I was a young junior high teacher during the Cuban missile crisis. We took the students out in the hall for drills to prepare for the real possibility that we would be attacked. I thought at the time that it was better to have the drills than not have them in case the missile’s guidance system was not quite accurate, but since we lived in a primary target all of us were almost certain to die if we were attacked. As I look back these decades later, it seems odd that life went on as normal. We were all apprehensive; we all knew that we were facing either instant death or a horrible, much slower death from radiation poisoning. Yet nobody left town. We all just kept going to work.
Fortunately, President Kennedy was able to communicate with Nikita Khrushchev and the two of them agreed to remove the nuclear threat in ways that allowed Khrushchev to maintain his dignity. Our lives were saved.
Growing up, we kept doing the drills. I guess that was supposed to make us feel like we could do something and weren't helpless in the face of a nuclear attack. It didn't. As you said, we all just kept going.
If there is a way for Putin to end this war he started without losing face, I don't see it. He went too far. Russia can be brutal about its transitions of power, but if that's how he has to be deposed, so be it. We do not need an example of a nuclear-armed country successfully imposing its will on the rest of the world by waving its nuclear sword. The next country to try it could be even more crazy about it.
I was a young junior high teacher during the Cuban missile crisis. We took the students out in the hall for drills to prepare for the real possibility that we would be attacked. I thought at the time that it was better to have the drills than not have them in case the missile’s guidance system was not quite accurate, but since we lived in a primary target all of us were almost certain to die if we were attacked. As I look back these decades later, it seems odd that life went on as normal. We were all apprehensive; we all knew that we were facing either instant death or a horrible, much slower death from radiation poisoning. Yet nobody left town. We all just kept going to work.
Fortunately, President Kennedy was able to communicate with Nikita Khrushchev and the two of them agreed to remove the nuclear threat in ways that allowed Khrushchev to maintain his dignity. Our lives were saved.
Growing up, we kept doing the drills. I guess that was supposed to make us feel like we could do something and weren't helpless in the face of a nuclear attack. It didn't. As you said, we all just kept going.
If there is a way for Putin to end this war he started without losing face, I don't see it. He went too far. Russia can be brutal about its transitions of power, but if that's how he has to be deposed, so be it. We do not need an example of a nuclear-armed country successfully imposing its will on the rest of the world by waving its nuclear sword. The next country to try it could be even more crazy about it.