Nuclear weapons and nonproliferation

GUEST:  WARD WILSON

North Korea conducted its third underground nuclear test last week, the same day President Obama addressed the country in his State of the Union speech.  Obama has made reducing the nation’s nuclear arsenal a priority for his second term and said in his speech that he would “engage Russia to seek further reductions in our nuclear arsenal.”  But will North Korea’s nuclear ambitions his stall nonproliferation efforts?  Likewise, U.N. nuclear talks with Iran recently fell apart.  Nearly 70 years after the first atomic bomb hit Japan, nuclear weapons still play a central role in geopolitics and many say, are a necessary evil for maintaining peace. But WARD WILSON dispels that notion, along with some others, in his new book, “Five Myths About Nuclear Weapons.”  Marty talks to Wilson, Senior fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies of the Monterey Institute of International Studies, about the role of nuclear weapons in global politics and the potential for nuclear arms reductions.

Photo: North Korean army officers and soldiers attend a rally at Kim Il Sung Square on Thursday, Feb. 14, 2013, in Pyongyang, North Korea, in celebration of the country’s recent nuclear test. (AP Photo/Jon Chol Jin)