Resolution Days

THREE GENERATIONS had passed since the beginning of the new century and for each, the struggle for survival had become safer and saner. But disappointingly, it had not come without a high cost and, of course, it had not come without first a crisis. Twenty years into the new century, critical food shortages had placed unbelievable pressure on several governments to support and feed their people. Food rioting had started in areas where the shortages were causing pain and suffering. As the wealthier world watched, mass hunger and starvation had occurred in many areas and to many peoples throughout the world. It was severe, it was intense, it was devastating. And to some, it was something that they could no longer endure or tolerate.

While several of the more developed nations were still able to keep the life-sustaining levels of foodstuffs on hand for their populations, this bred an even stronger contempt from the have nots toward the haves, from the poor toward the rich. And in that one corner of the world, in that one desperate moment, a core of individuals planned the unthinkable and dedicated themselves to carry it out. With their backs against the wall, with nothing left to lose, they wanted revenge and they wanted to even the score. A nuclear weapon in the hands of such a group could only have negative and very serious consequences.

These perpetuators would become the source of the world’s first ‘loose nuke’ but they were determined to give it someone else’s ownership. This highly technical, highly political faction had succeeded in creating the appearance of a nuclear attack on another country by one of its enemies. And before the deception was uncovered, the two countries retaliated with nuclear strikes of their own, coming down on a major city in each nation.

Three atomic weapons had been unleashed upon the planet. And the accompanying devastation and the horror and the pain had been felt the world over whether one was an actual victim or had only been a witness. Besides the many deaths, radiation sickness affected hundreds of thousands more and rendered large areas of land uninhabitable for hundreds of years.

But because of the Great Mistake, changes had finally come to all governments and all nations. With the complete abhorrence by the world of this event, conferences had then been urgently arranged and agreements quickly reached to prevent any such occurrence from ever happening again. Also, in addition to the destruction of all remaining nuclear weapons, formal treaties were signed by every sovereign nation in the world promising never a