Thirteen-year-old Tomiko Matsumoto was in school in Aki district (close to Hiro­shima) on August 6, 1945. She had no idea it would be a day she and her little world of her friends and family would change forever. She survived the bomb, but her young brothers and her mother did not. Neither Tomiko nor her family had anything to do with the war.

On August 11, 1945, two days after the bomb was dropped in Nagasaki, “in the ashes of their home, Dr Takashi Nogai discov­ered the bones of his wife beside her rosary beads.” A devout Cath­olic, he wasn’t a military man nor was he involved in planning and implementing the attack on Pearl Harbor. He hadn’t been conspir­ing with Germany to dominate the world either. He was in his own little world with his wife, and they too had nothing to do with the war (Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Paul Ham, 2011).

Nor did countless others who died and survived the A-bombs dropped in Hiroshima and Naga­saki on August 6 and 9 respec­tively. They were hit by a terrible weapon of mass destruction. A weapon so powerful that it had the capacity to destroy a whole city. A weapon so powerful that it left the survivors scarred both physically and mentally for the rest of their lives—the scars so severe that many survivors thought it would have been much better if they too had perished, just like their parents, children and friends. But they were the survivors, the hibakusha. And for a long time, they were untouchables.

You may very well say, what happened to those in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was sad and they didn’t deserve it. But what does it have to do with us living in Nepal in 2018, as if we are going to be hit by a bomb anytime soon? Fur­ther, both our neighbors have a stockpile of nukes and the “deter­rence” will dissuade them from ever using the weapon against each other. So we are pretty much safe and we have no reasons to be “paranoid” about a nuclear apocalypse.

But we have every reason to be paranoid and concerned. I am not saying it. The institution that is responsible for our sur­vival as a country and for our security, Nepal Army, believes that Nepal would be a lot safer in a world without nuclear weap­ons. Its Defense Doctrine of 2014 specifically calls on the govern­ment to champion the cause of denuclearization. It rightly views a nuclear war between the neighboring countries as a potential security threat. Is Nepal Army paranoid? No. Its fear is quite legitimate.

Many factors can trigger a nuclear war, including something as simple as “faulty intelligence.” If a country gets the idea that the other is about to nuke it, then it will try to preempt the attack. And you can never be sure of human reaction in the face of believable-but-faulty intelligence.

Further, today’s nuclear bombs are more destructive than the ones dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki 73 years ago. If our neighbors nuke each other, we will not be able to protect our­selves from the fallout effects.

Therefore, so long as there is something awesomely destruc­tive that let the insane leaders play God (or Satan) by unleash­ing hell on earth, we can nev­er feel secure. No sane people could. Nobody has to endure what Tomiko and Dr Nagai had to.

We take pride in the Buddha. We never tire of telling the world that the apostle of peace was born in Nepal. But taking pride in being the birthplace of Lord Bud­dha isn’t enough. We are weak, defense and economy wise. But we have immense spiritual power. After all we are the people who believe in the universal brother­hood of the Geeta and peaceful ways of the Buddha. We can, we must and we should be the ones doing all we can by taking on glob­al leadership to abolish nuclear weapons from the face of this earth. And it starts with us, you and me.

The first step in the right direc­tion would be to start a campaign to be signatory to the ratification of the UN Treaty on the Prohi­bition of Nuclear Weapons. (We have signed the treaty but we are not yet a signatory to ratifica­tion. That’s half-hearted. We are only deceiving ourselves.) Let’s not care what our nuclear armed neighbors and other big powers think, or give into their pressure. Let’s use our conscience and prac­tice what we preach to make our­selves and others safe. Others will soon follow.

For humanity’s sake, let’s for once be proactive.