Reply #73: That however, was a minsonception.

[Bassic]

It is an undeniable fact that faith can push people to extremes much more easily than political ideology. It encompasses the masses much more completely.

Extremist marxists, in the end, were but a select group made up of those who held some power. That is not the case with religious extremism : it thrives among the masses. Muslim extremist, for example, have been know to willingly die for their cause. This is exactly the type of people who run Iran right now, and that is what makes a nuclear conflict a very real possibility, albeit unlikely. Pushed to extremes the people in charge just might be capable of sacraficing milions of lives for their goals.

Israel is also run by extremist zionist whose zealotry equals the Iranians and surpasses (for now) that of the American religious right. That is a recipe for disaster.

Lastly : the simple fact that no nuclear conflict arose between the Capitalist and Communist worlds does not mean that such a conflict was impossible. Leaders back then simply managed to avoid it but imagine for a second that Stalin had lived another decade. Still a conflict would have been unlikely, but I remain convinced that even back then it was a distinc possibility.

All that I am saying is that we should not discard this possibility out of hand simply because it hasn't happened yet. As unlikely as it is, nobody wins if we just ignore it.