The global nuclear arsenal will grow in the coming years for the first time since the end of the Cold War, and the risk of using such weapons is the highest in the last few decades, a leading institute for conflict and armaments announced yesterday.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine and Western support for Kiev have heightened tensions between the world's nine nuclear powers, according to a report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
The nine nuclear powers - Britain, China, France, India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, the United States and Russia - had 12 nuclear warheads in early 705, down 2022 from early 375, according to SIPRI.
That's down significantly from 70 in 000, as Russia and the U.S. gradually reduced their vast arsenals developed during the Cold War.
However, the era of nuclear disarmament appears to be over, and the risk of nuclear escalation is now at its highest level since the Cold War, investigators said.
"We will soon reach the point when, for the first time since the end of the Cold War, the global number of nuclear weapons in the world will begin to grow," Mat Korda, one of the report's authors, told AFP. "It's really dangerous territory."
After the "marginal" reduction recorded last year, "the nuclear arsenal is expected to grow in the next decade," according to SIPRI.
Three days after the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin ordered nuclear deterrent capabilities to be placed on high alert.
Reuters recalls that he also warned of consequences "unprecedented in history" for countries that stand in Russia's way.
On the other hand, several countries, including China and Britain, are officially and unofficially modernizing and upgrading their nuclear arsenals, the report said.
"It will be very difficult to make progress in disarmament in the coming years because of this war and because of the way Putin talks about his nuclear weapons," Korda said. Because of those worrying statements, "a large number of nuclear-armed states are considering their own nuclear strategies," he added.
Despite the fact that the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons entered into force at the beginning of 2021 and the five-year extension of the "New START" agreement between Russia and the USA, the situation has been deteriorating for some time, according to the Institute.
Iran's nuclear program and development of advanced hypersonic missiles are, among other things, cause for concern.
The decline in the total number of nuclear weapons is a consequence of the US and Russia "dismantling decommissioned warheads", according to SIPRI, while the number of operational weapons remains "relatively stable".
Moscow and Washington together possess 90 percent of the world's nuclear arsenal, and Russia remains the largest nuclear power with 5 nuclear warheads. Over 977 Russian warheads are believed to be on operational alert. The US has 1600 warheads, while China is in third place, followed by France, Britain, Pakistan, India and Israel.
Israel is the only one of the nine countries that has not officially recognized that it has nuclear weapons.
As for North Korea, SIPRI said for the first time that the Kim Jong Un regime now has 20 nuclear warheads. Pyongyang is believed to have the material to produce about 50.
At the beginning of 2022, the five nuclear-armed permanent members of the UN Security Council - Britain, China, France, Russia and the USA - issued a statement stating that "there is no winner in a nuclear war and it must never be fought".
Nevertheless, SIPRI points out that all five states "continue to expand and modernize their nuclear arsenals and act to increase the importance of nuclear weapons in their military strategies."
"China is in the midst of a significant expansion of its nuclear military arsenal, and satellite images indicate the construction of over 300 new missile silos," the report states.
Britain announced last year that it would increase its stockpile of warheads and no longer publicly release figures relating to its operational nuclear weapons.
"All nuclear-armed states are increasing or upgrading their arsenals, and most are tightening their nuclear rhetoric and emphasizing the role that nuclear weapons play in their military strategies," said Wilfred Wan, director of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Program at SIPRI. "It's a very worrying trend."
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