Tag: List of states with nuclear weapons

Trending Given North Korea's nuclear lunacy, what exactly are the rules, formal or implicit, about which nations can have nuclear weapons and which cannot? Those realities meant that up until the early 1960s, only Britain, France, the Soviet Union and the United States had nuclear capabilities. The Soviet Union and the United States also informally agreed during the Cold War that their own dependent allies who had the ability to go nuclear -- including Eastern Bloc nations, most Western European countries, Australia and Canada -- would not. Nonetheless, until the official nuclearization of North Korea in 2006, the nuclear club remained small (eight nations) and was thought to be manageable. First, those nuclear countries that were relatively transparent and democratic (Britain, France, India, Israel and the United States) were deemed unlikely to start a nuclear war. Third, any unstable rogue nuclear nation (Pakistan) was assumed to be deterred and held in check by a nearby nuclear rival (India). Neither North Korea nor Iran is democratic. Neither is a stable country. A frustrated America may feel that China and Russia have encouraged rogue countries such as Iran and North Korea to develop nuclear weapons programs, selfishly assuming that missiles in those countries would be pointed at the West and not eastward. But America also assumes that the next nuclear powers (for a change) would be pro-American -- a payback of sorts to China and Russia for allowing their rogue friends to develop nuclear capabilities.