Irish examiner view: Russia's nuclear threat to Ireland

There may be a lesson to be learned from Stanly Kubrick's dark nuclear comedy 'Dr Strangelove'

Russia conducted the first test launch of its Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile last month, a new and long-awaited addition to its nuclear arsenal which president Vladimir Putin said would make Moscow's enemies stop and think. Picture: Roscosmos Space Agency Press Service via AP

There may be a strategist in the Kremlin who is a secret admirer of Stanley Kubrick’s dark nuclear comedy Dr Strangelove and felt the Irish sense of satirical humour would be amused by the concept of the Emerald Isle being wiped out by a first-strike attack aimed at obliterating Britain.

It may not carry the straight-faced irony of Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal but there is as much hyperbole in suggesting the detonation of a 100 megatonne torpedo 200 kilometres off the coast of Donegal as there is in making a fricassee of poor children for consumption by the ruling classes.

It’s comforting to learn that Russia’s embassy in Dublin believes there can be no winners in a nuclear war and that it “must never be unleashed”. 

The only problem is that we cannot take anything Russia says at face value.

Dr Strangelove first appeared in cinemas in 1964, shortly after the Cuban missile crisis. The sub-text of its title was ‘How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb’. 

As we cannot do anything about that which we cannot control it remains, in some ways, sound advice.