Terrorism: Weapons of Mass Destruction — WMD

Weapons of mass destruction (WMD) pose a viable threat to mankind.  Although there is no ideal solution in eradicating or limiting terrorist threats involving WMD attacks, there may be one practical way to finding such a solution.  I think that the practical route would involve continuous efforts to curtail, and essentially make defunct, the production/retention of such weapons and the cultivation of their agents.

Out of the three types of WMDs, nuclear weapons have the propensity to destroy the most targets and kill a lot of people with instantaneous results after a successful detonation.  This is something chemical and biological weapons cannot achieve in such a short time frame.

Although, nuclear weapons carry the risk of a tangible attack, chemical and biological weapons are capable of killing nearly in an intangible manner.  Often times, such attacks are categorized when it is too late.  This is mainly due to the fact that symptoms of chemical or biological agents within the body don’t show up right away in victims.

Hence, a constant effort to remove stockpiles of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons is essential.  We are not dealing with weapons of the future.  What we’re dealing with is old technology which should fuel a much more vigorous counter terrorism effort in order to eliminate such weapons.  There was, and still is, a lot of research done on the functions of many biological and chemical agents, and nuclear tests have been executed previously in order to understand the weapons’ lifespan and its ability to cause damage (i.e. blast radius, radio active fallout, projections of biological weapon’s reach, and etc.).

I think that more stringent inspections need to be done, and heavy consequences should be imposed on countries that do not cooperate.  This would have to be done with the help of NATO, UN, and other allied countries.  Such an effort needs to be continuous and not a continual effort.

I know that world peace would be the panacea for all worldly woes, but I feel strongly about the level of success that can be achieved with collaborative sweat. Although the aforementioned paragraphs do not contain the ideal solution, it is the practical solution for the present times.

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