Growing prominence of nuclear armament

09/07/2024

FACTA

FUTURA

Global spending on nuclear weapons is estimated to have increased by 13% to a record $91.4 billion during 2023 according to calculations from the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (Ican). All nine of the world's nuclear-armed nations are spending more. The US spent the most: $51.5 billion, while China and Russia took second and third place. Over the next decade, the United States plans to spend $756 billion on its nuclear forces, or about $75 billion a year, according to a 2023 Congressional Budget Office report. Meanwhile, Russia declared that it would continue developing its nuclear arsenal as a strategic deterrent and emphasised the importance of advancing the nuclear triad to maintain global power balance. Moreover, according to Pentagon China aims to amass 1,000 nuclear warheads by 2030. This trend is also confirmed by findings from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri), which reported that nuclear arsenals were being strengthened around the world in 2023 and that the number of active nuclear warheads is slightly higher in 2024 compared to 2023.

The gradual breakdown of legal regulations in the areas of arms control, disarmament, and non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, along with the paralysis of several key multilateral security structures, will likely continue to encourage the trend of strengthening existing nuclear capabilities or efforts to acquire nuclear weapons by non-nuclear-weapon states. The absence of political prerequisites for reviving the dialogue on strategic stability between the USA and Russia, and the potential inclusion of China, significantly limits the chances of enhancing cooperative security elements and will likely continue to encourage the strengthening of unilateral measures. A reassessment of the nuclear doctrines of nuclear powers cannot be ruled out either. A fundamentally new situation would arise if China closed in on nuclear parity with the USA and Russia, especially if this occurred in the absence of regulation or at least strategic dialogue within such a tripolar nuclear system.