Perhaps, it seems, international diplomacy has arrived at the dead end in the present day, if not a total collapse, as clouds of a horrifying conflict are hovering over the planet Earth amid tensions among different blocs over the Russia-Ukraine war and around various other critical flashpoints.
As the Russia-Ukraine war is now in its seventh month, the clamour of a nuclear war is wide and clear. Last week, United States President Joe Biden did not fall short of remarking that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s threat to use nuclear or biological weapons in Ukraine has brought the world closer to a nuclear Armageddon than any time since the Cold War, which spanned over at least four decades, and the 1962 Cuban Missile crisis.
The US President’s remarks on “Armageddon” and that Putin was not joking when he talked about the use of tactical nuclear weapons have renewed concerns about the world’s future prospects.
It is not misplaced to say that instead of taking to serious diplomatic effort to stop the war, the United States and allies in Europe and NATO resorted to pump more and more funds and ammunition to grease the war machine and to teach a lesson to Russia and its leader Putin to the first large scale land grab since the World War Two.
With the war raging in Ukraine, and the Russian forces facing the prospects of losing, other potential flashpoints are also clearly visible to test global diplomacy.
Tensions between Beijing and Washington over Taiwan are one such flashpoint that can erupt any time. China claims Taiwan to be its breakaway province and to be re-occupied with force, if necessary, and the United States says that her forces would defend the island nation with all its means and might.
The other flashpoints are South China Sea, North China Sea, Korean Peninsula, Japan and North Korea, China and the US, Iran’s nuclear capabilities and the world’s big powers, Turkiye and the Nordic nations, Europe and Turkiye, the Middle East, African continent, Arab-Israel conflict, China and Europe, and the list goes on.
With all blocs visibly and clearly divided, the military and maritime exercises by the world’s navies and armies and war preparations are enough to send shivers down the spine of the humanity. The world’s nations should take stock of the situation and give another chance to diplomacy to save the planet from total annihilation.
