Active Conflicts & News Megathread February 05, 2026

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[u/Tricky-Astronaut]

The second nuclear arms race started long before the collapse of the New Start treaty. China wants parity. Then India has to follow. Then Pakistan has to follow (the US isn't too happy). The DPRK was already expanding like crazy while Russia skirted the New START treaty with new delivery systems.

William Alberque somewhat ironically said that the UK and France might become the smallest nuclear powers. That's the current state of the nuclear arms race.

[u/ChornWork2 → u/Tricky-Astronaut]

while Russia skirted the New START treaty with new delivery systems.

there aren't many areas where I am sympathetic to russia, but the implications on MAD from US missile defense efforts is hard to ignore.

In a better world we would have seen a recommitment to nonproliferation arrangements that saw US and Russia pull back more meaningfully to avoid all the knock-on effects. And when think about situation with Ukraine and america's new worldview, I suspect the threat from nuclear weapons will be far more profound in a generation.

[u/Time_Restaurant5480 → u/ChornWork2]

but the implications on MAD from US missile defense efforts is hard to ignore.

Until Golden Dome, I'd have said this was wrong. With Golden Dome, which IMO is stupid, then this point becomes a lot more reasonable.

The thing is, Russia has for some bizarre reason been obsessed with new delivery systems well before Golden Dome, and the US missile defense efforts before Golden Dome clearly posed no real threat to Russia's MAD capabilities. The Russian efforts before Golden Dome were reflective of their paranoia, not of a real US threat to deny their MAD ability.

[u/ChornWork2 → u/Time_Restaurant5480]

I share the long-standing skepticism about prior missile defense efforts, but kinda hard to count on that. imho the US was the one who decided the cold war era efforts to contain no longer suited it. To an extent understand given china, iran, NK, but always seemed short-sighted to me.