Blog #9 Disarmament

According to the Global Post, this week a disarmament conference took place in Hiroshima, Japan. It was for foreign ministers, and for those countries part of the NPDI. It wasn't very high - status but a good step in getting countries on the same page as each other. They discussed things such as the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and the "nuclear umbrella" problem. 

This article seems to explain that although every country that's part of the NPDI can join for conferences, agreements can not always be made. The reason for this was to look over the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, but even though most countries agree that disarmament is crucial, it's a slow moving process. This article talks about the "nuclear umbrella" - this means that countries in treaties without nuclear weapons are protected by countries with them. This offers a dangerous incentive - one that doesn't encourage unarmed governments to encourage the armed was to use disarmament strategies. 

Another problem this article shows is that this conference was not upper - leveled. There are different statuses for meetings like this, and this particular one in Hiroshima, Japan, was more ministers, and mainly for countries without nuclear weapons. This particular meeting was also one that took place in a milestone location - Hiroshima has history with nuclear weapons. Clearly there are always meetings for nuclear disarmament, but it appears that that's what they always are. Not much gets done at them, except in war-torn or very poor countries where they have no option but to give up their weapons. However, dangerous countries or ones that have dangerous potential don't have incentives to give up their weapons completely.