The world has entered a dismaying and volatile period of renewed instability and accelerating risk. There has been no global conflagration for 80 years, yet several regions are now involved in, or at risk of, armed conflicts involving great powers. All governments claim to wish to avoid such conflicts, yet many appear convinced that the best – perhaps only – way to do so is by increasing their armed forces and deterrence capabilities. The world is presently engaged in a massive wave of rearmament, with NATO members, for example, agreeing to devote five percent of their GDP to military spending. Meanwhile, governments fail to find adequate resources to address environmental and climate degradation that threatens the very future of human civilisation.
United Nations member states are also ready to blatantly violate their obligations under the Charter, particularly Article 2(4), to refrain from threatening or using force to violate other states’ territorial integrity or political independence without provocation. In perfunctory bows to international law, strained legal arguments are provided as justifications for these breaches. Thus, at the end of February 2026, President Trump declared that his military’s bombing of Iran was needed to counter Iranian threats against the US. He was more frank when, in a recent interview, he said that he did not need international law.
Opportunities for arms control
Ongoing conflicts continue to cause untold suffering, while there is widespread concern that a nuclear war could be triggered by a conflagration between great powers – or by the proliferation of nuclear weapons to a greater number of states. In this febrile context, what reductions in current threats and use of arms may be within the realm of political possibility?
Only a total elimination of nuclear weapons will eliminate the risk that they could be fired by accident, in the case of a misunderstanding, or sheer lunacy. The absence of planning for radical nuclear disarmament by nuclear-armed states and the recent lapsing of the New START treaty – with its modest bilateral limitations of US and Russian strategic nuclear weapons – makes a new agreement limiting the arsenals of at least the three major powers of critical priority.
An important restraint on the use of nuclear weapons nevertheless exists: Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD). Ever since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, the prospect of a devastating second-strike response has created an almost insurmountable barrier – a powerful taboo – against nuclear use between nuclear-armed states, and has strongly discouraged conflicts that could escalate into such confrontations.
Awareness of the risk of second nuclear strikes is unlikely to be blotted out, even by Washington’s promised “Golden Dome” antimissile project. As long as a second nuclear strike remains deliverable, the fear of “unacceptable damage” will be a cause of restraint. And, as France – with a nuclear arsenal numbering only in the hundreds – is convinced, it does not matter much whether the threat comes from a stock of 200 or 2,000 nuclear weapons. Nor should it matter to non-nuclear armed states, for example in Europe, whether second-strike protection comes from a larger or more modest nuclear deterrent, such as France rather than the US, so long as the capability to deliver it remains credible.
The absence of planning for radical nuclear disarmament by nuclear-armed states and the recent lapsing of the New START treaty – with its modest bilateral limitations of US and Russian strategic nuclear weapons – makes a new agreement limiting the arsenals of at least the three major powers of critical priority. Hans Blix
MAD remains a fundamental assuring element. I argued a few years ago that “restraints against decisions on the first use of nuclear weapons have become so strong that… an actual governmental decision on [such] use… has become impossible, if not inconceivable”. Today, I might add restraints prompted by fears of catastrophic consequences that could follow from new means of warfare, such as cyber and space war.
Recent offensives demonstrate that when high-priority objectives are deemed attainable, and the risks of clashes with other great powers are deemed low, restraint on conventional arms is abandoned in pursuit of national self-interest (Russia in Georgia and Crimea, the US in Iran and Venezuela).
We also see moves towards non-kinetic means of warfare. An absence of ambition or ability to design new measures to prevent warfare – including the hybrid variety – necessitates greater use of traditional methods of deconfliction: restraint in arms deployment, nuclear fail-safe mechanisms, increased transparency, open communications, and hotlines.
The world under Trump 2.0
Central to speculation about arms control measures that may be possible in the near future is the mindset of President Trump. He is evidently anxious to respond to broad US public opinion against “forever wars” and is driven by an eagerness to intervene to terminate conflicts in Western Sahara, Armenia/Azerbaijan, Cambodia, as well as in Gaza and Ukraine. Yet this posture has been undermined by the recent US-Israeli assault on Iran, which sits uneasily with such claims. It may have been more than a populist punchline when he expressed dismay at the wasting of resources on armaments and general sympathy for the idea of fewer nuclear weapons.
Considering President Trump’s habitual dislike of agreements made by his predecessors, the chance of some sequel to New START appears slim. The difficulties of reaching understandings in substance among three rather than two great powers are formidable, yet perhaps not wholly unattainable, given the volatile political climate and the sporadic dialogue among the power-conscious three leaders.
Regrettably, it is unlikely that the great powers’ awareness of their own ever-growing ability to destroy one another will lead them to agree on new, far-reaching regulatory restrictions or institutional reforms. Even though President Trump is eager to be celebrated as the peace-maker of the world it appears unlikely that he will seek to rally his peer presidents to a conversation à trois based on a common conclusion that armed conflicts involving their countries have become too dangerous, and that they must jointly embark on disarmament and a drastic upgrading of common instruments for the maintenance of peace. The so-called “Board of Peace” recently created by the US government is nothing more than an amateurish, unilateral sketch.
An agenda could be made somewhat less difficult if, rather than aiming for a full formal treaty, it sought to define, more modestly, parallel unilateral pledges on nuclear arms restrictions. A precedent exists in the very successful Presidential Nuclear Initiative concluded by Presidents Gorbachev and Bush in 1991 to eliminate tactical nuclear weapons.
Addressing proliferation risks
Today, we must note not only the global anguish linked to the thousands of ready nuclear weapons in nine states but also increasing fears of a spread of nuclear weapons to more countries. One reason for these fears has been that in several countries – South Korea, Japan, Poland, Sweden – arguments have appeared that nuclear weapons under national control are needed, as the new America First policies have reduced the reliability of the US nuclear umbrella (extended deterrence) that they came to rely on. More likely is a continuation of discussions of how France’s nuclear deterrent force could be extended to serve all EU states – say, through a declaration that any threat or use of nuclear weapons against an EU member or candidate would be regarded as a threat or attack against France itself.
Neither economic sanctions nor incentives – such as the provision of nuclear reactors under the 1994 Agreed Framework, or President Trump’s suspension of US military exercises – have persuaded North Korea to slow or abandon its nuclear weapons program. With the country’s present dependence on and support from China and Russia, it remains firmly in their grip, and the situation appears tense but static. US permission for South Korea to build a nuclear-powered submarine (without allowing enrichment capacity) will perhaps boost morale in the country and vex Beijing, but will hardly alter the strategic situation.
Regrettably, it is unlikely that the great powers’ awareness of their own ever-growing ability to destroy one another will lead them to agree on new, far-reaching regulatory restrictions or institutional reforms. Hans Blix
What’s more, support among the non-nuclear armed parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) has been waning. A major reason is their perception that the nuclear-armed parties have failed in their obligation to move to nuclear disarmament. Although no nuclear weapons tests have been conducted since 2017, the failure of China and the US to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), adopted in 1999, has been particularly resented, as it has prevented the treaty from entering into force. While China and the US may feel a need to develop and test new means of delivering their nuclear weapons, it is unlikely that further development and testing of nuclear warheads is necessary.
President Trump could place a feather in his peace cap if he declared that he is ready to bring about US ratification of the CTBT, provided that the other states whose ratifications are needed – including China and North Korea – also ratify it. A somewhat less spectacular step would be to promise an American commitment to no testing, so long as all other states do the same.
The Middle East crisis and its impact on global arms control
The gravest concerns about proliferation have long been and remain those emanating from the Middle East, notably Iran, whose ambitious nuclear program has worried not only Israel but also Arab states. The most ambitious approach – a comprehensive Middle East nuclear-weapon-free zone – is an attractive dream. But it is one that remains elusive as Israel will surely never exchange the security provided by nuclear arms under its own command with its neighbours’ pledges to stay away from acquiring them.
A more modest approach had success in 2015 when a deal endorsed by the UN Security Council (the JCPOA) ensured that Iran’s nuclear program would be subject to intrusive inspection and tailored to sustain only peaceful use. The Israeli government was extremely dissatisfied with the deal, and it was successfully operated until 2018, when the first Trump administration singlehandedly breached it, imposed new economic sanctions, and urged others to follow its lead.
In the spring and summer of 2025, talks between the second Trump administration and Iran were pursued in Oman and Rome, but they could not bridge the US demand that Iran should forego all enrichment of uranium with Iran’s insistence on continued limited enrichment for peaceful uses. The talks were interrupted by the Israeli armed attack on 13 June 2025, with the US joining them in heavy bombings, which potentially destroyed Iranian facilities for enrichment. Remarkably, indirect talks were resumed between the US and Iran in 2026, and equally remarkably, these were again interrupted by extensive joint Israeli-US bombings. These attacks have led inter alia to the killing of Iran’s leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. Various US statements suggest that the objectives included the toppling of Iran’s theocratic regime and generally reducing the country’s military capacity, notably to erase its missile capacity and nuclear program. At the time of writing, hostilities have been paused following the announcement of a fragile ceasefire.
One must conclude that the US has joined Israel in that country’s long-standing practice of ignoring the UN Charter and pursuing preventive warfare – seen in the bombing of the Iraqi research reactor in 1981, the strike on a nuclear installation at Al Kibar in Syria in 2007, and the sabotage of Iranian centrifuges through the “Stuxnet” cyber operation in 2010.
Another sad reflection is that efforts to reduce the risk of nuclear proliferation through preventive military intervention risk strengthening incentives for further proliferation. More constructive action would lie in diplomacy aimed at reviving an agreement building on the 2015 nuclear deal and relevant UN Security Council resolutions. In the longer term, meaningful assurances against nuclear proliferation in the Middle East will require genuine movement toward – not merely rhetoric about – a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine.
The European Leadership Network itself as an institution holds no formal policy positions. The opinions articulated above represent the views of the authors rather than the European Leadership Network or its members. The ELN aims to encourage debates that will help develop Europe’s capacity to address the pressing foreign, defence, and security policy challenges of our time, to further its charitable purposes.
Image credit: Jeff Morgan / Alamy
