President Donald Trump has put the world one step closer to the “unimaginable catastrophe” with his actions against Iran, according to Newsweek columnistDavid Faris.
“President Donald Trump's reckless and illegal strikes on Iranian nuclear sites now threaten to blow up [80 years worth of work through the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT)],” Farris said.
Faris, who is an Associate Professor at Roosevelt University, added, “Trump's aggression is more likely to lead to what scholars call a ‘proliferation cascade’ than it is to stop Tehran's nuclear program.”
Breaking down the NPT, he said there are two components. One, don't build nuclear weapons. Two, work toward an “abolition“ of nuclear weapons.
Faris noted the second piece to the treaty is “much less discussed, component required the five signatories already in possession of nuclear weapons at the time the treaty was signed (the U.S., USSR, U.K., France, and China).”
Today, there are nine nuclear-armed countries, and the professor notes they all “have basically abandoned” the “abolition” part of the treaty.
Although these nine countries hold nuclear arms, former National Security Council staffer Jon Wolfsthal believes there are “40 additional states that are technically advanced enough to build nuclear weapons if they chose to do so."
Faris believes “Because the nuclear-armed countries have now gone decades without serious disarmament efforts, that trust [to abolish the weapon] was already wobbly.”
Now, Faris said, Trump’s bombing of an Iranian nuclear facility “has basically just destroyed [that trust].”
“A world with a growing number of nuclear powers is less safe and more prone to almost unimaginable catastrophe.” The professor later added, “That has been the driving principle of America's successful nuclear policy for decades, and with one capricious order, President Trump has inadvertently made the nightmare of a proliferation cascade much more likely.”