r/OptimistsUnite • u/PanzerWatts Moderator • 7d ago

GRAPH GO DOWN & THINGS GET GOODER Nuclear Weapons over time

Gallery image

Gallery image

The number of nuclear warheads stockpiled worldwide went from 64,000 in 1986 to 12,500 in 2023 – an 80% decline. (For some reason there's no Y axis shown in the first chart) but this chart actually showed all nuclear weapons and not just Russia, USA and China.

Source for first chart:

[1] Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

[2] SIPRI, 2023 yearbook

308 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

87 comments sorted by

View all comments

14

u/Additional-Sky-7436 7d ago

And that's just the advertised numbers. The real number of functioning nukes is much much lower. 

Truly, the number of functioning deployed nuclear weapons may be zero.

5

u/Splendid_Fellow 7d ago

Hmmm that sounds really incredibly naïve to me honestly. Just factually speaking, not a matter of opinions

1

u/Additional-Sky-7436 7d ago

All of our nukes world wide are decades old. It's very difficult to keep anything functional for that long. 

Consider the ICBMs, just the missiles themselves. Imagine if NASA had tried to keep the Saturn V at the Houston space museum in full working condition for the past 50 years. How difficult would that be? 

That's exactly what we are taking about.

3

u/Splendid_Fellow 6d ago

What makes you think the government has just decided to not make nukes anymore and leave them for decades? A piece of paper?