Global Courant
ANKARA
As the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) celebrates its 55th anniversary, disagreements over nuclear proliferation continue, with an increased $82 billion diverted to this area of investment last year.
The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) was opened for signature on July 1, 1968, and entered into force in 1970 in order to prevent the danger of nuclear war. The NPT should remain in effect indefinitely.
Currently, the US, Russia, China, UK, France, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea are nuclear weapons. Among these countries, Russia, the USA and China are seen as the dominant power in terms of the number of nuclear weapons.
Around 12,500 nuclear warheads worldwide
According to the online statistics portal Statista, there were about 12,500 nuclear warheads worldwide as of January 2023.
Russia leads with 5,889 nuclear warheads, followed by the United States with 5,244 and China with 410. France has 290 nuclear warheads, Britain 225, Pakistan 170, India 164, Israel 90, and according to estimates, North Korea has 20.
According to the 2023 report of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), although the number of nuclear warheads in the world continues to decline, this is mainly because the United States and Russia are removing obsolete warheads.
“The global reduction of operational warheads appears to have stopped and their numbers are increasing again,” the report added.
The report noted that both the United States and Russia “continue extensive and expensive programs to renovate and modernize their nuclear warheads, missiles, aircraft and submarine launch systems, and nuclear weapons production facilities.”
Addressing the nation in February, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia is suspending its participation in the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START).
The New START Treaty, signed in 2010, limited the number of strategic nuclear warheads deployed by Russia and the United States to a maximum of 1,550.
Putin said in June that his country had deployed the first batch of tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus and that the arms transfer would be completed by the end of summer.
It is reported that the nuclear tactical weapons sent by Russia to Belarus are three times more powerful than the nuclear weapons used by the USA against Japan in 1945.
China’s number of nuclear warheads, which was thought to be 350 in January 2022, rose to 410 in January 2023. SIPRI’s report underlines that China’s nuclear power is not fully known and a significant part of its assessments are based on data from the United States. Defense.
Nuclear weapons investments on the rise
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) has released a report titled Wasted: 2022 Global Nuclear Weapons Expenditures, which focuses on investments made by nine nuclear-armed countries in the development of nuclear weapons during the 2019-2022 period.
According to the report, worldwide nuclear weapons investments amounted to $72.9 billion in 2019, $72.6 billion in 2020, $82.4 billion in 2021 and $82.9 billion in 2022. Investments increased by $10 billion in four years.
“Nine countries spent $82.9 billion on nuclear weapons, and the private sector earned at least $29 billion in 2022,” the report said. “The United States spent more than all other nuclear-armed states combined, $43.7 billion. Russia, 9 At $1.6 billion, it spent 22% of what the US did, and China spent $11.7 billion, just over a quarter of the US total.”
‘Different attitudes towards nuclear weapons’
SIPRI Researcher Petr Topychkanov told Anadolu, “NATO’s nuclear policy is determined by the compromise between nuclear-armed and non-nuclear members, which includes the US, UK and France.”
“Non-nuclear members of NATO have different stances on nuclear weapons,” Topychkanov said, adding that “some countries store US tactical nuclear weapons on their territory and are willing to participate in NATO nuclear missions, while others do not allow deployment.” they do not maintain nuclear weapons on their territory and do not participate in such missions. This diversity of views results in an ambiguous NPT policy for NATO.”
Noting that since the implementation of the NPT, significant progress has been made in reducing nuclear weapons in both the USSR/Russia and the USA, he said: “The latest bilateral agreement, New START, has reduced the number of operationally deployed nuclear warheads to 1,550 units, which means It resulted in a significant decrease compared to the Cold War era.”
However, the increase in nuclear arsenals in non-NPT countries such as China and North Korea, India and Pakistan, as well as problems between Russia and the West, could lead to an increase in global nuclear weapons,” he said. .
When asked about North Korea’s nuclear threats, Topychkanov said, “North Korea’s nuclear threats are a survival strategy for their regime and do not pose a significant threat to NATO countries in Europe or the United States.”
However, for US allies like South Korea and Japan, the North Korean nuclear threat is a concern.
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