Giving Compass' Take:

• This article reports that both India and Pakistan are expanding their nuclear arsenals and how the effects of a potential nuclear war would be 'worldwide and devastating.' 

• How can policymakers and other leaders urge action to reduce the nuclear threat? 

• Here's an article on networking to improve nuclear security. 


More than 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons are held by the United States and Russia. The world’s other nuclear powers — Britain, China, France, Israel, India, and Pakistan — are believed to maintain much smaller arsenals, probably 100 to 300 warheads each. But in the past few years, India and Pakistan are believed to have expanded their nuclear capabilities.

And that, argues a new paper, is a recipe for disaster. In the paper, “Rapidly expanding nuclear arsenals in Pakistan and India portend regional and global catastrophe,” published last week in Science Advances, Owen Toon of the University of Colorado and co-authors analyze the effects of a nuclear war between India and Pakistan in 2025, if both countries continue to expand their nuclear capabilities as they reportedly currently are. Unsurprisingly, the expanded capabilities would make a nuclear exchange between the two countries deadlier and more devastating.

Even if no other country in the world got involved, the effects would be worldwide and devastating. It’s a reminder that having countries with nuclear weapons is a frighteningly unstable situation. While most attention may focus on the US and Russia, any two nuclear-armed countries are more than sufficient for a global catastrophe.

Read the full article about nuclear war and winter by Kelsey Piper at Vox.