I'm slowly clearing out old papers. I came across a piece I'd written (not sure now what for). It was just after Hungerford, and began with blurb for a "toy": "Rambo M60 Gun and Target set. Two guns in one. A machine gun sound and a rotating ammo belt. Set includes combat knife, Rambo headband and soft darts. No batteries are rqeuired." The whole piece was about societal acceptance of violence (and the MoD sending videos to schools to counter CND stuff by teaching kids about enmity), but it was this bit that leapt out. "Psychologists have strong evidence that a good proportion of those who have control of nuclear weapons exhibit some degree of instability. It may be the responsibility - as in Richard Nixon's calm statement, 'I can go into my office, pick up the telephone, and in half an hour fifty million people will be dead'. It may be the sense of power. But the question remains: do people go mad because they have such power, or do they seek such power because they are mad?"
