Opinion: Everyone who grasps the risk of nuclear war says Trump shouldn’t be trusted

Anyone who would consider voting for Donald Trump needs a reminder about the horror of the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. I get that now, after wandering around the New Mexico town that is synonymous with clichés like “cautionary tale” and “Pandora’s box” and “be careful what you wish for.” The shadow over the Manhattan Project — the undeniable feat of scientific brainpower that gave us the nuclear bomb — is apparent nine miles from this haunting town, in a roadside protest sign that quotes Pope Francis speaking five years ago in Hiroshima: “The possessing of nuclear weapons is immoral.” It is apparent in a video at the local history museum, as scientists reflect on their work with ambivalence and pride — regretful that Japanese leaders were not offered the chance to see a demonstration of a nuclear bomb and perhaps surrender before two cities were destroyed; thankful that after President Franklin Roosevelt’s death, President Truman followed through with the plan to use the bombs that ended World War II. And Trump is now trying for a second term in a race most analysts consider too close to call — a prospect so disturbing that this week more than 700 current and former national security officials signed a bipartisan letter endorsing his opponent, asking Americans to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris because Trump is “impulsive and ill-informed.” Just days earlier, more than 100 former Republican national security officials warned in a similar Harris endorsement that Trump’s erratic nature “threatens reckless and dangerous global consequences.” Opinion Calmes: What’s with the silence from former Trump heavyweights? Historian Lawrence S. Wittner, author of “ Confronting the Bomb,” warned in July that “Trump was far less interested in arms control and disarmament than in entering ― and winning ― a new nuclear arms race.” This was full circle from President Carter’s single term 40 years earlier, in the midst of the Cold War. What’s inarguable is that “nuclear deterrent” is a nerve-racking concept, especially if voters once again hand the “godlike power” to launch a nuclear strike to Donald Trump.