Threat of Nuclear War Is Rising, But Scientists Say the Public Can Change That

 Jon Letman , Truthout, August 4, 2025, https://truthout.org/articles/threat-of-nuclear-war-is-rising-but-scientists-say-the-public-can-change-that/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=52c13be8d1-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2025_08_04_09_03&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-52c13be8d1-650192793

Eighty years after two U.S. atomic bombs killed between 110,000 to 210,000 people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, public awareness of nuclear risks has fallen to new lows, said Laura Grego, senior scientist and research director with the Union of Concerned Scientists.

“I think people don’t know how terrible nuclear war would be,” Grego told Truthout on July 16 — 80 years to the day since the first-ever atomic detonation in New Mexico. The Trinity test was conducted just three weeks before the U.S. dropped two atomic bombs on Japan.

Brian Schmidt, an American-Australian astrophysicist who received the Nobel Prize for physics in 2011, pointed out that many of today’s nuclear weapons are far more destructive than the bombs used in the horrific Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. In contemporary arsenals, a single bomb can contain as much destructive power as was unleashed in all of World War II

Currently, the world’s nine nuclear-armed nations are estimated to possess the destructive equivalent of 146,500 Hiroshima-sized bombs, many of which are ready to launch on short notice.

Schmidt told Truthout that even a “small” nuclear weapon could precipitate the use of a gigaton’s worth of nuclear arsenal being used, causing the collapse of civilization.

“I think the public needs to be focused on asking our respective governments to lower the risk of nuclear war,” he said.

Nuclear Spending Is Rising as Arms Treaties Are Abandoned

Today, nuclear weapons spending is rising, nuclear-armed nations are modernizing and upgrading their weapons, and China is rapidly expanding its arsenal. Currently, the U.S. has seven modernization programs underway, is building two new nuclear weapons facilities, and replacing its entire intercontinental ballistic missile force with a new system that is 81 percent over budget. The U.S., which spends more on nuclear weapons than the other eight nations combined, is forecast to spend an average of $95 billion per year over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

In contemporary arsenals, a single bomb can contain as much destructive power as was unleashed in all of World War II.

In recent years, nuclear threats have become increasingly common while diplomacy and dialogue are overshadowed by mistrust, conflict, and war. As reliance on nuclear weapons grows, there are fears of a new arms race and possible return to nuclear explosive testing. This comes as critical arms treaties have been abandoned or face an uncertain future.

In 2001, George W. Bush announced the U.S. would withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, and under Donald Trump, the U.S. has rejected or withdrawn from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, the Open Skies Treaty, the (conventional) Arms Trade Treaty, and the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. The last remaining nuclear arms control agreement between the U.S. and Russia, the New START Treaty, will end in February 2026 unless it is renegotiated or replaced soon.

After World War II, the U.S., followed by the Soviet Union, invested heavily in developing nuclear weapons, with the U.K., France, China, and later Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea building their own bombs. In the mid-1980s, global nuclear arsenals peaked at just over 70,000 warheads. Arms control treaties and diplomacy succeeded in reducing those numbers to roughly 12,200 today, nearly 90 percent of which are possessed by Russia and the United States.

While some argue that nuclear deterrence provides safety and security, many in the arms control and scientific communities believe that the threat of nuclear war has never been higher. In the first six months of 2025, five nuclear-armed countries (Russia, India, Pakistan, Israel, and the United States) have engaged in military hostilities or outright war, increasing the risk of nuclear war by accident, miscommunication, or design.

Warnings and Solutions

Last month, on the Trinity test anniversary, an assembly of more than a dozen Nobel Prize laureates and some 60 nuclear experts gathered for three days of discussions at the University of Chicago to come up with practical, actionable steps that can be taken now to reduce the risk of nuclear war.

The world’s nine nuclear-armed nations are estimated to possess the destructive equivalent of 146,500 Hiroshima-sized bombs.

In a press conference, the group presented a two-page declaration for the prevention of nuclear war signed by 127 Nobel laureates representing six disciplines and at least 44 nuclear experts. Among their recommendations was a call for every nation to publicly recommit to all nonproliferation and disarmament objectives and obligations, to reiterate commitment to the nuclear explosive test moratorium, and for Russia and the U.S. to enter into immediate arms control negotiations. They also called on scientists, academics, civil society, and communities of faith to “create the necessary pressure on global leaders to implement nuclear risk reduction measures.”

Speaking at the university, Cardinal Silvano Maria Tomasi, an adviser to Pope Leo XIV said, “The Trinity explosion taught us what we are capable of destroying. The task before us now is to rediscover what we are capable of preserving and building.”

The choice of venues was intentional as the University of Chicago was where key steps in the Manhattan Project were achieved, where the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded, and where the symbolic Doomsday Clock was created to communicate threats to humanity and the world. Today, the clock is set at 89 seconds to midnight — the closest it has ever been to global catastrophe.

Headed in the Wrong Direction

Alexandra Bell, president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, points out that the Chicago assembly wasn’t the first time Nobel laureates have called for leaders to rein in nuclear dangers. But now, after decades of “slow, tedious, difficult progress” to create restraints to prevent a nuclear catastrophe, the world has reached a reckoning point: “Those [structures] are crumbling and we seem to be heading in the wrong direction,” she says.

Although we have the diplomatic and political tools as well as the historical background to reduce risks, Bell says today’s leaders lack the necessary ambition and will. This raises the question: Will our luck hold out?

“The odds are not in our favor,” she says.

The last remaining nuclear arms control agreement between the U.S. and Russia, the New START Treaty, will end in February 2026 unless it is renegotiated or replaced soon.

Yet even in the face of nuclear peril, she understands why people seem more concerned about the price of eggs. In addition to so many other concerns, Bell says, people still need to care about nuclear war because the threat has never gone away. She insists that ordinary people do have a role to play and can have an impact by pressuring elected officials or simply starting a conversation with each other.

“This affects all of us,” says Bell. “And if we get the nuclear problem wrong, nothing else matters.”

More Weapons, More Risks

In a time of growing geopolitical tension and instability, when international norms are under stress, competition between nuclear weapon states means greater nuclear risks, says Mallory Stewart, executive vice president at the Council on Strategic Risks.

Stewart told Truthout that it’s important to dispel the perception that nuclear risk reduction is an esoteric, political issue only for experts, and bring an end to public complacency: “It would be nice if the public felt some agency to say, ‘It’s not as simple as arms racing. It’s not as simple as might makes right. There is a deeper threat to humanity.’”

“The Trinity explosion taught us what we are capable of destroying. The task before us now is to rediscover what we are capable of preserving and building.”

“Growing reliance on nuclear weapons and modernization or more weapons will just lead to more weapons and modernization on the other side,” Stewart says.

Understanding and Engagement

James McKeon, a program officer for nuclear security at the Carnegie Corporation of New York, encourages people to educate themselves about arms control, nonproliferation, or the basics of nuclear technology. “It’s no more complicated than any other scientific topic,” he says, pointing to resources that clearly explain the science, history, and policies of nuclear issues.

McKeon says we need new ways for artists, writers, and creative individuals to think about nuclear policy. An engaged citizenry, he says, is more likely to reach out to elected officials and understand that the risk of nuclear weapons hasn’t gone away and is compounded by new technologies.

Robert Latiff is a retired major general in the Air Force who teaches weapons ethics and how new technology impacts the laws of armed conflict at Notre Dame University. “There is absolutely no ethical argument for nuclear weapons,” he says. He prefers not to call them “weapons” because they can’t be used to fight a war. “They’re more devices of terror than they are weapons,” he says. “Fight a war with nuclear weapons and what do you have left?”

Latiff points to George H. W. Bush’s 1991 Presidential Nuclear Initiatives which took unilateral action to remove U.S. tactical nuclear weapons from Europe and South Korea. He says that with moral courage, a U.S. president could again have a huge impact on nuclear policy.

Climate of Fear

Wole Soyinka, a Nigerian playwright and recipient of the 1986 Nobel Prize for literature, also came to Chicago to grapple with how to reduce nuclear risks. “We do have an enhanced climate of fear right now,” he told Truthout.

This affects all of us. And if we get the nuclear problem wrong, nothing else matters.

“It isn’t only global warming that we are witnessing. There’s a certain heating up of, shall we say, human and social relationships and national interaction,” says Soyinka. He describes a “disturbing escalation of violence” and a “kind of demonic sweep of leadership” in which politicians blithely declare, “if necessary, I will use an atom bomb,” and display what he calls “boastful, arrogant, hubristic body language” and terms like “little rocket man” and “obliterating unilaterally.”

Since 2009, the African continent has been designated a nuclear-weapon-free zone under the Treaty of Pelindaba. Africa is often left out of the nuclear conversation, but it was in the colonized Algerian Sahara that France conducted 17 nuclear weapons tests in the 1960s over the protests of African nations.

“If there is an atomic war in Ukraine, even Africa would be affected. We probably see that reflected more and more in the literary arts as well as the graphic arts,” Soyinka says. “Many people still believe that political leaders are people of common sense and that has never happened. My imagination has gone over and beyond that, and I wake up sometimes wondering what will be the next global conflagration.”

Uprooting the Nuclear Order

Laura Grego from the Union of Concerned Scientists warns that when the U.S. military makes war plans, it doesn’t include the full spectrum of what would happen in a nuclear war, saying, “I think they don’t want to know the answer because it’s terrible.”

Grego told Truthout that military expectations for nuclear war can be found in National Academies reports, which she believes likely undercount the long-term effects of radioactive fallout, possibly by as much as a factor of 10. Nuclear winter, major disruptions to agriculture, and mass starvation are long-term consequences of nuclear war that are usually not counted by military planners, Grego says. “We’re running risks that we don’t fully understand.”

We’re a democracy and our responsibility is to make sure our policies align with our democratic values, with our hopes for the world, hopes for a long-term future for our children that is healthy, secure, and sustainable.”

The Nobel declaration calls on all nations to increase investment and cooperative research on the environmental, social, military, and economic impacts of nuclear conflict, and to support a UN Independent Scientific Panel on the Effects of Nuclear War.

Grego is also concerned about the expanding role of nuclear weapons. “Russia has recently changed their nuclear policy to say that they’re meant to deter nuclear powers that are helping a non-nuclear adversary,” she says, adding that the role of nuclear weapons should be reduced and that by investing heavily in modernization, we are disincentivizing the reduction of nuclear weapons. Investing in nuclear weapons, she says, indicates we expect them to be around for another 80 years.

“We need to find a way to wean ourselves off the reliance of [nuclear weapons],” Grego says, noting that the leader of a major nuclear-armed country could transform the world by eliminating nuclear weapons with a verified plan and encouraging others to join them. Doing so, however, would surely mean facing powerful, determined opponents who are invested in maintaining the status quo. Grego hopes global leaders will demonstrate a commitment to political courage over simply seeking unilateral security advantages.

In her interactions with members of Congress, Grego says they report almost never hearing their constituents bring up nuclear weapons. It’s not enough for the public to be scared or angry at how we’ve organized our security, she says. “We do need to further engage. We’re a democracy and our responsibility is to make sure our policies align with our democratic values, with our hopes for the world, hopes for a long-term future for our children that is healthy, secure, and sustainable.”

CORRECTION: This article was updated on August 4, 2025, to reflect that 127 Nobel laureates and at least 44 nuclear experts signed a two-page declaration for the prevention of nuclear war.

August 7, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | weapons and war | Leave a comment

Remembering Hiroshima 80 years on

August 6, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | weapons and war | Leave a comment

Jeremy Corbyn: Nuclear Disarmament Now

By Jeremy Corbyn, https://tribunemag.co.uk/2025/08/jeremy-corbyn-remembering-hiroshima/

On the 80th anniversary of Hiroshima Day, Jeremy Corbyn continues the call for nuclear disarmament and world peace in a speech at the World Conference Against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs. We publish his remarks, edited for length and clarity, here.

Fujio Torikoshi was 14 years old when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, 80 years ago today. He was eating breakfast with his mother when he heard a rumbling and stepped outside into the front garden. All he could see was a black dot in the sky, when it suddenly burst outwards to fill the sky with a blinding white light. He recalls his last memory of being lifted off the ground by a hot gust of wind. He was more than two kilometres away from the blast, but he could still feel a burning sensation all over his body. That’s when he passed out on his front porch.

Eventually, he woke up in hospital. He was told by the doctors he wouldn’t live past 20. He lived to be 86 years old and died in 2018. In one of his last interviews, he said: ‘All I can do is pray — earnestly, relentlessly — for world peace.’

This week, we remember every single person who was killed by an indefensible act of inhumanity, both on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We also remember the hundreds of thousands of survivors like Fujio — known as the hibakusha. They are the ones who endured the horror of what was left behind. They are the ones who have been campaigning to ensure the horrors of Hiroshima never happen again.

Me and the CND

When I was at school, we had a book club where we could choose a book for class. We chose Brighter Than A Thousand Suns, which told the story of Hiroshima. It had a huge impact on me. Before that book, I didn’t know what a nuclear explosion was. I didn’t know the destruction it could cause. It was that book that taught me that nuclear weapons have one purpose and one purpose only: to cause death and destruction on a colossal scale.

When I was 14, in the 1960s, I joined the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), after following and being frightened by the Cuban Missile Crisis. My first ever demonstration of any sort was with CND, and I have been a campaigner against nuclear weapons ever since. It was at CND where I met Bruce Kent, a leading figure in CND in the 1980s. It was Bruce who said, ‘I want to be optimistic because I don’t think man is intrinsically violent.’ He inspired in us a belief that peace was not just preferable, but possible.

I’ve gotten a lot of flak over the years for daring to say that I would not wish to use a nuclear bomb on human beings. For having the audacity to say that killing millions of people would make the world a safer place. For those who are in any doubt over my position: I’m not interested in bombs. I’m interested in peace. 

We also should not forget the impacts of nuclear testing, which began at the end of the Second World War. These programs caused widespread radioactive contamination and generational harm to the people of the Pacific region. It is estimated that more than two million people have died from cancer as a result of these nuclear test explosions.

Joseph Rotblat was a Polish physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project, before becoming a fierce critic of nuclear weaponry. I want to share two things he said. One, ‘There is no direct evidence that nuclear weapons prevented a world war.’ Two, ‘Above all remember your humanity.’

I grew up in a period where people were fearful of the possibility of global nuclear war. There was a realisation of just how dangerous nuclear weapons are. 

Since then, several countries have taken steps that have lessened nuclear tensions in certain places. The most dramatic example was when post-apartheid South Africa, led by President Mandela, announced that it would no longer develop any nuclear weapons and would completely disarm. 

That in turn brought about a nuclear weapons-free continent of Africa, also known as the ‘Pelindaba Treaty’, which came into force on 15 July 2009. Those events were followed by nuclear weapons-free zones for the whole of Latin America and for central Asia.

These treaties showed that it is possible to get countries to agree in mutual co-operation, mutual disarmament, and mutual peace. We must continue to push for a renewed adherence to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which bans the development, production, possession, use, or threat of use of nuclear weapons.

The Only Path Forward Is Peace

In 2023, UN Secretary-General António Guterres addressed the General Assembly and announced that the symbolic Doomsday Clock — which measures humanity’s proximity to self-destruction — had moved to 90 seconds to midnight. (It has since moved to 89 seconds to midnight.) Declaring that humanity was perilously close to catastrophe, Guterres named three perilous challenges: extreme poverty, an accelerating climate crisis, and nuclear war. 

Today, the global stockpile of nuclear weapons is accelerating as international relations are deteriorating. After a period of gradual decline that followed the end of the Cold War, the number of operational nuclear weapons has risen again; there are now said to be more than 12,000 warheads around the world. Ninety percent of these weapons are owned by Russia and the United States alone.

It’s been more than three years since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine. I want to take a moment to reflect on the hundreds of thousands of lives that have been lost in this ghastly war.

I also want to pay tribute to the thousands of peace campaigners in Russia who opposed this invasion, and have continued to call for a ceasefire. I also want to thank those global figures who have called for de-escalation and diplomacy. That includes the UN Secretary-General, global leaders such as President Lula, President Ramaphosa, and, of course, the late Pope Francis. Three years on, and hundreds of thousands of deaths later, I renew these calls for peace. 

The longer the fighting goes on, the more lives will be lost and the greater risk of nuclear escalation. Those who fuel escalation must know that in the event of a nuclear war, nobody wins.

Meanwhile, we have all watched with absolute horror at what is happening in Gaza. Over the past 21 months, human beings have endured a level of horror and inhumanity that should haunt us forever. Entire families wiped out. Limbs strewn across the street. Mothers screaming for their children torn to pieces. Doctors performing amputations without anaesthesia. Home by home, hospital by hospital, generation by generation. 

We have not been witnessing a war. We have been witnessing a genocide, livestreamed before the entire world. We must remember that our governments could have stopped this genocide. Instead, they allowed Israel to act with impunity, igniting a much wider war between Israel, the United States, and Iran — and putting the world on the brink of a nuclear conflict in the process.

I echo the call made by the UN Secretary-General: ‘There is no military solution. The only path forward is diplomacy. The only hope is peace.’

A great achievement was the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, signed in 1970. The five declared nuclear weapons states — Britain, France, the Soviet Union, the USA, and China — agreed to ensure that there was no proliferation of their weaponry and to take steps towards their own eventual nuclear disarmament.

August 6, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | weapons and war | Leave a comment

Hiroshima anniversary: mayor says Ukraine and Middle East crises show world ignoring nuclear ‘tragedies

Justin McCurry , Guardian, 6 Aug 25

On 80th anniversary of atomic bombing, Kazumi Matsui urges younger people to recognise ‘inhumane’ consequences of nuclear weapons as a deterrent.

The mayor of Hiroshima has led calls for the world’s most powerful countries to abandon nuclear deterrence, at a ceremony to mark 80 years since the city was destroyed by an American atomic bomb.

As residents, survivors and representatives from 120 countries gathered at the city’s peace memorial park on Wednesday morning, Kazumi Matsui warned that the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East had contributed to a growing acceptance of nuclear weapons.

“These developments flagrantly disregard the lessons the international community should have learned from the tragedies of history,” he said in his peace declaration, against the backdrop of the A-bomb dome – one of the few buildings that survived the attack eight decades ago.

“They threaten to topple the peace-building frameworks so many have worked so hard to construct,” he added, before urging younger people to recognise that acceptance of the nuclear option could cause “utterly inhumane” consequences for their future.

Despite the global turmoil, he said, “we, the people, must never give up. Instead, we must work even harder to build civil society consensus that nuclear weapons must be abolished for a genuinely peaceful world.”

As applause rang out, white doves were released into the sky, while an eternal “flame of peace” burned in front of a cenotaph dedicated to victims of the world’s first nuclear attack.

The ceremony is seen as the last opportunity for significant numbers of ageing hibakusha – survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki – to pass on first-hand warnings of the horror of nuclear warfare.

Just under 100,000 survivors are still alive, according to recent data from the health ministry, with an average age of just over 86………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Successive Japanese governments have faced criticism for refusing to ratify a 2021 treaty to ban the possession and use of nuclear weapons. Dozens of countries have signed the treaty, but they do not include any of the recognised nuclear powers or countries, including Japan, that are dependent on the US nuclear umbrella.

After laying a wreath in front of the cenotaph, the prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, did not mention the treaty but said it was Japan’s “mission” as the only country to have been attacked by nuclear weapons to lead global efforts towards disarmament.

The UN secretary general, António Guterres, said in a statement that “the very weapons that brought such devastation to Hiroshima and Nagasaki are once again being treated as tools of coercion”. Guterres added, however, that Nihon Hidankyo’s Nobel prize was cause for hope, adding that “countries must draw strength from the resilience of Hiroshima and from the wisdom of the hibakusha”. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/06/hiroshima-mayor-ukraine-middle-east-nuclear-history-atomic-bombing-80th-anniversary

August 6, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | weapons and war | Leave a comment