World faces new arms race as nuclear powers spend 100B a year

World faces new arms race as nuclear powers spend 100B a year
By Johannes LEDEL
Stockholm (AFP) June 15, 2025

Most of the world's nuclear-armed states continued to modernise their arsenals last year, setting the stage for a new nuclear arms race, researchers warned Monday.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said nuclear powers including the United States and Russia -- which account for around 90 percent of the world's stockpile -- had spent time last year "upgrading existing weapons and adding newer versions".

Since the end of the Cold War, old warheads have generally been dismantled quicker than new ones have been deployed, resulting in a decrease in the overall number of warheads.

But SIPRI warned that the trend was likely to be reversed in the coming years.

"What we see now, first of all, is that the number of operational nuclear warheads is beginning to increase," SIPRI Director Dan Smith told AFP.

This was especially the case with China, which SIPRI said had about 600 nuclear warheads and had added 100 new warheads in 2023 and 2024.

"China is increasing its nuclear force steadily," Smith said, adding that the country could reach 1,000 warheads in seven or eight years.

While that would still be well short of Russian and US arsenals it would make China "a much bigger player", said Smith.

He said the world faced new threats "at a particularly dangerous and unstable moment" for geopolitics, adding: "We see the warning signs of a new nuclear arms race coming."

- 'Extensive programmes' -

SIPRI counted a total of 12,241 warheads in January 2025, of which 9,614 were in stockpiles for potential use.

The institute noted in its report that both Russia and the United States had "extensive programmes under way to modernise and replace their nuclear warheads".

The United Kingdom was not believed to have increased its number of warheads in 2024, but SIPRI said that given the country's 2021 decision to raise its limit on the number of warheads from 225 to 260, it was likely to increase in the future.

Similarly, while France's arsenal was believed to have remained steady at around 290, "its nuclear modernisation programme progressed during 2024".

India and Pakistan both "continued to develop new types of nuclear weapon delivery systems in 2024".

India had a "growing stockpile" of about 180 nuclear weapons at the start of 2025, the institute said, while Pakistan's arsenal remained steady at about 170 warheads.

- 'Doomsday scenarios' -

SIPRI also noted that North Korea's nuclear weapons programme remained "central to its national security strategy", estimating that it had around 50 warheads and was believed to possess "enough fissile material to reach a total of up to 90 warheads".

Israel -- which does not acknowledge its nuclear weapons -- is also believed to be modernising its arsenal, which SIPRI estimated was about 90 warheads at the start of the year.

Smith stressed that the looming nuclear arms race would not just be about "the numbers of warheads".

"It's an arms race which is going to be highly technological," Smith said.

He added that it would be both in "outer space and in cyberspace" as the software directing and guiding nuclear weapons would be an area of competition.

The rapid development of artificial intelligence will also likely begin to play a part, at first as a complement to humans.

"The next step would be moving towards full automation. That is a step that must never be taken," Smith said.

"If our prospects of being free of the danger of nuclear war were to be left in the hands of an artificial intelligence, I think that then we would be close to the doomsday scenarios."

Nuclear states spent $100 billion on weapons in 2024: ICAN
Geneva (AFP) June 13, 2025 - Nuclear-armed states spent more than $100 billion on their atomic arsenals last year, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons said Friday, lamenting the lack of democratic oversight of such spending.

ICAN said Britain, China, France, India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia and the United States together spent nearly $10 billion more than in 2023.

The United States spent $56.8 billion in 2024, followed by China at $12.5 billion and Britain at $10.4 billion, ICAN said in its flagship annual report.

Geneva-based ICAN won the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize for its key role in drafting the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which took effect in 2021.

Some 69 countries have ratified it to date, four more have directly acceded to the treaty and another 25 have signed it, although none of the nuclear weapons states have come on board.

- Hosting costs -

This year's report looked at the costs incurred by the countries that host other states' nuclear weapons.

It said such costs are largely unknown to citizens and legislators alike, thereby avoiding democratic scrutiny.

Although not officially confirmed, the report said Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey were hosting US nuclear weapons, citing experts.

Meanwhile Russia claims it has nuclear weapons stationed in Belarus, but some experts are unsure, it added.

The report said there was "little public information" about the costs associated with hosting US nuclear weapons in NATO European countries, citing the cost of facility security, nuclear-capable aircraft and preparation to use such weapons.

"Each NATO nuclear-sharing arrangement is governed by secret agreements," the report said.

"It's an affront to democracy that citizens and lawmakers are not allowed to know that nuclear weapons from other countries are based on their soil or how much of their taxes is being spent on them," said the report's co-author Alicia Sanders-Zakre.

- 'Vested interests' -

Eight countries openly possess nuclear weapons: the United States, Russia, Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan and North Korea.

Israel is widely assumed to have nuclear weapons, although it has never officially acknowledged this.

ICAN said the level of nuclear weapons spending in 2024 by these nine nations could have paid the UN budget almost 28 times over.

"The problem of nuclear weapons is one that can be solved, and doing so means understanding the vested interests fiercely defending the option for nine countries to indiscriminately murder civilians," said ICAN's programme coordinator Susi Snyder.

The private sector earned at least $42.5 billion from their nuclear weapons contracts in 2024 alone, the report said.

There are at least $463 billion in ongoing nuclear weapons contracts, some of which do not expire for decades, and last year, at least $20 billion in new nuclear weapon contracts were awarded, it added.

"Many of the companies that benefited from this largesse invested heavily in lobbying governments, spending $128 million on those efforts in the United States and France, the two countries for which data is available," ICAN said.

Standard nuclear doctrine -- developed during the Cold War between super powers the United States and the Soviet Union -- is based on the assumption that such weapons will never have to be used because their impact is so devastating, and because nuclear retaliation would probably bring similar destruction on the original attacker.