As leaders from 53 nations gather in Seoul for the second Nuclear Security Summit, President Obama spoke of his ‘vision
of a world without nuclear weapons’. It’s a vision he described during his 2008 campaign, and which was later the
focus of his 2009 speech in Prague. Today, as then, he talked about the ‘obligation’ he feels to act on this in
strikingly personal terms:
Obama detailed his efforts to reduce America’s arsenal, to get other countries to reduce theirs, and to improve the security of nuclear material around the globe. ‘Step by step’, he said, ‘we come closer to the security and peace of a world without nuclear weapons’.‘I say it as a father, who wants my two young daughters to grow up in a world where everything they know and love can’t be instantly wiped out.’
But Obama’s opponents present a much darker vision of where his efforts will lead.
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