Day: March 10, 2026

Jack Lawlor is a member of the CAPA Foreign Policy Working Group and leader of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship’s Chicago Chapter.

This essay is an effort to enhance understanding among ordinary Americans about the perils of nuclear weapons and a new nuclear arms race that will include space-based weaponry.

I have participated in organizing annual commemorations of the tragedies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the Chicago area for many years.   There is now, after years of effort, growing interest in these subjects.  For good reason.

Let me begin by describing what I find most troubling at this time. Unfortunately, the list is a bit lengthy:

1. THE FAILURE OF THE U.S. AND RUSSIA TO EXTEND THE NEW START TREATY BEFORE IT EXPIRES IN FEBRUARY, 2026.  (Editor: the treaty expired on February 5, 2026.)

We face the expiration of the last meaningful nuclear weapons agreement between the U.S. and Russia. The New Start Treaty has been credited for successfully reducing the number of nuclear weapons kept by each country.  

If this expiration is not successfully prevented, we may be facing another woefully expensive nuclear arms race that will further cripple domestic spending on peacetime needs such as health care, education, scientific research and the needs of the poor.

2. THE RACE TO DEVELOP HYPERSONIC MISSLES.

Russia, China and the U.S. are testing, developing and, in the case of Russia, using hypersonic missiles which can travel at speeds currently known to be between 7 or 8 times the speed of sound.

Hypersonics are very accurate and have a range of about 3,400 miles.  They are extremely difficult to intercept because they are highly maneuverable and can be flown at low altitudes.   In short, an enemy can be struck before realizing what is going on.  

If mounted on long-range bombers or submarines near our nation’s coast, hypersonic missiles can have a strategic as well as tactical use.  They are capable of carrying nuclear weapons with multiple warheads. In the recent movie, “House of Dynamite,” the U.S. President is said to have 19 minutes to respond to the launch of a conventional Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (an “ICBM”).  If the launch in that movie involved a hypersonic missile shot from a submarine near the U.S. coast, the President’s reaction time would be limited even further and the likelihood of repelling the hypersonic with a U.S. interceptor missile would be nil.

Why? Compare the flight paths of hypersonic missiles with that of ICBMs.  The ICBMs are also hypersonic, but their 30-minute-long journey into outer space and return to earth’s atmosphere follow a predictable flight path providing a longer reaction time and perhaps a 50/50 possibility of being hit by a defensive weapon if the attack does not involve a swarm of incoming nukes.  In contrast, as indicated above, hypersonics can very quickly navigate low-altitude strike paths and maneuver in ways that evade defensive missile interception.

Putin has already launched two hypersonic missile strikes against Ukraine, one falling within short miles from the Polish border. 

Most significantly, Putin and his chief Russian deputies have threatened the use of tactical nuclear weapons on many occasions.  These statements should give the entire world great pause.  Imagine such a use of hypersonic missiles.  It would be unlikely that any nation attacked by nuclear-armed hypersonics could refrain from engaging in its own nuclear strikes and counterstrikes that their systems are designed to deliver.

The time to stop the development of these hair-trigger weapons is now, before it is too late.  Can we cope with such weapons?  Can Russian, Chinese and American societies afford this multi-faceted arms race as their populations age and domestic economies stagger?  The resemblance of our times to the 1930s looms large.

3. THE THREAT TO RESUME ATMOSPHERIC NUCLEAR TESTING.

In October 2025, the American President made vague remarks that because other countries have resumed nuclear testing, the U.S. would resume nuclear testing as well.

The White House has refused to clarify what the President was referring to.  If the reference is indeed to atmospheric testing, it would be the first resumption of atmospheric testing by any country in over 30 years.

The President’s vague statement and the White House failure to clarify has renewed fears in the peace and nuclear disarmament communities that multiple countries may embark upon the atmospheric testing that poisoned the earth and its atmosphere in the 1950s.  

This of course is a great leap backwards.  The 1963 Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, although not formally adopted by requisite countries, has directly and indirectly prevented such lethal testing for decades.

4. THE MILITARIZATION OF OUTER SPACE

There is growing concern about the militarization of outer space, especially in low orbits, where world communications and surveillance satellites are located.

Earth to space and space to space weapons systems are being developed and tested by several countries.  A Russian test successfully destroyed a low orbit target satellite, adding more space debris among the flight paths of the satellites which hold the world communications and financial systems together.

Once again, this is a great leap backwards, at least in terms of previous international intent.  The 1967 Outer Space treaty banned nuclear weapons in space but does NOT address conventional weaponry.  Of course, the intricate and vulnerable system of communications satellites which now are an essential part of the infrastructure of contemporary civilization did not exist in 1967.

The dangers posed by anti-satellite weapons are similar to the premise of the “House of Dynamite” movie, where panic sets in among U.S. defensive weapons systems analysts because their equipment failed to detect the nation of origin that has launched an ICBM against Chicago. If a nation loses its communications and surveillance satellite systems due to the use of anti-satellite weaponry, the victimized nation will be more inclined to panic and make mistakes regarding its use of nukes in a possible first strike.

5. A PROPOSED NEW MISSILE DEFENSE SYSTEM.

Remember ABMs, anti-ballistic missile systems? President Reagan initiated their development, nicknaming it “Star Wars.”  Russia entered the race to build an ABM system, further weakening its economy.

Our current President was much impressed by the performance of Israel’s “Iron Dome” anti-missile system, although its performance was not perfect.  Also, the Israeli system is distinguishable because it defends a significantly smaller land area and does not defend against either ICBMs or hypersonics.

Nonetheless, our President wants to construct at massive cost a “Golden Dome” missile defense system to protect the entire U.S.  No matter how much money is spent on it, a “Golden Dome” will not provide effective protection against a nuclear swarm attack of ICBMs, hypersonics, and drones attacking the U.S. in quick succession raids.

ADDITIONAL HELPFUL BACKGROUND

In short, there has been bad recent news regarding the development and use of nuclear weaponry.

Many citizens may wonder how we got to this point.

It’s helpful to further explore post-World War II developments in this area to gain a reasoned, sobering perspective and discern the chances for success in regulating and eventually disarming nuclear weapons.

Let’s start with the problem caused by our fading memories about the lethality of these weapons.

Many U.S. baby boomers were required to read a masterly piece of journalism on this subject while in high school. I am of course referring to John Hersey’s Hiroshima, originally published as a lengthy article in an oversized issue of The New Yorker magazine.

Within a few months after the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 31-year-old war correspondent John Hersey went to Hiroshima, interviewed survivors, and wrote his book.  The book does not treat the first use of a nuclear weapon as an abstraction; instead, it personalizes the nature of the resulting injuries to six survivors caused by the attack in ways left unexplored by the recent hit movie, “Oppenheimer.”

For many years, Hersey’s book became required summer reading on high school mandatory summer reading lists.

Less so, today.  

Our fading memory of the catastrophic impact of these weapons has helped us fail to notice the ominous developments described above.  It would be helpful if movie producers, artists and musicians could be further encouraged to use their artistic talents to place the fearsome nature of these weapons front and center in public consciousness throughout the world.  Everything we love can be destroyed in a short time if either malice or uncertainty and panic unleash these weapons.

I wish we could discern an arc of much progress in the efforts to regulate and eventually abolish nuclear arms.  But the arc is going in the wrong direction.

Consider this recent history:

— As stated above, the New Start Treaty between the US and Russia is expiring.  Russia has already suspended its participation but has not formally withdrawn as yet.  New Start successfully achieved verifiable large reductions in the number of nuclear weapons from 50,000 to approximately 1,700 deployable warheads each between the U.S. and Russia.

If New Start is not renewed, and if China is not involved in its renewal, the U.S. may feel compelled to exceed New Start limits due to China’s nuclear weapons build up.  China has more than doubled its nuclear arsenal from 200 warheads in 2010 to an estimated 600 today; the Pentagon estimates its number may grow to 1,500 by 2026.

Also, both the U.S. and Russia have walked away from the separate 1987 INF Treaty, which sought to eliminate intermediate-range nuclear missiles.  Nuclear-equipped hypersonic missiles would fall into this category.

— There are now at least 9 countries with nuclear weapons, stockpiling 13,000 of them.

— There have been United Nations resolutions and treaties (such as the 2022 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons) pledging countries to forego and abolish them.  This is a highly admirable effort, but the nine nations who possess nuclear weapons haven’t signed.

The 1970 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons helped limit the number of states possessing nuclear weapons and pledged good faith efforts on the nations possessing nuclear weapons to negotiate their disarmament.   However, these negotiations among the nuclear powers have not progressed.  The limited success of this treaty may end soon if Iran and other countries proceed vigorously to obtain a bomb in the wake of the recent U.S./Israeli attack on Iran, in the wake of European concerns about the reliability of America’s “nuclear umbrella” given its unsteady foreign policy, and in the wake of recent border violations by Russia in Ukraine and the U.S. in Venezuela.

— U.S. peace and justice groups have been pushing hard for the US to forego first use of nuclear weapons, but the legislative resolutions stall in a toxically divided Congress pre-occupied with elections and culture wars.

— Peace group efforts have also tried and failed to regulate the U.S. President’s sole authority to authorize and launch a nuclear attack.  Apart from verifying that the order to launch comes from the President, U.S. protocols do not require discussion or review of the order to attack by any other U.S. official.  This is obviously dangerous if autocratic or unstable individuals occupy the Oval Office.  Senator Tim Kaine’s recent effort to regulate the president’s authority was recently defeated in a 53 – 47 Senate vote.

— As you can glean, a new, incredibly costly arms race reminiscent of the 1930s, 1950s and 1960s may soon break out into the open.  The cost to refurbish the U.S. “Sentinel” land-based missile system ALONE has escalated from 78 billion to 140.9 billion, and according to 2023 estimates the total cost of nuclear refurbishment already underway will cost $756 billion dollars between 2023 and 2036.  PLUS, as indicated above, the U.S. President has announced his interest in a new, doomed-to-fail uber-expensive Golden Dome missile defense system, likely triggering a costly anti-missile arms race.  

WHAT CAN WE DO?

Let’s not assume the U.S. public is very familiar with the story told above. Let’s instead build a dialogue that uses plain language to avoid future Hiroshimas and Nagasakis.  People can be encouraged to:

— learn more about the situation, using resources such as Arms Control Today magazine and frequent seminars offered by the Peace Action network;

— work together to retain the life of the New Start Treaty;

—work together to support pending House Resolution 317, the so-called “Back from the Brink” resolution which calls for the U.S., Russia, China and other nuclear-armed states to negotiate to reduce their arsenals and cancel replacement plans; renounce first use of nuclear weapons from high alert status; and end the President’s sole authority to launch a nuclear attack, all with the goal of eventually abolishing nuclear weapons systems;

— with resolve, urge Congress to support the proposed Nuclear Testing Without Approval Act (HR 5951) which requires Congressional approval of any explosive nuclear tests and, in addition, the proposed Restrain Act (HR 5894) which bans such tests and restricts their funding;

— above all, join other groups in your community such as Chicago Area Peace Action, teachers unions, religious congregations, local officials and others and get folks involved in anti-nuclear proliferation efforts.  You’ll learn a lot from others by doing so and they will appreciate your insights and talents.  Seasoned groups know how to work with governmental officials and their staffs, elevating the effectiveness of individual efforts enormously. As suggested above, it’s high time for these efforts to also work toward the abandonment of hypersonic, missile defense, space-based weapons systems, and any plans to resume atmospheric nuclear tests.

Finally, it’s time to explore a new greater cooperation with like-minded grass roots peace and justice groups in other countries on a coordinated international basis. Chicago Area Peace Action has already met with a like-minded group from South Korea. 

The time for making these efforts may be right. A recent poll indicates that the overwhelming majority of Americans favor extending the New Start Treaty, and that a majority are more inclined to vote for candidates who take this position.      

Let’s ponder all of this with the curiosity of a  young John Hersey and work together to prevent future Hiroshimas and Nagasakis.

David Borris is a former CAPA president and current board member

We must understand and recognize the disturbing and growing danger represented by the pending expiration of the LAST remaining nuclear arms control treaty between the two most prolific possessors of these weapons of mass destruction. Equally disturbing – there are ZERO, and I mean zero,  active negotiations for what might replace New Start – and ZERO active negotiations with the Peoples Republic of China, who, understandably, after more than 60 years of not engaging, are now worried enough about the behaviors of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin – that they are now embarked on a decade long plan to achieve some sort of parity in the madness. And what rational head of state would not be worried hearing the irresponsible rhetoric and actions of the two world leaders that control nearly 90% of the world’s nuclear weapons?  

Here it is worth mentioning, again, in case anyone is not fully aware – that the United States is the ONLY nation to have used a nuclear weapon on another country in armed combat, at the end of World War II. While there is much debate over the necessity of those bombings – particularly the Nagasaki bombing – there is no debate that the effects of those two bombings, on Aug 6 and Aug 9, more than 80 years ago were so singularly horrific that the world’s conscience has not afforded the space for another use of these diabolical weapons since. 

UNTIL NOW. 

NOW we enter a world order that no longer seeks security through cooperation and understanding – NOW we see rhetoric and behaviors reminiscent of the world order prior to WWI when the struggle for access to land, and human and mineral resources determined the world order and great powers behavior. When what mattered, as Steven Miller so recently reminded us, in his interview with Jake Tapper and what will matter again now is the  new world order are to be governed again by Strength, governed by Power, governed by Force, rather than by what he referred to as “niceties” – what we might call sanity and loving our children.  

These are indeed, worrisome words and worrisome times. Not that we have not had dangerous scenarios in the past. 

The Korean War, The Cuban Missile Crisis, the 1973 Arab Israeli War – to name a few. But in each of these instances, those who controlled the mechanisms of the end of civilization prevailed over chaos through communication, careful diplomacy, and sane rational thinking. Over the past 80 years, we have been lulled into a false sense of security believing that such clear communication, careful diplomacy and sane, rational thinking will always come to the fore and save mankind from its worst instincts. 

I am here today to say loud and clear that this is nothing more than magical thinking—and anyone who chooses to ignore the dire warning signs are either closing their eyes to a situation they do not wish to acknowledge, or they are blissfully, nay, foolishly, unaware of the gathering storm.  

For a moment, let’s take a short trip through recent history—we’ll begin a mere 62 years ago, on June 10, 1963, on the campus of American University – when then President John F. Kennedy delivered what has become known as the “Peace Speech” – at the height of the cold war. The rhetoric was powerful- but more important, the actions that followed were inspiring. The United States would unilaterally stop all nuclear testing and pledge not to resume if no other nation did so. And the limited test ban treaty was signed less than 60 days later- and is largely credited as being the first step toward a global nonproliferation treaty – which became a reality in 1968 – and found full force of int’l law in 1970.

Moving from 1963 to 1970 – when the NPT came into force – it represented a grand bargain – the non-nuclear weapons nations would agree to NOT develop these weapons of horrific mass destruction, and the then 5 nuclear armed states in turn – under Article VI of the treaty would agree “to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament.”  

While the rest of the world largely held up their end of the bargain – with the fervent hope that the nuclear weapons owning states would hold up their end—we failed – and largely failed humanity. To be clear, we continued the empty rhetorical service to the safety and security of a world without nuclear weapons- but tragically, we did nothing more.   

Continuing on our historical journey- we jump ahead to Prague-  April, 2009- where newly elected President  Barack Obamas promised- “ So today, I state clearly and with conviction America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons”  – Such great hope — Alas-  a short two years later, in 2010 – that same president signed into law a full and complete nuclear modernization program – committing   $1.5 trillion over 30 years to a complete overhaul of our entire nuclear weapons architecture. This boondoggle has ensured that the US would NOT and WILL NOT lead on the disarmament obligations all signatories to the treaty claimed to undertake under Article VI.  

Finally, in one more attempt to position the US as the keeper of the Nuclear Disarmament flame, in 2020,  then candidate Joe Biden spoke repeatedly on the campaign trail stating that the sole purpose of our nuclear arsenal will be  deterrence –and deterrence only – with the clear understanding that the US would adopt, in effect, a no first use policy – which he promptly never spoke of again after being sworn in to office.  

And now we come full circle to this moment. Martin Luther King recognized more than 60 years ago that “Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power.” Indeed, with the massive growth of scientific knowledge and lightning-fast global communication systems – it is no longer possible to keep nuclear weapons technology and the accompanying scientific knowledge bottled up to be dispensed only to whosoever “we see fit to possess it.” That ship has sailed – and so we have become, in Kings words “a nation of guided missiles and misguided men.”  

And we have very little left to bargain with – save our rapidly vanishing moral authority. And with the current administration fixation on demanding that the industrialized nations of the world arm themselves to the teeth – with US made weapons and weapons systems- we now face the very real nightmare of at least a dozen, and possibly more, nuclear arme nations in the very near future. 

In the last year of his life, I heard Daniel Ellsberg say on more than one occasion, “the possibility of a nuclear detonation, by design, miscalculation or accident is not 0%, it’s not even close to 0%.” And we know that the universal laws of physics and mathematics tell us that anything that is not a mathematical impossibility is a mathematical inevitability. 

Our 80-year history of nuclear weapons possession is replete with example after example of misunderstandings, accidents, and cold war fear where we just barely escaped a major exchange of thermonuclear weapons. And now we increase the opportunities for misjudgment by magnitudes with a new nuclear arms race with China. Adding to that risk are more nations—Iran, South Korea, Japan and Saudi Arabia—exploring the development of their own arsenals–-all nations, with whom we have had limited history of arms control treaties or negotiations.  

By a stroke of luck, or the right person being in position to exercise proper judgment in the moment, or by cooler heads at the top restraining their initial instinct—we have avoided the apocalypse. 

But that should not, and cannot, be counted on to last forever.  I took my degree from the University of Nevada, in Las Vegas. And I took a lot of courses in mathematics of casino games.  I must tell you; I know a little about winning streaks.  They don’t last forever. It is a mathematical impossibility. 

We have been the beneficiaries of a fantastically long winning streak with respect to nuclear weapons. It won’t last forever. If we continue to add bullets to the chamber of the revolver we hold to our heads and to the heads of the world population in this lunatic game of nuclear Russian Roulette, our luck will run out – and we won’t get a second chance to get this right. 

In the opening of the 2003 movie “The Fog of War,” former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara says, “The conventional wisdom in warfare is ‘don’t make the same mistake twice, learn from your mistakes.’ But there will be no learning period with nuclear weapons—you make one mistake you’re going to destroy nations.” And now we know about nuclear winter: that we will destroy more than just the belligerent participants—we’ll functionally obliterate human civilization across the planet. And we won’t get a second chance.

In this historic moment, it is incumbent on The United States, as the leading possessor of nuclear weapons to summon both the moral authority and the political will – to stand before the world and say “Mea Culpa Mea Culpa.”

We are now morally required to finally act under our obligation to the Grand Bargain that was and is the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. We must commit to no longer preach temperance from a barstool. If we are asking South Korea, Japan, Iran, Saudi Arabia and other non-nuclear weapons states to hold off on developing their own nuclear arsenals- then we must be prepared to lead by example. 

If we are unable to do so- we will fall victim to – as Martin Luther King reminded us in New York City – one year to the day before his tragic assassination, and  one year before the Nonproliferation treaty entered into force,  “ If we do not act, we shall surely be dragged down the long, dark, and shameful corridors of time reserved for those who possess power without compassion, might without morality, and strength without sight.”

 Il close by paraphrasing the 1rst century sage Hillel the Elder – “If not us – who? If not now – when? “Let us hope that our children, and our children’s children, will live to see the answer to that ancient philosophical question. 

Should they not – it will need to be answered a thousand years or more from now – by the few thousand descendants of the unfortunate survivors of the inevitable nuclear holocaust as they continue to rebuild the shattered fragments of global society. 

Several CAPA members felt this article by journalist Zakaria well complemented the pieces we’re posting today by our own Jack Lawlor and David Borris.

February 6, 2026

We all sense that the world is entering a more uncertain phase. Alliances feel shakier, trade is fragmenting, and great powers are jostling more openly. But beneath these visible shifts lies something less discussed and more dangerous: the slow collapse of nuclear stability.

For much of the Cold War, people were terrified that a world with nuclear weapons would inevitably lead to proliferation and that wars would end up nuclear. After all, rarely in human history has a weapon sat unused in arsenals. But that is what happened. The arsenals remained, but they were bound by treaties, habits and doctrines about restraint. Arms control agreements capped numbers. Deterrence relationships were relatively clear. Proliferation was constrained, if imperfectly, by norms and pressure. It was not a safe world — but it was a stable one.

That era might be at an end.

The clearest marker was the expiration this week of New START, the last remaining nuclear arms control treaty between the United States and Russia. There are now no legally binding limits on the world’s two largest nuclear arsenals for the first time in more than 50 years. Some hope this will be a brief interregnum, and efforts have begun to find a successor agreement. But the broader context is not encouraging.

When New START was signed in 2010, it reflected a different world. Russia’s strategic weapons were aging. China’s nuclear arsenal was small and oriented toward what was called “minimum deterrence.” Now, as Eric Edelman and Franklin Miller write in Foreign Affairs, that world “no longer exists.”

Russia has modernized roughly 95 percent of its strategic nuclear forces, at least according to President Vladimir Putin.More worrying, Moscow has built a vast regional nuclear arsenal — experts estimating some 1,500 tactical weapons deployable from land, air and sea. These systems fell outside New START altogether. During the war in Ukraine, Putin has repeatedly invoked nuclear threats, engaging in a scary game of blackmail.

China’s trajectory may be even more consequential. When Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, China possessed roughly 240 nuclear warheads. Today it has more than 600 and is on track to reach 1,000 by 2030, according to U.S. estimates. China is fielding a full nuclear triad — land-based missiles, ballistic-missile submarines and air-launched weapons — and moving toward more frequent levels of high alert, including the capacity for “launch on warning”: launching while an adversary’s missiles are still in the air.

The Biden administration sought to slow this buildup through dialogue, pressing Beijing to enter nuclear arms discussions. The response was blunt. China would seriously talk only when its arsenal matched more closely that of the U.S. and Russia. As Edelman and Miller note, Beijing views transparency and verification not as confidence-building measures but as vulnerabilities. Arms control is seen as a constraint to be avoided.

The result is a three-sided nuclear competition, far more complex than the bipolar standoff of the Cold War. The Economist captures the shiftwith a vivid image: What Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, once called “two scorpions in a bottle” has become three — the more crowded bottle means the scorpions are less predictable.

This matters because deterrence grows more fragile as the system grows more complex. A bipolar nuclear world was dangerous but legible. A tripolar — or multipolar — one is not. Russia and China are cooperating more closely, exchanging technology and conducting joint military exercises, sometimes involving nuclear-capable forces. A bipartisan U.S. Strategic Posture Commission warned in 2023 of the risk of “opportunistic aggression” or even coordinated pressure across multiple theaters. American nuclear forces, designed for a largely bilateral rivalry, weren’t meant to deter two peer adversaries simultaneously.

Arms races are dangerous. Numbers creep up. Doctrines blur. The risk of miscalculation rises — not just in war but also in crises, exercises or moments of panic. Modern nuclear systems are increasingly entangled with cyber networks, space-based sensors and compressed decision timelines. A false alarm or misread signal can escalate far faster than in the past.

The danger does not stop with the major powers. According to the New York Times, about 40 countries have the technical skills to produce nuclear weapons.

For decades, nuclear nonproliferation rested on a bargain: Most countries would forgo nuclear weapons in exchange for security guarantees and the promise that nuclear states would manage their arsenals responsibly. Both pillars are now under strain.

As doubts grow about America’s willingness to protect allies consistently, some are quietly reassessing their options. In South Korea, debate about acquiring an independent nuclear deterrent has moved from the margins toward the mainstream. In Japan, once-unthinkable discussions are now whispered among strategists. If such moves begin in northeast Asia, they will not end there.

We are drifting from managed deterrence toward competitive rearmament, from limits toward accumulation, from predictability toward improvisation.

For decades, we lived under the shadow of the most powerful weapons in history and learned, imperfectly, how not to use them. That achievement is a landmark but may prove to be fragile and temporary.