As the biggest NATO member, the United States is bound to defend countless countries. Now the alliance is upping the ante.
And NATO made a nuclear announcement that left Joe Biden’s jaw on the floor.
NATO countries are contemplating the deployment of new nuclear weapons to fight rising hostile powers, particularly China, according to NATO’s secretary general.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg stated that the alliance is facing an unprecedented challenge from a nuclear-armed Russia and another developing nuclear power, China.
To counter the threat and maintain deterrence, the alliance is considering removing some nuclear weapons from storage and making them active.
“I won’t go into operational details about how many nuclear warheads should be operational and which should be stored, but we need to consult on these issues. That’s exactly what we’re doing,” Stoltenberg told The Telegraph in an interview published over the weekend.
“In a not-very-distant future,” he said, “NATO may face something that it has never faced before, and that is two nuclear-powered potential adversaries – China and Russia. Of course, this has consequences.”
The secretary-general stated that, unlike in the past, NATO should embrace transparency over its nuclear capabilities. He emphasized that transparency is essential for deterrence.
“Transparency helps to communicate the direct message that we, of course, are a nuclear alliance,” Stoltenberg said.
“NATO’s aim is, of course, a world without nuclear weapons, but as long as nuclear weapons exist, we will remain a nuclear alliance, because a world where Russia, China, and North Korea have nuclear weapons, and NATO does not, is a more dangerous world.”
The NATO secretary-general is particularly concerned about China.
Beijing’s nuclear warhead arsenal might reach 1,000 by the end of the decade.
Stoltenberg noted that the Chinese military is also investing extensively on other types of modern weapons.
NATO has 32 members, although only three of them are nuclear powers: France, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Politico reports the Americans have tactical nuclear weapons in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey.
Among NATO nations, the United States has the largest nuclear weapons arsenal, with 5,428. Last year, the U.S. State Department reported that 1,419 warheads were deployed.
Russia is reported to have the world’s largest stockpile of nuclear warheads, at 5,977. Russia claimed to have 1,549 warheads deployed as of 2022.
Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesperson, slammed Stoltenberg’s remarks, calling them “nothing else but an escalation.”
The Kremlin spokesman went on to add that Russian President Vladimir Putin does not talk about nuclear weapons “at his own initiative as he takes the issue seriously,” according to Politico.
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