The crucial and fateful nuclear-arms dilemma
The crucial and fateful nuclear-arms dilemma

Author(s): Miroslav Tůma
Subject(s): Government/Political systems, International relations/trade, Security and defense, Military policy, Political behavior, Comparative politics, ICT Information and Communications Technologies, Peace and Conflict Studies
Published by: Ústav mezinárodních vztahů
Keywords: Nuclear arms dilemma; AI and nuclear weapons; USA; Russia; Chinese nuclear capacity;
Summary/Abstract: Nuclear weapons are an existential threat to humanity, as are the increasingly intense manifestation of climate change. The Reflection describes more broadly the main risk factors of this threat, including artificial intelligence (AI). In this context, it highlights the impasse which the US-Russian arms control process and strategic dialogue have reached as a result of their strained relations and the ongoing war in Ukraine. It also analyses the expected developments in the nuclear weapon field, taking into account the US Pentagon’s warning about the possible growth of China’s nuclear arsenal. In particular, it concludes by noting the main dilemmas for further development in this area: either the initiation of arms control and risk reduction negotiations by the major nuclear powers or the growing spiral of a costly and security-risk-laden nuclear arms race. The possibility of an ethical and moral commitment by the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, the so-called P5 (the US, Russia, China, France and the UK), to “responsible nuclear behaviour“, which is promoted by the US administration, appears as a temporary solution to this security crisis.

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