\n Fast forward to this past week. The most-watched movie on Netflix is \u201cA House of Dynamite,\u201d about a nuclear missile heading for Chicago and evading air defenses. Russian President Vladimir Putin oversaw nuclear exercises, including a new missile system<\/a> that can strike anywhere on Earth. In response, President Donald Trump ordered<\/a> \u201cimmediate\u201d renewal of nuclear weapons tests after a three-decade moratorium. Russia threatened to do the same.\n <\/p>\n \n What is going on? Let\u2019s try to make sense of things.\n <\/p>\n \n Against the backdrop of these headlines is the steady erosion of arms control agreements that trace back to the Cold War. The centerpiece of this framework is known as the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, which when signed in 1991 reversed an arms race between the US and the Soviet Union, mandating the reduction of nuclear arsenals together with inspection and verification in both countries.\n <\/p>\n \n START was agreed to shortly before the fall of the Soviet Union but was later expanded in a 2010 agreement between the United States and Russia to further reduce arsenals and maintain verification in both countries. This deal, known as New START, was extended for five years \u2014 through February 2026 \u2014 in the early months of Biden\u2019s presidency.\n <\/p>\n \n Then came the Ukraine war, after which Russia suspended its participation in the treaty and blocked American inspectors from its nuclear facilities. Hopes of renewing the treaty or negotiating further extensions have remained dormant ever since.\n <\/p>\n \n While Russia claims to still be complying with its obligations, the treaty expires altogether in three months, and there are no signs of work to negotiate a new accord. The demise of START would remove the last remaining arms control treaty between the world\u2019s leading nuclear powers. Trump\u2019s aversion to international agreements and perceived unfairness in such accords toward US interests makes new arrangements further unlikely.\n <\/p>\n \n So, while the risk of a nuclear exchange may remain low, the world is entering an era not seen since the Cold War, with a potential free-for-all expansion of nuclear weapons by the two leading nuclear powers (accounting for 90% of all deployable weapons systems), as well as by countries not yet in the nuclear club.\n <\/p>\n \n South Korea, faced with a nuclear armed adversary to the north and questions over American security guarantees, has debated the merits of acquiring its own nuclear capability. Saudi Arabia has long warned that it will obtain a nuclear weapon absent American security guarantees in the event Iran ever does the same and recently signed a mutual defense pact with Pakistan, a nuclear armed power.\n <\/p>\n \n Extending the US nuclear deterrence umbrella to Saudi Arabia may be a topic when the Saudi crown prince visits Washington later this month for meetings with Trump.\n <\/p>\n \n While nuclear arms control agreements like START curbed the expansion of American and Russian nuclear arsenals, there has never been such an agreement in place for China. Given Beijing\u2019s adversarial positioning, Trump has a fair point in making clear that the US will keep pace and remain ahead of both Russia and China.\n <\/p>\n \n China\u2019s nuclear arsenal is growing by approximately 100 new warheads per year, faster than any other country. According to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists<\/a>, Beijing now possesses 600 nuclear weapons, together with advanced missile delivery systems that can strike the US. These experts predict that China may possess 1,500 nuclear weapons by 2035, with strike capabilities from land, sea, and air (known as a full nuclear triad).\n <\/p>\n \n While the country is a recognized nuclear power under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, or NPT, it has never engaged in serious arms control talks to curtail its buildup.\n <\/p>\n \n Beijing argues<\/a> its nuclear stockpile pales in comparison to the US or Russia (each with over 5,000 warheads) and thus it should not be treated similarly as it goes about a rapid nuclear expansion. This argument cuts against the spirit of nuclear non-proliferation that undergirds the NPT system. It also calls the entire system of strategic stability that START established further into doubt, heralding an expansion of nuclear arsenals and nuclear-armed powers, together with heightening risk of mistrust and miscalculation.\n <\/p>\n \n Even at best, therefore, the world is entering an uncharted era of expanding nuclear arsenals without any of the traditional guardrails that have existed for decades.\n <\/p>\n \n Now, add the entry of artificial intelligence into decision-making and military analysis, and the world may also be moving perilously closer to a once-fictional \u201cDoomsday Machine\u201d scenario from Stanley Kubrick\u2019s \u201cDr. Strangelove\u201d (1964). That machine contained an automatic nuclear launch program outside human control under certain conditions, an absurdity created by humans to ensure their own destruction without human input.\n <\/p>\n \n This is no longer fictional.\n <\/p>\n \n Only last year, when Biden met Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the two \u201caffirmed the need to maintain human control over the decision to use nuclear weapons,\u201d according to the White House readout of the meeting. This principle for humans and not AI to control nuclear use in all circumstances might seem obvious, but it\u2019s not backed by any treaty or formal agreement.\n <\/p>\n \n Even if human judgment controls a decision at launch, machine judgments are being integrated into analysis cycles, compressing timeframes in a crisis, with risks of miscalculations driven by AI modeling as opposed to human judgment.\n <\/p>\n \n While the risk should not be overstated, Ukraine remains the current flashpoint.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump\u2019s order last week to renew nuclear tests came in response to Putin\u2019s provocatively overseeing nuclear exercises, including the launch of missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads and reaching the US. Moscow claimed the exercises were routine, but the timing and saber-rattling came after Trump poured cold water on a rumored second summi<\/a>t with Putin, as well as Russia\u2019s failure to gain new ground on the battlefield in Ukraine.\n <\/p>\n \n This is not the first time that Putin has brandished a nuclear threat over his flailing military campaign in Ukraine. In February 2024, Putin warned<\/a> that \u201cNATO nations assisting Ukraine \u2026 genuinely poses a risk of a conflict involving nuclear arms, which would lead to the annihilation of civilization.\u201d This past summer, Russia\u2019s former president and deputy chair of its security council, Dmitry Medvedev, warned Trump on continuing US support for Ukraine and pointed to Russia\u2019s nuclear strike capacity. In response, Trump ordered the deployment of submarines carrying nuclear weapons toward Russia.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump has been right to call Moscow\u2019s rhetorical bluff, while keeping diplomatic channels open toward a ceasefire together with support for Ukraine. However, the exchange of words together with exercises and deployments should heighten the concern about any further proliferation of nuclear weapons in a polarized environment.\n <\/p>\n Essential: Deterrence and diplomacy<\/p>\n \n All the above demonstrates that there is something to the recent headlines on nuclear weapons and popular movies about a loose nuke poised to annihilate Chicago. The risks of a nuclear exchange are small but increasing. 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