Brett McGurk is a NCS international affairs analyst who served in senior nationwide safety positions below Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden.
In the summer time of 2022, I accompanied President Joe Biden to a summit in Saudi Arabia with leaders from throughout the Middle East. During a working session, somebody requested Biden to call one difficulty that saved him up at evening.
Without flinching, Biden stated nuclear struggle.
I used to be stunned by the reply, as a result of the threat-of-all-threats had appeared contained over the current a long time. But on the time, with Europe on the entrance finish of a struggle launched by Russia, a nuclear-armed energy, the erosion of nuclear arms management preparations, along with the rise of synthetic intelligence and a burgeoning nuclear arms race with China, it’s a shock the difficulty had not acquired extra consideration given the stakes.
Biden later told NCS’s Jake Tapper that Russian miscalculations in Ukraine “could all end in Armageddon,” although he stated the dangers remained low on the time.
Fast ahead to this previous week. The most-watched film on Netflix is “A House of Dynamite,” a few nuclear missile heading for Chicago and evading air defenses. Russian President Vladimir Putin oversaw nuclear workouts, together with a new missile system that may strike wherever on Earth. In response, President Donald Trump ordered “immediate” renewal of nuclear weapons checks after a three-decade moratorium. Russia threatened to do the identical.
What is happening? Let’s attempt to make sense of issues.
Against the backdrop of those headlines is the regular erosion of arms management agreements that hint again to the Cold War. The centerpiece of this framework is called the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, which when signed in 1991 reversed an arms race between the US and the Soviet Union, mandating the discount of nuclear arsenals along with inspection and verification in each nations.
START was agreed to shortly earlier than the autumn of the Soviet Union however was later expanded in a 2010 settlement between the United States and Russia to additional scale back arsenals and keep verification in each nations. This deal, generally known as New START, was prolonged for 5 years — by means of February 2026 — within the early months of Biden’s presidency.
Then got here the Ukraine struggle, after which Russia suspended its participation within the treaty and blocked American inspectors from its nuclear services. Hopes of renewing the treaty or negotiating additional extensions have remained dormant ever since.
While Russia claims to nonetheless be complying with its obligations, the treaty expires altogether in three months, and there are no indicators of labor to barter a brand new accord. The demise of START would take away the final remaining arms management treaty between the world’s main nuclear powers. Trump’s aversion to worldwide agreements and perceived unfairness in such accords towards US pursuits makes new preparations additional unlikely.
So, whereas the danger of a nuclear alternate might stay low, the world is coming into an period not seen because the Cold War, with a possible free-for-all growth of nuclear weapons by the 2 main nuclear powers (accounting for 90% of all deployable weapons techniques), in addition to by nations not but within the nuclear membership.
South Korea, confronted with a nuclear armed adversary to the north and questions over American safety ensures, has debated the deserves of buying its personal nuclear functionality. Saudi Arabia has lengthy warned that it’ll get hold of a nuclear weapon absent American safety ensures within the occasion Iran ever does the identical and just lately signed a mutual protection pact with Pakistan, a nuclear armed energy.
Extending the US nuclear deterrence umbrella to Saudi Arabia could also be a subject when the Saudi crown prince visits Washington later this month for conferences with Trump.
While nuclear arms management agreements like START curbed the growth of American and Russian nuclear arsenals, there has by no means been such an settlement in place for China. Given Beijing’s adversarial positioning, Trump has a good level in making clear that the US will maintain tempo and stay forward of each Russia and China.
China’s nuclear arsenal is rising by roughly 100 new warheads per yr, quicker than another nation. According to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Beijing now possesses 600 nuclear weapons, along with superior missile supply techniques that may strike the US. These specialists predict that China might possess 1,500 nuclear weapons by 2035, with strike capabilities from land, sea, and air (generally known as a full nuclear triad).
While the nation is a acknowledged nuclear energy below the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, or NPT, it has by no means engaged in critical arms management talks to curtail its buildup.
Beijing argues its nuclear stockpile pales compared to the US or Russia (every with over 5,000 warheads) and thus it shouldn’t be handled equally because it goes a few fast nuclear growth. This argument cuts in opposition to the spirit of nuclear non-proliferation that undergirds the NPT system. It additionally calls the whole system of strategic stability that START established additional into doubt, heralding an growth of nuclear arsenals and nuclear-armed powers, along with heightening danger of distrust and miscalculation.
Even at finest, due to this fact, the world is coming into an uncharted period of increasing nuclear arsenals with none of the standard guardrails which have existed for many years.
Now, add the entry of synthetic intelligence into decision-making and army evaluation, and the world might also be shifting perilously nearer to a once-fictional “Doomsday Machine” situation from Stanley Kubrick’s “Dr. Strangelove” (1964). That machine contained an automated nuclear launch program outdoors human management below sure situations, an absurdity created by people to make sure their very own destruction with out human enter.
This is not fictional.
Only final yr, when Biden met Chinese chief Xi Jinping, the 2 “affirmed the need to maintain human control over the decision to use nuclear weapons,” based on the White House readout of the assembly. This precept for people and never AI to regulate nuclear use in all circumstances might sound apparent, nevertheless it’s not backed by any treaty or formal settlement.
Even if human judgment controls a choice at launch, machine judgments are being built-in into evaluation cycles, compressing timeframes in a disaster, with dangers of miscalculations pushed by AI modeling versus human judgment.
While the danger shouldn’t be overstated, Ukraine stays the present flashpoint.
Trump’s order final week to resume nuclear checks got here in response to Putin’s provocatively overseeing nuclear workouts, together with the launch of missiles able to carrying nuclear warheads and reaching the US. Moscow claimed the workouts had been routine, however the timing and saber-rattling got here after Trump poured chilly water on a rumored second summit with Putin, in addition to Russia’s failure to achieve new floor on the battlefield in Ukraine.
This just isn’t the primary time that Putin has brandished a nuclear menace over his flailing army marketing campaign in Ukraine. In February 2024, Putin warned that “NATO nations assisting Ukraine … genuinely poses a risk of a conflict involving nuclear arms, which would lead to the annihilation of civilization.” This previous summer time, Russia’s former president and deputy chair of its safety council, Dmitry Medvedev, warned Trump on persevering with US help for Ukraine and pointed to Russia’s nuclear strike capability. In response, Trump ordered the deployment of submarines carrying nuclear weapons towards Russia.
Trump has been proper to name Moscow’s rhetorical bluff, whereas conserving diplomatic channels open towards a ceasefire along with help for Ukraine. However, the alternate of phrases along with workouts and deployments ought to heighten the priority about any additional proliferation of nuclear weapons in a polarized surroundings.
Essential: Deterrence and diplomacy
All the above demonstrates that there’s something to the current headlines on nuclear weapons and fashionable motion pictures a few unfastened nuke poised to annihilate Chicago. The dangers of a nuclear alternate are small however rising. Earlier this yr, what is called the “Doomsday Clock,” a predictor of nuclear disaster set by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, was moved to the closest level since its inception in 1947.
So, Trump is true to obviously determine this most major problem, and to clarify that the US is not going to sit idle as its adversaries increase their very own nuclear capabilities. Investments in our personal techniques should guarantee a deterrent to any considered utilizing a nuclear weapon by anybody and below any circumstance. Congress earlier this yr mandated a rise in spending to modernize and keep our nuclear arsenal contemplating China’s advances and tensions with Russia. That’s proper to do. Maintaining nuclear deterrence has served the world and the US nicely for over 75 years and should proceed.
Washington may additionally think about extending its nuclear deterrence umbrella to nations not inside our net of mutual protection treaties, comparable to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. Such a transfer along with guaranteeing a rustic like Iran by no means obtains a weapon reduces dangers of proliferation, because the American umbrella renders additional growth of recent nuclear powers pointless. At the identical time, Washington can coordinate with companions world wide on new restrictions, notably on the usage of AI in command techniques, and calling on Beijing to curb its personal fast and pointless growth of nuclear warheads.
New explosive checks wouldn’t assist this equation. Moscow carried out its final check in 1990. Washington in 1992. Beijing in 1996. The second the U.S. conducts an explosive check, Russia and China would certainly do the identical, eradicating one other brick from the non-proliferation system. Nor are new checks wanted to keep up readiness and modernization of the US nuclear arsenal. This is one nuclear genie to maintain locked within the bottle.
Trump’s nominee to supervise US Strategic Command, which is chargeable for the worldwide command and management of nuclear weapons, appears to agree. In questioning earlier than the Senate Armed Services Committee about Trump’s obvious order to resume nuclear checks on an “equal basis” with China and Russia, Vice Adm. Richard Correll answered, “Neither China nor Russia has conducted a nuclear explosive test. So, I’m not reading anything into that or reading anything out.” Trump ought to drop this concept.
Note: In breaking information, Secretary of Energy Chris Wright late Sunday additional walked again Trump’s obvious order, saying any checks could be normal “systems tests,” and “not nuclear explosions.” But Trump, in an interview with 60 Minutes aired after Wright however recorded earlier, advised China and Russia are finishing up secret nuclear checks, requiring the US to do the identical.
While there isn’t any reported indication of China or Russia secretly exploding nuclear bombs, Trump may ask the Senate to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) if each China and Russia do the identical. The CTBT has sat dormant within the Senate because the late Nineteen Nineties. Russia was a signatory however withdrew in 2023. China just like the US was a signatory however by no means ratified the accord.
This could be a greater method, even perhaps worthy of a Nobel Prize, than renewing explosive checks.
The world is coming into an unmapped period of nuclear danger. The reply just isn’t new explosive checks, however a coordinated marketing campaign with allies and companions to maximise deterrence in opposition to any conceivable use, whereas working to ascertain new norms in opposition to additional growth of nuclear weapons and managing the usage of AI in decision-making techniques. A brand new period of danger calls for new preparations and requirements, which as of now, are nowhere in sight.