Anti-war protest in New York on 7 July 1941

The situation is quite different today. The other side is a heavily-armed nuclear power.

Fear from scientists fleeing Hitler led to the creation of the atomic bomb. When Niels Bohr foresaw the coming nuclear arms race and the unwinnability of nuclear war in 1944, fear is what led to Churchill and FDR to dismiss his proposals that the United States share nuclear technology with the Soviet Union. And so we got the nuclear arms race that we were warned about. History shows us that these horrific situations with nuclear brinkmanship are avoidable, but we are too afraid to do the right thing.