At a Low Nuclear Starting Point: The future balance of power in the world will be determined by a new arms race that is only just beginning

Has a new arms race begun?

At first glance, the latest yearbook from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), which today serves as the main barometer of global armaments and military expenditure, answers this question quite definitively: 'Yes.' Global military spending in 2024 marked its tenth consecutive year of growth, exceeding $2.7 trillion (+9.4% compared to the previous year). Between 2015 and 2024, global military expenditure rose by 37%, increasing across all regions: Europe (+83%), Asia and Oceania (+46%), the Americas (+19%), the Middle East (+19%), and Africa (+11%). In 2024, military expenditure increased in every European country except Malta, with a total regional increase of 17%. Russia increased its spending by 38%, and the defence budgets of 17 out of the 30 European NATO members reached or surpassed the alliance’s 2% of GDP target, with especially notable increases in Romania (+43%), the Netherlands (+35%), Sweden (+34%), Poland (+31%), and Germany (+28%).

However, two important caveats must be made. First, 38% of global military spending is accounted for by the United States, 17% by European NATO countries, 12% by China, and 5.6% by Russia. In total, these countries represent 72% of global expenditure. Following them are India and Saudi Arabia (3% each), Ukraine (2.4%), Japan (2%), and South Korea and Israel (1.7% each). Clearly, the primary contribution to global spending growth comes from this first group. Over the past 10 years, global military expenditure has grown by $1 trillion, with the United States accounting for $363 billion, Europe for $220 billion, China for $117 billion, and Russia for $83 billion, according to SIPRI’s database. Altogether, that represents nearly 80% of the total global increase in current dollar terms.

The second caveat is that, from a long-term historical perspective, the current level of global military expenditure remains relatively low. This year, it exceeded the 2.5% threshold of global GDP. The last time military spending reached this level was in 2009, but not because of growth, but because of a decline in global GDP caused by the financial crisis. Prior to that, military spending dropped below 2.5% of GDP in 1994, apparently for the first time in the entire post-Second World War period (SIPRI has reasonably reliable figures dating back to 1960). In contrast, during the 1960s, military spending averaged 5.7% of global GDP; in the 1970s and 1980s, it stood at 3.9%; in the 1990s and 2000s, it was 2.5%; and in the 2010s, it fell to 2.3%. In this regard, humanity is still a long way from an arms race that would in any way resemble that of the Cold War era.

Global military spending as a share of global GDP, 1960–2024, %

At the same time, it can be said that an arms race has indeed begun. This is evidenced by the rapid growth in military spending among the group of countries that can be classified as contemporary superpowers and which account for over 70% of all military expenditure. These include the United States, China, Europe, and Russia. Although the legal definition of what is meant by 'Europe' here is somewhat blurred, there is a clear effort underway to formulate a unified military policy in the region aimed at a sharp increase in defence spending. Commitments made at the NATO summit indicate that military budgets are set to almost double over the next ten years (having already grown by 1.8 times over the past decade). For its part, Russia, from an economic standpoint, would not normally be considered a superpower. However, it is grouped with them due to possessing the world’s largest nuclear arsenal.

New tensions and rivalries among the superpowers are not only leading to an increase in their military spending, but are also spreading a sense of vulnerability to other countries and regions. Over the past 30 years, the United States and NATO have been seen as guarantors of the global status quo, in particular the principle of the inviolability of borders and the inadmissibility of attempts to change them by force. However, now, with the United States competing with China on one side and Russia on the other, and with mutual tensions between European capitals and Washington on the third, confidence in these guarantees has been severely shaken.

A new concept of war

While competition among the superpowers is the starting point of this new arms race, it has also been driven by a shift in the fundamental understanding of modern warfare. First and foremost, the concept of nuclear deterrence has changed. Whereas it was previously seen as a cornerstone for preventing conflict between major powers, it has now become apparent that escalation to the nuclear stage is viewed as an unacceptably high cost. As a result, even countries that possess nuclear weapons may refrain from using them in direct confrontations with each other. A conventional conflict involving a nuclear power is the first major shift.

Second, at the end of the last century, the US-led 'Operation Desert Storm', which liberated Kuwait from Iraqi occupation within a few weeks, gave rise to the belief that future wars using precision weapons would be swift. But those hopes quickly faded, and the world has entered the era of the 'long wars' of the 21st century, notes Lawrence Freedman, emeritus professor of war studies at King's College London and author of Command: The Politics of Military Operations from Korea to Ukraine, in Foreign Affairs.

The American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan proved to be long. Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which was expected to last a few days, has evolved into a gruelling conflict lasting more than three years. Israel's war in Gaza, launched in response to the Hamas attack in October 2023, instead of a ‘quick and decisive’ operation, has dragged on for 15 months, spreading to Lebanon, Syria and Yemen. History shows that the decisive factor in most wars has not been speed, but endurance and resources. In other words, military strategists have returned to the view that one must prepare for a long war from the outset rather than a short, decisive one, writes Freedman.

This means that militaries around the world are now concerned with building up significant stockpiles of arms. In the final decades of its existence, the Soviet Union produced vast numbers of tanks, which were stored across the vast expanses of Western Siberia. Soviet strategists were well aware that the country’s industrial potential was much weaker than NATO’s, and so they stockpiled tanks in anticipation of a drawn-out conflict. Paradoxically, the remnants of those stockpiles proved useful when the invasion of Ukraine turned from a 'quick' war into one of attrition.

Drivers of the new nuclear race

If we look at the formal indicators, the nuclear arms race has not started either. Global nuclear arsenals are still shrinking. According to the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), the peak of the world’s nuclear stockpiles was in 1986 with 70,400 warheads (over 40,000 in the USSR and more than 23,000 in the US). By 2000, this had fallen to 34,000; by 2015, to 15,800; in 2024, to 12,400; and by early 2025, to 12,200. But in reality, these figures are misleading. According to SIPRI, global nuclear arsenals are still declining primarily due to the dismantling of outdated weapons. A new phase of the nuclear arms race is virtually inevitable and, in practice, already underway. The threat is exacerbated by declining transparency in the nuclear sphere and the breakdown of arms control agreements. Once the New START treaty expires in February 2026, the number of warheads on strategic missiles is likely to begin rising once again.

Although the role of nuclear forces as a deterrent has diminished, the global driver behind the new nuclear arms race is once again the shifting balance of power among the great powers. For China to fully assume the status of a fully-fledged superpower commensurate with its economic weight and political ambitions, it must expand its nuclear capabilities to a level comparable with those of the United States and Russia. In turn, for Russia, whose nuclear arsenal is its only real 'ticket' into the club of superpowers, there is a strong incentive to modernise and maintain its relevance. Meanwhile, the United States is being forced to rethink its nuclear strategy in the context of a potential confrontation not with a single rival, but with several nuclear-armed adversaries simultaneously – China, Russia, and North Korea. Finally, signals from the United States to its allies that it may no longer serve as a guaranteed security umbrella are undermining the entire concept of nuclear non-proliferation as the world has known it in recent decades. This, in turn, is prompting 'Greater Europe' to reconsider the strengthening of its own nuclear capabilities (→ Re:Russia: A Hobbesian World).

According to the key findings of SIPRI’s latest annual yearbook, in 2024 all nine nuclear-armed states – the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel – continued the modernisation of their arsenals. As of January 2025, around 3,912 warheads were deployed on missiles and aircraft; this figure is consistent with January 2024. Of these, approximately 2,100 deployed warheads were kept in a state of high operational readiness on ballistic missiles, the vast majority of which belong to the United States and Russia, though a small number are attributed to France, the United Kingdom, and, possibly, China.

Global nuclear arsenal at the beginning of 2025

Over the past year, China increased its nuclear arsenal from 500 to 600 warheads, and experts anticipate further growth over the coming decade. The most ambitious forecast suggests that by 2035, China could possess up to 1,500 nuclear warheads, i.e. maintaining an annual pace of 100 additional warheads. At such a level, China would begin to see itself as a member of the top nuclear league, especially given that current widely accepted estimates, including those by SIPRI, put the number of deployed warheads for both the United States and Russia at just over 1,700.

In China, the vast majority of warheads are believed to be stored separately from their launch systems, in line with the country's traditional policy. However, according to the US Department of Defence, Beijing has begun to shift away from this approach and is now placing a small number of warheads on intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). China is also rapidly expanding its ICBM infrastructure, building new missile silos in the north and east-central regions of the country, and by January 2025, their number had nearly reached 350. By the end of the decade, China may match Russia and the United States in the number of ICBMs, although its total number of nuclear warheads will still remain significantly lower. The location of these silos in northern China reduces their vulnerability to long-range conventional strikes. Additionally, China is modernising its Type 094 (SSBN) submarines by equipping them with longer-range missiles. Work is also underway on a new class of submarine and a strategic bomber, indicating Beijing’s desire to boost its nuclear capabilities and strategic flexibility.

Old rivals — new doctrines

The United States and Russia, who together possess around 90% of the world’s nuclear weapons, are not only modernising and expanding their arsenals but are also making changes to their nuclear doctrines. In November 2024, Russia updated its nuclear strategy, slightly lowering the threshold for possible nuclear use (→ Re:Russia: The Doctrine of Nuclear Non-Deterrence). This is more a sign of weakness than strength: the war in Ukraine has once again shown that Russia’s economic capabilities do not allow it to become a powerful conventional military force, which is pushing it to rely more heavily on nuclear threats.

At the same time, the war has slowed the modernisation of Russia’s nuclear arsenal in 2024, according to SIPRI analysts: the delivery of new ballistic missile submarines and upgraded bombers did not take place, and work on ICBM bases has made little progress.

In turn, the Biden administration updated its nuclear doctrine in March 2024. According to information gathered by The New York Times, the classified document instructs the United States to be prepared to deter Russia, China, and North Korea simultaneously – in peacetime, during crises, and in the event of conflict. This strategy of 'tripolar deterrence', along with China’s intentions to dramatically elevate its nuclear status from basic deterrence to the capacity to withstand a full-scale nuclear conflict, is expected to prompt the US to deploy additional forces, according to the US Council on Foreign Relations’ (CFR) report entitled ‘Optimal Deterrence’.

Historically, the US has focused on a 'counterforce' strategy, where the primary aim of a nuclear strike is to destroy the enemy’s nuclear forces – launch sites, command centres, and the like. This approach has driven a constant arms race: the more launch systems are vulnerable to attack, the more are needed to ensure a second-strike capability. For decades, the USSR, and later Russia, were prepared to maintain limited strategic parity. The quantitative arms race was frozen, but the qualitative race continued: the US invested in counterforce capabilities by improving missile accuracy and enhancing its intelligence and surveillance.

However, the growth of China’s nuclear arsenal and the new challenge of tripolar deterrence are disrupting this balance. If Washington continues to adhere to the counterforce strategy, it will need to keep expanding its own forces to preserve its ability to neutralise adversaries’ arsenals in a conflict. According to the CFR report, this is a path to an endless and costly arms race, which only increases the risk of war. Nonetheless, US officials and analysts frequently discuss this scenario as if it were inevitable. The United States is standing still while autocrats are racing ahead, complains Robert Peters of the Heritage Foundation. But there is a choice, the US Council on Foreign Relations argues: abandoning counterforce logic and shifting strategic objectives from adversaries’ nuclear forces to their conventional military assets and infrastructure could offer a less escalatory and potentially more effective form of deterrence.

European countries and the non-proliferation regime

The preconditions for entering the nuclear race have also developed in peaceful Europe, where forces advocating the complete denuclearisation of the continent were still quite influential until recently. First Vladimir Putin, and then Donald Trump, significantly altered Europe’s perspective on the nuclear issue. Putin incorporated nuclear rhetoric into his military diplomacy following the invasion of Ukraine, more or less openly threatening Europe with his nuclear arsenal (→ Re:Russia: The Doctrine of Nuclear Non-Deterrence). Trump, meanwhile, has managed to sow uncertainty among Europeans about the reliability of US nuclear protection guarantees. According to a survey by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) conducted in May this year, between 55% and 85% of those surveyed in seven of twelve European countries (Portugal, Spain, Poland, Romania, Italy, Germany, and the Czech Republic) report being concerned in their daily lives about the potential use of nuclear weapons. In the remaining countries, concern ranged from one-third to 45%. In nine countries, between 50% and 68% support the creation of a European nuclear shield (in Switzerland 45%; in Italy and Hungary, majorities are opposed), seeing the US shield as insufficiently reliable. In six countries, either a relative or outright majority support the development of a national nuclear deterrent (Poland, Spain, Portugal, Romania, Denmark, and Estonia).

In the United Kingdom, according to the same survey, opponents of expanding the national nuclear arsenal only slightly outnumber supporters (42% vs 38%). However, back in 2021, the British government decided to raise the ceiling on its warhead stockpile from 225 to 260. The actual number of deployed warheads and delivery systems remains undisclosed. The UK’s modernisation programme includes replacing the Vanguard-class submarines with the new Dreadnought-class, participating in the US programme to extend the life of the Trident II D5 missiles, and developing the A21/Mk7 (Astraea) warhead, similar to the American W93/Mk7 but under UK control, ensuring independent launch capability. In France, by contrast, an absolute majority of those surveyed support expanding nuclear forces (52% vs 27%). However, the French government is currently focused solely on modernising its existing arsenal, including the development of next-generation submarines and the ASN4G cruise missile.

India has increased its arsenal to 180 warheads and is developing a nuclear triad comprising aircraft, land-based missiles, and submarines. The country may be transitioning from the separate storage of warheads to their integration with launch systems even during peacetime. India’s strategy is increasingly focused on deterring China, rather than solely Pakistan. Pakistan, for its part, possesses 170 warheads and continues to build a triad of its own while expanding the production of fissile material, which may indicate plans to expand its arsenal.

As of January 2025, SIPRI estimates North Korea’s nuclear arsenal at 50 warheads, with the potential to increase to 90. While the country did not conduct any tests in 2024, experts in South Korea and the United Nations have observed progress in the DPRK’s development of tactical nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. In autumn 2024, Pyongyang announced it was accelerating its nuclear programme, suggesting that further growth of its arsenal is likely. Israel is estimated to possess 90 nuclear warheads and carried out a strategic forces modernisation programme in 2024, which included missile technology tests and the upgrading of its plutonium reactor in the Negev.

However, all of this data on changes in the status of nuclear forces reflects the results of programmes that were planned and initiated in the early 2020s. The re-evaluation of the role of nuclear deterrence, influenced by Putin and Trump, took place between 2023 and early 2025, and its consequences are yet to be fully seen. In any case, SIPRI experts consider the nearly 40-year period of nuclear arms reduction to have come to an end. The key challenge of the coming era will be the growing number of countries seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. If North Korea has managed to do so, then there are few nations in the world for whom it would be technically or politically impossible. The war in Ukraine and the Western coalition’s failure to stop it present a compelling and, to many, irrefutable argument for the existential necessity of taking such a step.