Nuclear Weapons Present On The Planet Earth example essay topic

395 words
The Grapes of Wrath is usually described as a novel of social protest, for it exposes the desperate conditions under which one group of American workers, the migratory farm families, was forced to life in the 1930's. These were the people who, in the depths of the greatest economic depression the United States has ever seen, had to abandon their homes and their livelihoods. They were uprooted and set adrift because tractors were rapidly industrializing the Southern cotton fields and because erosion and drought were creating the Dust Bowl in wide areas of Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma. Of all of the social novels that came out of the great depression, and there were many such novels of protest, there were very few that have condemned man's inhumanity to man with the persistence, forcefulness and recurring vividness Steinbeck's epic work displays. The Grapes of Wrath is a strongly sustained social and political narrative that provides an accurate description of a critical time in American history. Why is nuclear proliferation such a sensitive issue?

The reason is that as of the early 1960's, there were enough nuclear weapons present on the planet earth to kill all the people in the world, and possibly even knock the planet out of orbit. Since that time, the United States, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and China have all declared themselves to be nuclear powers. With all of these countries expanding their military with the investment of governmental funds into nuclear weaponry, and machinery, the amount of nuclear weaponry present on the planet earth today has increased to at least 40,000, to 50,000 nuclear weapons. The power of these weapons is equal to that of one million Hiroshima bombs, or thirteen billion tons of TNT. This amount of TNT allows for three tons for every person living on the planet earth. The major problem, however, is not that there are 40 - 50 thousand indespensible weapons still in the world, the problem is that countries are still making more.

Nuclear proliferation, is the steady increase in numbers of nuclear devices, and weapons. This is a major problem in our world today, and is a factor in many of the world's conflicts. Of these nuclear weapons, there are many types, sizes, and yeilds of power.