Is Nuclear Disarmament our Future?

The aim of the paper is to scrutinize the idea of nuclear disarmament in the 21st century with rather realistic optic. Obama’s idea of the nuclear free world is supported by the arguments which accentuate the success of the Non-proliferation regime. Sure, nuclear disarmament has experienced certain success, but it would be wrong to presume that the development will continue in such pace and hence the Global Zero will be reached in our century. The paper analyzes some of the arguments which are rather against the idea of nuclear disarmament. First of all, a nuclear weapon has proved itself to be a very useful tool. There has not been an open conflict among major powers since the WW II. So why should be such a concept abandoned? Second, the Non-proliferation regime is weaker than it seems. The major powers, led by the USA, has not succeeded in persuading Iran or North Korea to abandon their nuclear ambitions, so it is unlikely that they would persuade the whole nuclear club to give up their nuclear arsenal. Third, but not the last, not all the nuclear states are members of the NPT which creates "holes" in institutional framework of nuclear disarmament. . The paper concludes that the idea of nuclear free world is slowly becoming an empty political notion as it has happened with other similar initiatives.