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The global community has failed to curb the rapacity of the domineering powers and the guerrilla tactics of the terrorists: 

(i)It has also often served as a mute spectator of genocide — the systematic massacre of an entire group of people.

(ii)This became particularly evident in Rwanda — an African country that witnessed the murder of nearly half a million Tutsis by Hutus during 1994.

(iii)Despite the availability of intelligence before the killing began and subsequent international media coverage of the genocide as it unfolded, there was no international intervention.

(iv)The UN refused to authorise its peace-keeping operation in Rwanda to stop the carnage.

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Many of the aforesaid calamities involved the use of advanced technology to wreak havoc on an unprecedented scale.

Germany ‘carpet-bombed’ London during the Second World War and the British responded by sending 1000-bomber raids to attack German cities. The war ended with the USA dropping atom bombs on the Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At least 1,20,000 people died immediately from the two attacks and many more died later due to the effects of nuclear radiation. Nearly 95 per cent of the casualties were civilians.

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The contemporary preoccupation with peace can be traced to the attrocities of the twentieth century which resulted in the death of millions of human beings:

(i)The rise of Fascism in Italy, the rise of Nazism in Germany and the World Wars. Closer home in India and Pakistan the human beings have experienced directly or indirectly the horror of Pakistan (1947).

(ii)Many of the aforesaid calamities involved the use of advanced technology to wreak havoc on an unprecedented scale.

(iii)Thus, Germany Carpet-bombed, London during the Second World War 1000-bomber raids to attack German cities. The war ended with the USA dropping atom bombs on the Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

(iv)At least 1,20,000 people died immediately from two attacks and many more died later due to the effects of nuclear radiation. About 95 per cent of the casualities were civilians.

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Civil disobedience is a major mode of struggle:

(i)It has been successfully used to make a dent in structures of oppression. 

(ii)A prominent instance being Gandhi’s deployment of satyagraha during the Indian Freedom Movement. Gandhi took his stand on justice and appealed to the conscience of the British rulers.

(iii)If that did not work, he put moral and political pressure on them by launching a mass movement involving open but non-violent breaking of the unjust laws.

(iv)Drawing inspiration from him, Martin Luther King waged a similar battle in the 1960s against anti-Black racial discrimination in the USA.

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The rise of terrorism is partly a response to the self-serving and ham-handed conduct of the aggressive states.

(i)Terrorists currently pose a great threat to peace through an adroit and ruthless use of modern weapons and advanced technology more generally.

(ii)Examples: The demolition of the World Trade Centre (New York, USA) by Islamic militants on 9September 2001 was a striking manifestation of this sinister reality.

(iii)The use of biological/chemical/nuclear weapons of mass destruction by these forces remains a frightening possibility.

(iv)The global community has failed to curb the rapacity of the domineering powers and the guerrilla tactics of the terrorists.