Only 90 Seconds to the World’s End? Russia’s Nuclear Posture Triggers Doomsday Clock Panic

Russia Escalates Nuclear Weapons Use Risk
Doomsday Clock Time Shortened
Past Crises of Similar Nature

During the first nuclear test conducted by the United States, known as the Trinity Test, Kenneth Bainbridge, who participated in the experiment, is said to have remarked, “Now we’re all sons of bitches.” The project involved world-leading intellects such as Robert Oppenheimer and Richard Feynman, many of whom became anti-nuclear activists after the experiment and subsequent use of atomic bombs. The horror of nuclear weapons then is still valid today.

Nuclear weapons still have the potential to wipe out humanity, and recently, the risk of their use has reportedly increased unprecedentedly. This is due to the increased possibility of Russia using tactical nuclear weapons in its invasion of Ukraine. Today, let’s explore this and look into past instances of similar crises.

Intellectuals’ Warning, Doomsday Clock
Russia Implies Use of Nuclear Weapons

After World War II, scholars, including Albert Einstein, who participated in the U.S.’s nuclear tests, initiated a campaign called the Doomsday Clock, symbolizing the potential of nuclear weapons to wipe out humanity at any moment. The campaign aims to raise awareness of the risk of self-destruction by metaphorically showing how close humanity is to “midnight” or doom due to threats like nuclear weapons.

Recently, Russia has been suspected of intending to use small-scale tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine, and there are even confirmations of it deploying large-scale strategic nuclear weapons across Europe. This has plunged Europe, and consequently the world, back into the shadow of a nuclear war threat. Has there ever been a time in human history when the threat of nuclear war escalated like this? Indeed, there was, and the situation was even more severe. It was the atomic war crisis stemming from the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Cuban Crisis At Peak Danger
The U.S. Also Feared Nuclear War

As time passed, declassified documents revealed that the Soviet Union was at a 17:1 disadvantage in actual nuclear power compared to the U.S. during the Cold War. However, the fear of humanity’s extinction due to nuclear war was real, and the situation was almost madness, given the unknown enemy atomic power. When it was revealed through intelligence that the Soviet Union was building bases in Cuba, right under the U.S.’s nose, to deploy nuclear missiles and was trying to transport missiles, the White House crisis escalated to the point where opinions began to emerge that this must be prevented, even at the risk of a third world war.

Robert McNamara, the U.S. Secretary of Defense at the time, was so engulfed in the terror of a premonition that they would all be dead by the following Saturday that he left a record of this. The U.S. was rife with the fear that World War III and a nuclear war could actually happen. The fact that it did not occur in the end is not important. And there is a growing risk that such a situation could occur again between Ukraine and Russia recently.

Increasing Possibility of Humanity’s Self-Destruction

Nuclear weapons represent the first time humanity has developed a weapon capable of completely self-destructing. Considering that many scholars involved in nuclear weapons development later actively participated in anti-war movements or deeply regretted their contribution, it appears that nuclear technology. However, it has greatly benefited humanity and is indeed a horrifying weapon.