INDIA CHINA TENSION – NUCLEAR STOCKPILE YEARBOOK 2020

INDIA CHINA TENSION – NUCLEAR STOCKPILE YEARBOOK 2020

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) launched its findings of SIPRI Yearbook 2020 on 15^th June 2020, which assesses the current state of armaments, disarmament and international security.

It also provides relevant statistics regarding development of new nuclear warheads and nuclear arsenals.

Overview of the SIPRI Yearbook 2020 edition:

The report was released at a time when the South Asian continents are already heated up after violent clashes took between two Asian giants India and China at the Galwan valley claiming lives of three Indian soldiers and five Chinese PLA troops

There are also reports of tensions brewing up between North Korea and South Korea.

“The report states that despite an overall decrease in the number of nuclear warheads in 2019, all nuclear weapon-possessing states continue to modernize their nuclear arsenals”

India and China have added to their nuclear warhead stockpile in the last year while all other nuclear-armed nations like the U.S., Russia and France, continued to modernize their arsenal

KEY HIGHLIGHTS

The nine nuclear-armed states—the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea)—together possessed an estimated 13,400 nuclear weapons at the start of 2020, a decrease from 13,865 nuclear weapons possessed during the previous year

Around 3720 of the nuclear weapons are currently deployed with operational forces and nearly 1800 of these are kept in a state of high operational alert.

Decline in overall number of nuclear weapons in the world in 2019 was due to the dismantlement of retired nuclear weapons by Russia and the USA—which together still possess over 90 per cent of global nuclear weapons

World Nuclear weapon statistics

Source: SIPRI Database

Countries increasing their nuclear arsenal – 🔺China (+30), 🔺 North Korea (+10), 🔺  India (+10), 🔺  UK (+15)

Countries decreasing their nuclear arsenal – 🔻 USA (-385), 🔻Russia (-125), 🔻 France (-10)

Pakistan and Israel didn’t make any changes in their nuclear stockpile

Analysis and Future Outlook

The reductions in US and Russian strategic nuclear forces was required under the 2010 Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (New START) signed in 2018, and in 2019 the forces of both countries remained below the limits as specified by the treaty.

New START will lapse in February 2021 unless both parties agree to prolong it. However, discussions to extend New START or to negotiate a new treaty made no progress in 2019.

This was due in part to the US administration’s insistence that China must join any future nuclear arms reduction talks—something that China has categorically ruled out.

The deadlock over New START and the collapse of the 1987 Soviet–US Treaty on the Elimination of Intermediate-Range and Shorter-­Range Missiles (INF Treaty) in 2019 suggest that the era of bilateral nuclear arms control agreements between Russia and the USA might be coming to an end

Therefore, we can say that the loss of key channels of communication between Russia and the USA could potentially lead to a new nuclear arms race

 

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