time before other nations would strike and so they struck first. And that started a horrific war of untold decimation. The Russians at one point were losing 250,000 men a month! Just catastrophic levels of casualties on all sides. It became a meat-grinder war, I think Churchill called it, taking over 18 million lives and 23 million wounded.

And the second world war was far worse. So when you consider conventional vs nuclear war, it is clear that given all their destruction power, nukes have stopped the course of man’s propensity to fight. At least on a global warfare scale. There needs to be equilibrium amongst the world’s greatest powers and unfortunately, that means building a nuclear arsenal that matches others. Remember, Khrushchev had said in 1960 that he wanted to bury the west. And he had no fondness for JFK after their last meeting in Vienna in 1961. JFK’s last words to Khrushchev was, “It is going to be a cold winter.” Chilling, sorry for the pun, words indeed.

Truman is the only man in history to use nuclear weapons on their enemies. Even the men who created the bomb were conflicted about the moral repercussions. Oppenheimer was especially worried over the move to bigger and greater nukes. He has the incredibly chilling remarks about the bomb: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb13ynu3Iac

Truman did, I think, what was right. Millions of more people would have died if he had not bombed Japan. So while it was a terrible thing, it was the best solution at the time and given the situation.
So I do not see another option at this point in human history. If Truman had not kept up pace with Stalin then the Russians would have had the upper hand and a man like Stalin would take his power and use it to take over the world. Nukes are horrendous but they are needed in a fallen world.

Come again Lord Jesus, come again.