All nations have a right to nuclear weapons

I'd just like to start with a quick thanks to my opponent for making this a strong and intriguing debate. I think this topic has a lot of meat to it, and you've shown that your side is worth defending as well. I thoroughly appreciate his contributions to this debate, and it's been a pleasure to take him on. With that, I'll launch into some crystallization (which will include the remainder of my rebuttal) and conclude. By the end of this debate, judges should be asking themselves two key questions: 1) What does an increased number of nuclear weapons in the world mean? 2) Are there countries that should not have nuclear weapons? So let's look at these individually. "What does an increased number of nuclear weapons in the world mean?" This has quite a few components to it. We have to look at the security of those weapons, Responsibility to Protect (R2P), and what a preponderance of nuclear weapons means for both rational and irrational actors, something I'll address on the second question. But before we can get into that, we have to establish what's actually happening by affirming this resolution. Affirmation means an increased number of nuclear weapons in the world, plain and simple. Pro has conceded that the number of these weapons in the world will increase, as will the number of countries with ownership of them. The fact that South Africa decided to take a different route doesn't change the fact that most countries have hung onto and will continue to hang onto their weapons. Nor does the fact that some nations haven't acquired and aren't interested in acquiring nuclear weapons affect that outcome substantially (though I would say South Korea is interested, especially given concerns about North Korea). Why do we care? Well, I've provided several important reasons to care over the course of this debate. I've discussed how an increased number of nuclear weapons in more hands increases the chance of nuclear war, and how other conflicts become more likely to erupt between countries due to the tension these create. I've argued that an increased number also increases access by non-state actors, thereby providing an increased opportunity for these people (who, again, lack any attachment to the state and therefore any reason to regard MAD as a problem) to get and make use of them. I've stated time and again that each additional nuclear power is another opportunity for an accidental launch, whether it's due to mechanical failures or human ones. The fact that accidents happen doesn't change the fact that they're more prone to happen when more opportunities are made available. I've also repeatedly emphasized R2P, which my opponent agrees is necessary, becomes impossible in any nation in a world where everyone has access to nuclear weapons. So far, this has gone uncontested. The main response that Pro brings to the fore here is that countries that currently have nuclear weapons are terrible too. He argues that MAD will solve for any possible strife, and that striving for equality should be paramount. I think I've already shown how MAD doesn't solve (thought I'll get more into that shortly), but the equality point is a bit amorphous. We still don't have a solid idea of why we should prefer equality, or what equality means in terms of outcomes. The outcomes Pro provided in R2 simply don't exist, and as such, we should not prefer equality over the measures of safety I've outlined here. It's great in theory, but when we're talking about the nuclear world, it fails to deliver and only increases existent harms. The presence of hypocrisy alone doesn't validate dramatically changing policy in this manner. "Are there countries that should not have nuclear weapons?" The reality is that there are countries that engage in far more of the harms that R2P should be working against. Even if voters are buying this idea that countries that currently own nuclear weapons engage in crimes against humanity, the fact remains that many of the countries that would be acquiring them are guilty of 2 or more of the 4 reasons for intervention. Genocide, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing aren't just crimes against humanity - they show a flagrant disregard for life in all of its qualities. There are simply too many nations that have engaged in these acts recently, and continue to do so. To allow them access to these weapons would allow that disregard for life to be expressed in the most glaring and devastating way possible. At the very least, nations that currently have internationally legal access to their nuclear weapons have drawn the line at human rights abuses. So no, it's not about superiority, which is an argument I haven't made in this debate. It's about realizing that these nations have a dangerous history that could extend into a dangerous present and future. Even if voters aren't buying that argument, I've shown that extending the right to nuclear weapon ownership to other nations that abuse their people or their neighbors, even if they're doing so to the same extent as current nuclear countries, only spells disaster. All of my arguments outlined under the first question above apply here as well. None of us have to trust any of the nations that currently have nuclear weapons in order to understand that spreading them further to other untrustworthy nations is only going to lead to grievous harm. So no matter what UN conventions have been signed by these nations (none of which are enforceable without the full support of the permanent Security Council, leading to those signatures functioning solely as token gestures)[1], the prospect of providing these supposedly "more civil countries" access simply outweigh any benefits Pro has ascribed. Even if this did showcase a change of heart, it doesn't change the actions that Iran continues to undertake to cause indirect harms to Israel through non-state actors, something that they most certainly haven't backed off on. But I think to bring the point home about rational and irrational actors, we have to look back at the examples. Pro finally provides a response about Iran and its actions, though he failed to notice that his own link shows that in the 1980's, Iran did invade Iraq. It was following Iraq's own invasion of Iran, but that doesn't change anything. The fact remains that Iran invaded one of its neighbors. More importantly, and this still goes cold dropped, Iran continues to funnel money and resources to non-state actors in the region like Hezbollah. Pro failed to counter my contention that they would similarly be likely to hand over a nuclear weapon to them, and, as I already outlined above, Hezbollah having a nuclear weapon is far worse than any nation having one, especially since they've shown a proclivity for giving their lives for their cause. No, it does not have anything to do with the specific religion. It has everything to do with fundamentalism. The reality is that fundamentalist groups control the government of Iran, as they also lead Hezbollah and other terrorist groups in the Middle East. There are fundamentalist Christian and Jewish groups that do dramatic harms, but they don't lead nations or sizable terrorist groups (and certainly not ones that are getting supplied by a legitimate state). So no, it has nothing to do with what god they believe in. It has everything to do with a willingness to put religious idealism at the fore in state policy. Sure, it's possible that nations like Iran will be the most secure with their nuclear weapons, but that would be in direct contradiction to their previous policies. And the same goes for North Korea, a nation led by a young man who has been told his whole life that he is a deity who should care mainly for his well-being over that of his own people. Comparisons to Nazi Germany don't do it justice, and the blatant disregard for any and all rights, plus the unwillingness to regard human life with much in the way of dignity, should be regarded as important.[2] These are not small issues, they are not subjective comparisons. These are real world concerns that are very blatantly apparent. That's not to mention the fact that North Korea's economy is in terrible shape, as I stated in R2, and that desperation will eventually push them towards an even more irrational state. To bring this point about rationality and irrationality home, this is really all I'd have to do " showcase that there are nations that have acted and will act irrationally. But I've taken it one step further. I've provided reasons why even rational nations can disregard MAD, making it completely unimportant. Recall that in R3, I stated several reasons why a perfectly rational state would choose to launch their nuclear weapons first. Whether it has more to do with the concentrations of human beings within a given region, or the reality that technology has made a response to a nuclear attack difficult if not impossible for many countries, rational states can very easily come to the conclusion that their attack will be more devastating than the reprisal. This means that, within this debate, we can easily dismiss MAD as irrelevant. It's not going to stop anyone, though irrational nations wouldn't have been deterred by it in the first place. So what does this all mean? It means that one of the two positions Pro utilizes for his arguments falls away completely. MAD is not going to do anything here. The only argument that Pro has left is this equality point, and he simply hasn't given a reason to prefer this ideal to the tremendous harms incurred as a result of a larger number of unstable nuclear powers. All of his impacts on this point are simply overwhelmed by the problems he creates. This is why you should vote Con in this debate. I leave it to my opponent to conclude. 1. http://www.eolss.net... 2. http://theweek.com...