How MAD logic may be staging a grand comeback in nuclear strategy

Let’s remind ourselves of the importance of this moment. After the US developed the hydrogen bomb in 1952, the world’s two superpowers—the US and Soviet Union—engaged in a stupefying nuclear arms race.

From under 400 total nuclear warheads in 1950, by 1960 the world had over 22,000 (dominated by the US at the time). By the late 1960s, this arsenal had grown even more ominously. This was a time when American children practised nuclear drills in school and suburban houses were built with bomb shelters and stacked with provisions to outlast a nuclear attack. A survivalist ethos and culture took root. John Lennon sang Give Peace a Chance. Stanley Kubrick made the film Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.

The first attempts to limit the growth of warheads were the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks that led to several small pacts about first-use and missile delivery capacity but had little impact on total warheads, which reached 38,000 by 1970, 55,000 by 1980 and peaked at 70,000 in 1986. Other agreements such as the Non-Proliferation Treaty to stop the spread of nuclear arms to countries like India, the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty tried to prevent the arms race from careening out of control.

After 1986, as a result of the initial reforms in the Soviet Union (perestroika and glasnost), the global arsenal started to decline. This reduction took off after the first Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start-I) in 1991, when the Soviet Union began to come apart. By 2000, total global nuclear warheads had declined to 34,000, a little under half their peak.

Start-I expired in 2009 and was followed by New Start in 2010. It is New Start that expired on 4 February and there are few prospects of its revival in the foreseeable future. Security experts believe that a new arms race is underway.

The world currently has about 12,000 warheads: 4,400 Russian, 3,700 American, 5-600 Chinese, plus sundries like about 170 each in India and Pakistan. To quote the source of this data (Ourworldindata.org/nuclear-weapons): “The exact number of countries’ warheads is secret, and the estimates are based on publicly available information, historical records, and occasional leaks.”

It is tempting to blame the belligerence of specific leaders of ‘great powers’ for the demise of a process that seemed to be doing its job. But that may be simplistic. Rather, we should look at the conditions that led to the surge followed by its decline to understand what today’s situation may imply for the future.

There are three logical foundations of the nuclear arms race. The core logic is what’s known as the ‘security dilemma,’ which is a version of concepts like ‘cumulative causation’ or ‘self-fulfilling prophecy.’

In a security dilemma, any move by nation A to increase its weapons capacity is interpreted as aggression by its rival nation B and leads it to increase its capacity; this spurs nation A to further increase its weaponry and nation B to make a corresponding move. This circular escalation can go on indefinitely.

Second: with nuclear weapons, the logic of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) leads to the belief that if both sides can destroy each other, neither will initiate conflict.

Third: the economically stronger nation (say, the US) believes that by overspending on weapons, it can bankrupt the weaker nation (the Soviet Union).

In this framework, the gradual and rapid dissolution of the Soviet Union led to a gradual and then rapid de-escalation of the arms race. A world polarized into two great powers and their camps became a unipolar system that inspired proclamations about the “end of history” (Francis Fukuyama, 1992), a coming “clash of civilizations” between Christians and Muslims rather than capitalists and communists (Samuel Huntington, 1996), and a “new world order” (George H.W. Bush, 1990).

That unipolar world no longer exists. The Russian Federation is back, at least militarily, and there’s a new kid on the block, China, whose arsenal is rising quickly. Using the same logic outlined above—especially the security dilemma and MAD—China does not intend to join any nuclear weapons control regime. It asserts its right to self-defence by catching up with the larger caches of its rivals. It is almost inevitable that this will be interpreted as aggression by its rivals and result in escalation of nuke acquisition.

Plus, technical innovations in accuracy, lethality and delivery systems (especially from underwater and space) combined with AI capabilities suggest that the world is on the cusp of a new era of nuclear arsenal expansion.

We are in a brand new world order of three great powers (which could become four if Europe is left to fend for itself by the US). Humanity’s remarkable capacity for brinkmanship is set to face yet more tests.

To mark this moment, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved its metaphorical Doomsday Clock closer to midnight: now just 85 seconds away. Thankfully there will always be tales of sexual morality and identity politics to distract us from existential questions.

The author is a professor of geography, environment and urban studies and director of global studies at Temple University.