As conflict rises to frightening levels across the globe, the threat of all-out nuclear war has become even more prominent.
China’s hostility towards Taiwan, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, a raging North Korea, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine all come together to suggest the world may never have been closer to Armageddon than right now.
Since the end of WWII, nuclear-armed states have engaged in a policy of deterrence, which is based on the idea that if warring states were to launch major nuclear strikes it would lead to mutually assured destruction.
But this has not stopped countries embroiled in conflict from launching threats and displaying shows of strength regarding their nuclear capabilities.
MailOnline has taken a look into the four nuclear flashpoints across the planet and how they are forcing us to the brink of WWIII and Armageddon.
China ‘s hostility towards Taiwan , Iran ‘s nuclear ambitions, a raging North Korea , and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine all come together to suggest the world has never been closer to Armageddon than right now
Russia and the West
Just last month, Russia’s tyrant leader Vladimir Putin said the country would consider an attack from a non-nuclear state that was backed by a nuclear-armed one to be a ‘joint attack’ in what could be construed as a threat to use nuclear weapons in the war in Ukraine.
Putin, 71, declared his government was was considering changing the rules and regulations around Russia and its use of its nuclear arsenal even though war-torn Ukraine is a non-nuclear state that relies on military support from the US and other nuclear-armed countries.
Responding to Putin’s remarks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak said Russia ‘no longer has anything other than nuclear blackmail to intimidate the world’.
Putin has threatened the use of nuclear weapons in the past, but even Russia’s allies including China have called for calm with reports Chinese President Xi Jinping warning the dictator against using nuclear arms.
The threats have always failed to materialise, and Russia has continued its bombardment of Ukraine without using its nuclear arsenal.
In the early days of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Putin frequently invoked Moscow’s nuclear arsenal, the world’s biggest, repeatedly pledging to use all means necessary to defend Russia.
October 2022 – the launch of a Russian nuclear capable Yars missile at Plesetsk cosmodrome
Soldiers stand next to a Russian RS-24 Yars ballistic missile parked along Tverskaya street prior to a rehearsal for the Victory Day military parade in Moscow, on Thursday, May 2, 2024
He later seemed to moderate his rhetoric, but officials close to the Russian president have recently warned Nato countries they risked provoking nuclear war if they gave the green light for Ukraine to use long-range weapons.
But last month, Putin announced the radical expansion of the nuclear doctrine that would ‘clearly set the conditions for Russia to transition to using nuclear weapons’ – and said such scenarios included conventional missile strikes against Moscow.
He also said that Russia would consider such a ‘possibility’ of using nuclear weapons if it detected the beginning of a massive launch of missiles, aircraft, and drones into its territory.
The country’s nuclear arms were ‘the most important guarantee of security of our state and its citizens’, the Kremlin leader said.
Putin claimed the more was a direct response to discussions in the US and UK about allowing Ukraine to strike deep into Russian territory with Western-supplied long-range conventional missiles.
The leader earlier said in a speech to launch his ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine that Russia is a leading nuclear power ‘and possesses certain advantages in some of the newest types of weaponry.
‘In this regard, no one should have any doubts that a direct attack on our country will lead to defeat and horrible consequences for any potential aggressor.’
Russia boasts a fearsome nuclear arsenal with more atomic weapons than any other country (Pictured: the mushroom cloud from the Soviet Union’s Tsar Bomba – the largest nuclear weapon ever tested)
Russia is believed to have some 5,800 nuclear warheads, more than 1500 of which are operational and ready for deployment with Putin previously declaring that his nation was ready for the eventuality of a nuclear war
A Russian Yars intercontinental ballistic missile system drives in Red Square during a military parade on Victory Day
He later added: ‘Whoever tries to hinder us, or threaten our country or our people, should know that Russia’s response will be immediate and will lead you to consequences that you have never faced in your history.’
Putin declared that any attempt to use nuclear weapons on Russia would provoke a split-second response with hundreds of nuclear missiles that no enemy could survive.
‘I think no person of sound mind and clear memory would think of using nuclear weapons against Russia,’ he said, before declaring that his forces had tested and will place on combat duty their latest nuclear-capable weapons, the Burevestnik cruise missile and Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile.
Pavel Podvig, a senior researcher at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR), is widely considered to be the world’s leading Western expert on Russia’s nuclear weapons and last month warned: ‘If there were to be some kind of a massive launch — or several [Russian] missiles have been launched — then it’s pretty much impossible to guarantee that everything will be intercepted’.
Russia boasts a fearsome nuclear arsenal with more atomic weapons than any other country.
It is said to have some 5,800 nuclear warheads, 1500 of which are operational and ready for deployment with Putin declaring in March that his nation was ready for the eventuality of a nuclear war ‘from a military-technical point of view’.
North Korea, South Korea, and the US
North Korea regularly issues fiery, blistering rhetoric as the ties between the two Koreas remain tense since a US-led diplomacy on ending North Korea’s nuclear programme fell apart in 2019.
North Korea has since pushed hard to expand its nuclear arsenal and repeatedly threatened to attack South Korea and the US with its nuclear weapons. South Korea has no nuclear weapons
North Korea has argued it was forced to pursue nuclear weapons to deal with U.S.-led nuclear threats.
But experts say it’s unlikely for North Korea to launch a full-blown attack because its military is outpaced by the combined US and South Korean forces.
In July, US President Joe Biden and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol authorised the signing of joint nuclear deterrence guidelines as part of efforts to enhance their capabilities to cope with North Korea’s growing nuclear arsenal.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, his daughter and an official watch what it says is an intercontinental ballistic missile launching from an undisclosed location in North Korea in December 2023
Chilling images released by KCNA showed the communist dictator inspecting live artillery firing by graduates of the O Jin U Artillery Academy. Image shows live ammunition shooting training of the graduates of the 75th class of O Jin U Artillery Academy
The guidelines were adopted a year after the two countries established a consultation body to bolster information-sharing on nuclear operations and discuss how to integrate US nuclear weapons and South Korean conventional weapons in contingencies.
In a statement carried by state media, North Korea’s Defense Ministry said the US -South Korea guidelines betrayed ‘their sinister intention to step up their preparations for a nuclear war against’ North Korea.
The statement said its enemies’ escalating nuclear threats urgently require North Korea to further improve its nuclear deterrent readiness and add unspecified ‘important elements to the composition of the deterrent.’
It said the US and South Korea will ‘pay an unimaginably harsh price’ if they fail to stop provocative acts.
The South Korean Defense Ministry, however, snapped back in a statement that any attempt by North Korea to use nuclear weapons will invite an overwhelming response by the South Korean-US alliance and result in the end of the North’s government.
The US has repeatedly promised to use all its military capabilities, including nuclear weapons, to protect South Korea if it is attacked by North Korea, but many experts in South Korea believe the US lacks plans on how it would implement its extended deterrence to its ally.
Concerns about North Korea’s nuclear programme have grown in recent years as the North performed a slew of provocative missile tests and openly threatened to use nuclear weapons preemptively in potential conflicts with its adversaries.
North Korea recently said its front-line army units were ready to launch strikes on South Korea, as it ramped up pressure on its rival that it said flew drones and dropped propaganda leaflets over its capital Pyongyang.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un views a missile launcher before the launch of a Hwasong-18 intercontinental ballistic missile during what North Korea said was a drill in December 2023
This undated picture released this month by North Korea shows the test launch of a Hwasongpho-18 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) at an undisclosed location
Kim Jong Un inspected the live artillery firing by graduates of O Jin U Artillery Academy but state media did not report when the exercise took place
The country threatened to respond with force if it happened again, after accusing South Korea of carrying out the move three times already this month.
In a statement carried by state media, the North’s Defense Ministry said that the military had issued a preliminary operation order to artillery and other army units near the border with South Korea to ‘get fully ready to open fire.’
An unidentified ministry spokesperson said the North Korea’s military ordered relevant units to fully prepare for situations like launching immediate strikes on unspecified enemy targets when South Korea infiltrates drones across the border again, possibly triggering fighting on the Korean Peninsula, according to the statement.
The spokesperson said that ‘grave touch-and-go military tensions are prevailing on the Korean Peninsula’ because of the South Korean drone launches.
In a separate chilling statement, the spokesperson said that the entire South Korean territory ‘might turn into piles of ashes’ following the North’s powerful attack.
The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un described as ‘suicidal’ the South Korean Defense Ministry’s reported warning that North Korea would face the end of its regime if it harms South Korean nationals.
She warned that the discovery of a new South Korean drone will ‘certainly lead to a horrible disaster.’
China and Taiwan
Nuclear superpower China today launched ‘total blockade’ drills around Taiwan after Taipei last week vowed to resist any Beijing attack.
The fresh round of war-games saw Chinese military warships, planes, and land vehicles encircling the island and its outlying territories
The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) said on Monday that it was starting ‘joint assaults’ involving its land, naval, air and rocket forces to practise ‘combat readiness patrols, blockades of key ports and areas, assaults on maritime and ground targets, and the seizure of comprehensive superiority’.
The PLA Eastern Theatre Command said the drills were a ‘stern warning to the separatist acts of ‘Taiwan Independence’ forces’.
Taiwanese President Lai-Ching-te vowed to resist ‘annexation’ by Beijing in an address last week.
Here, a MailOnline graphic compares the relative sizes of each country’s current nuclear arsenals
A diagram released by the coast guard showed four fleets encircling Taiwan and moving in an anticlockwise direction around the island
Armed military vehicles patrol outside the Songshan Airport in Taipei after China deployed fighter jets and warships to encircle Taiwan on October 14, in drills Beijing said were aimed at sending a ‘stern warning’ to ‘separatist’ forces on the self-ruled island
He said ‘China has no right to represent Taiwan’ and that he ‘will uphold the commitment to resist annexation or encroachment upon our sovereignty’.
Taiwan’s defence ministry said Monday that 25 Chinese aircraft and seven navy vessels were detected around island at 8:00am local time.
Although the US claimed it was following China’s military exercises around Taiwan and called Lai’s speech ‘routine’, Beijing on Monday said the drills were ‘a legitimate and necessary operation for safeguarding state sovereignty and national unity’.
China has ramped up military activity around Taiwan in recent years, sending in warplanes and other military aircraft while its ships maintain a near-constant presence around the island’s waters.
‘In the face of enemy threats, all officers and soldiers of the country are in full readiness,’ Taiwan’s defence ministry said Monday.
The drills have prompted fresh fears of a potential invasion, which would almost certainly include nuclear threats, despite Beijing’s longstanding no-first-use (NFU) policy.
The United States has the ability diminish the potential for China to leverage nuclear threats during a Taiwan crisis, but only if it moves with alacrity to strengthen conventional and nuclear deterrence.
China earlier this month also urged other nuclear-armed countries to make a commitment to no first-use of nukes and chillingly warned that any attempt to smear or distort China’s nuclear policy would be ‘in vain.’
China has updated its nuclear arsenal in recent years, having unveiled its next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile DF-41 – capable of hitting virtually anywhere on the planet and carrying 12 warheads each
Two Taiwanese Air Force Mirage 2000 fighter jet armed with missiles scramble from the Hsinchu Air Base, following China’s announcement of the military exercise Joint Sword-2024B that encircles Taiwan, in Hsinchu, Taiwan, on October 14
This handout from China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Eastern Theatre Command released on October 14 shows a map of locations of the ‘Joint Sword-2024B’ military drills being conducted by China around Taiwan
Taiwan Navy Kuang Hua VI-class missile boats maneuver at the Keelung military harbor in Keelung city, Taiwan
Also unveiled by China in 2019 was the JL-2 submarine-launched ballistic missile, which is carried by its Jin-class nuclear submarines and can be tipped with nuclear warheads
In a show of strength, the Chinese military conducted a test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile last month.
The missile was reportedly fired from the southern island of Haina and its dummy warhead splashed down 7,400 miles away in the Pacific Ocean.
Despite the face Beijing has never disclosed the size of its nuclear arsenal, the US military said China had rapidly expanded its nuclear capability and possessed over 500 warheads as of May last year.
It has been estimated that the number will likely reach over 1,000 by 2030.
Changes to the numbers, capability and readiness of Chinese nuclear forces in the coming years were ‘likely to outpace’ potential developments by the nuclear forces of any rival, the Pentagon concluded in a report issued in October last year.
Iran and Israel
Last week, 39 Iranian lawmakers called on Iran’s Supreme National Security Council to review the country’s defence doctrine and consider using nuclear weapons if Israel targets the Islamic republic’s atomic facilities.
The MPs argued that Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei can reconsider his religious ban on nuclear weapons on the grounds that the circumstances have changed.
‘To create deterrent capability and ensure national security, the ability to develop nuclear weapons is necessary,’ Iranian MP Mohammad Reza Sabaghian said.
‘While having nuclear weapons is possible for Israel, Iran must pursue nuclear weapons for self-defence.’
In this picture released by the Iranian Defense Ministry on Thursday, May 25, 2023, Khorramshahr-4 missile is launched at an undisclosed location in Iran
China, the US and Russia are engaged in a global arms race that now includes the development of hypersonic missile technology. Here, the MailOnline has compared (from left) each country’s main nuclear weapon, the latest hypersonic technology they have tested, their most up-to-date aircraft carriers, main battle tanks, and cutting-edge jets
Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system intercepts rockets, as seen from Ashkelon, Israel
As Iran prepared for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s response to Iran’s missile attack on Israel earlier this month, Brigadier General Rasoul Sanaei-Rad told Fars, an Iranian news agency: ‘Striking nuclear sites could certainly have an impact on the calculations during and after the war.’
‘Some politicians have already raised the possibility of changes in [Iran’s] nuclear strategic policies,’ Sanaei-Rad added.
‘Moreover, such actions [an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear plants] would cross regional and global red lines.’
Iranian officials have repeatedly asserted that the country’s nuclear programme is peaceful, referring to a religious ruling by Khamenei prohibiting weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear bombs.
But the growing tensions between Iran and Israel has led some hardliners in Tehran to push for stronger measures.
After Iran launched 180 ballistic missiles at Israel in retaliation for the assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and other militant leaders, right-wing Israelis said Netanyahu’s government should target the republic’s nuclear programme.
But western diplomats have warned that move would be the most extreme retaliation – and would likely be unsuccessful without the support of the US as its main plants are heavily defended and built deep underground.
Iranian launched projectiles being intercepted by Israel above Jerusalem
The U.S. Embassy warned its staff in Israel to prepare to head for bomb shelters amid reports Iran is planning an ‘imminent’ ballistic missile strike. The image shows an Iranian rocket launched during a drill earlier this year
Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant said following the airstrikes that Israel’s response would be ‘deadly, precise and above all surprising’.
‘They will not understand what happened and how it happened,’ he said. ‘They will see the results.’
Tehran has racked up its nuclear activities since former US President Donald Trump in 2018 unilaterally withdrew from an accord Iran signed with world powers and imposed sanctions on the country.
Its been enriching its stockpile of uranium, currently at 60 per cent purity, which could potentially be refined to weapons-grade 90 per cent within a matter of weeks.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has inspectors in Iran, estimates the country has sufficient fissile material to produce about three nuclear bombs in the very near future, if it chose to do so.
Olli Heinonen, a former deputy director of the IAEA said that if Iran ‘rushed’ it could have an arsenal of 10 nuclear warheads ready by next April.
‘You cannot wipe out a country with those missiles, but you can threaten it and be in a much stronger position in negotiations,’ he told The Times.
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