The public discourse on artificial intelligence has eclipsed attention to the most immediate existential danger: the accelerating spread of advanced nuclear weapons. Eighty-one years after the bombing of Hiroshima, the global stockpile continues to grow. The United Nations secretary-general warned that the world now faces the most dangerous nuclear moment since 1989, while annual spending on nuclear forces has risen by roughly twenty percent.
Vladimir Putin recently threatened to unleash Russia’s entire arsenal,about 4,400 warheads,against NATO if a supposed plan to seize the Kaliningrad exclave were activated. No evidence supported the claim, and the credibility of Moscow’s saber-rattling has waned since the invasion of Ukraine. Nevertheless, deterrence depends on the belief that threats are credible; disbelief raises the risk of miscalculation and could push a leader toward using low-yield tactical nukes.
Former President Donald Trump has asserted that Iran is on the brink of acquiring a nuclear bomb and used that premise to justify a potential U.S. strike, even threatening annihilation at the United Nations. At the same time, the United States is modernising its own force of roughly 3,700 warheads and may resume nuclear testing. Washington also backs Israel’s undisclosed nuclear programme and is negotiating a civilian nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia that could be diverted to weapons production.
North Korea has secured informal international acceptance of its nuclear status, with South Korean estimates placing its arsenal at up to 120 warheads. The Korean peninsula’s traditional goals of reunification and denuclearisation have been abandoned, prompting both South Korea and Japan to debate indigenous nuclear capabilities for self-defence. Meanwhile, China is accelerating its own nuclear buildup, a trend that former U.S. officials have highlighted as a potential flashpoint for future conflict.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres told the General Assembly that the world has entered the most dangerous nuclear moment since 1989, a warning echoed by arms-control experts. Daryl Kimball, head of the Arms Control Association, wrote in a new paper that “the nuclear sword of Damocles still hangs over all of us. The threat has become more complex, and in the absence of new arms-control breakthroughs, we are headed for an unprecedented three-way buildup of Chinese, Russian, and US nuclear forces.” He noted the absence of high-level disarmament talks and the lapse of strategic arms treaties.
The erosion of the rules-based international order compounds the nuclear danger, as ongoing wars in regions such as Palestine, Iran, Ukraine, Myanmar, Yemen and Sudan create conditions for a broader conflict. Simultaneously, a race to establish nuclear-powered lunar bases and the development of orbiting nuclear anti-satellite weapons, reported in Russia, signal the weaponisation of space despite the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. Public disengagement and the lack of mass protest further deepen the sense of collective complacency.