Nuclear weapons by country

Nuclear Weapons By Country – 90% Belong To Russia And The USA

Given current events, one might wonder about nuclear weapons by country… Who has them, and how many? Well, as the title reads, 90 percent of all nuclear warheads belong to Russia and the United States.

Data sourced from armscontrol.org, there are an estimated 13,000 nuclear warheads in the world as of the year 2021.

Nuclear Weapons By Country

The following nuclear warhead totals include the following…

Retired (intact, awaiting dismantlement), Military Strategic (nuclear warheads assigned for potential use), and Strategic Deployed (on missiles, bomber bases, etc.).

Warheads are counted using the provisions of the New START agreement, which was extended for 5 years in January 2021.

New START caps each country at 1,550 strategic deployed warheads and attributes one deployed warhead per deployed heavy bomber, no matter how many warheads each bomber carries.

Warheads on deployed ICBMs and SLBMs are counted by the number of re-entry vehicles on the missile. Each re-entry vehicle can carry one warhead.

Russia (6,257) 1,458 deployed ready-to-launch

1,458 strategic warheads deployed on 527 intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and strategic bombers.

Ballistic Missile Submarines (SSBNs): 11

Russia leads the world with its new Hypersonic nuclear-capable missiles – 3M22 Zircon (Tsirkon). Speeds up to 6,670 mph.

United States (5,550) 1,389 deployed ready-to-launch

1,389 strategic nuclear warheads deployed on 665 intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and strategic bombers.

The United States also has an estimated 100 B-61 nuclear gravity bombs that are forward-deployed at six NATO bases in five European countries.

14 Ohio-class ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs), armed with Trident II D5 SLBMs, form the sea-based leg of the U.S. strategic deterrent triad. Four of these vessels previously carried the Trident C-4 missiles. They have been retrofitted with the longer-range, more accurate D5. Assuming an average of twelve operational submarines with 24 launch tubes each and four warheads per missile, these boats carry roughly 1,152 warheads. However, given that normally only eight to ten of the Ohio-class submarines are deployed at one time, and that their launch tubes will be reduced from 24 to 20 in accordance with the requirements of the New START treaty, the actual number of warheads in the field is closer to 720.

While the U.S. is actively pursuing hypersonic weapon technology, such hypersonic weapons have not yet entered service with any U.S. military branches.

China (350)

China has since accelerated its nuclear development, and the Defense Department estimates, as of 2021, that China may have up to 700 deliverable nuclear warheads by 2027 and 1,000 by 2030.

Ballistic Missile Submarines (SSBNs): 4

France (290)

Ballistic Missile Submarines (SSBNs): 4

UK (225)

The United Kingdom possesses a total of four Vanguard-class Trident nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, which together form its exclusively sea-based nuclear deterrent.

Pakistan (165)

India (156)

Israel (90)

North Korea (50)

Nuclear Weapons by Country – Inventories Chart

Countries That Had Nuclear Weapons or Nuclear Weapons Programs at One Time:

  • Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine inherited nuclear weapons following the Soviet Union’s 1991 collapse, but returned them to Russia.
  • South Africa secretly developed but subsequently dismantled its small number of nuclear warheads.
  • Iraq had an active nuclear weapons program prior to the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The U.S.-led March 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent capture of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein definitively ended his regime’s pursuit of nuclear weapons.
  • Libya voluntarily renounced its secret nuclear weapons efforts in December 2003.
  • Argentina, Brazil, South Korea, and Taiwan also shelved nuclear weapons programs.

Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD)

However, will it be enough? For instance, one might consider the following… Putin is backed into a corner, so to speak. It reaches an extent such that he believes his country is a ‘goner’ anyway. So, he decides to take it all down. In other words, he decides that he’s not bluffing.

Current events (US/NATO – Russia) and reckless rhetoric of launching nuclear weapons. Not good. It’s happening on both sides. That is to say, it leads to furthering the risk of an exceedingly stupid thing. There are many reasons to exercise restraint of such statements. Above all, it keeps us alive another day… While I’m not supporting recent actions, I am not in favor of backing Putin into a corner. However, I do prefer some diplomacy. Do we really need to own the whole world anyway?

In conclusion, there sure seem to be enough nuclear weapons to destroy us all…

[ Read: United States Nuclear Targets Map ]

[ Read: Time Lapse Of All Nuclear Explosions Since 1945 ]

46 Comments

  1. if an erratic or threatened Putin was to order the launch of nukes in a first strike scenario i very much doubt that his staff would allow it or follow his orders, and it could be his downfall.
    they have families also. i think that it would have to be a first strike against their country before that happens. something to think about.
    right now all it would take, with tensions as high as they are now, is if a terrorist nation ( Iran?) were to smuggle in and detonate even a small yield nuclear weapon in Russia, Russia would almost certainly retaliate, and it would be on like donky kong. the terrorists could just sit back and watch the destruction of the western world.
    after the last two years, nothing would surprise me anymore.

      1. We need more people to go to church,if that happened i bet the world be a better place!!

        1. Not necessarily Paul.

          Keep in mind in those “terrorist nations”, they have a church attendance rate nearly at 100%. A less known motivation for Russia attacking Ukraine has also been about religion. The Russian Orthodox Church had a major split not too long ago and the split leadership went to Ukraine, and the Kremlin Religious Leadership see that as the highest form of betrayal and heresy. And believe me they are NOT on speaking terms with each other. They have threatened death and more between their bickering.

          So as much as I’d love to agree. More people going to church will not solve anything. Holy wars have existed for about as long as organized Religion.

    1. Scout
      We might/maybe/hope so, survive a nuclear strike, but, we will Not survive a century of nuclear winter.! If all out nuclear war happens, the Northern hemisphere is frozen solid, We will all be ice cubes huddled around our preps. Not kidding.

      1. all anyone of us can do is try and hope for the best. who knows what could happen.
        good luck with everything

      2. Like Global warming it is over hyped. Most of those predications were made in the 70s and 80s, when we had 53,000 nukes between us and the Russians, now we have about 11,000 active nukes between us. Still too many!!! Even then it was projected by Carl Sagan and other that the nuclear winter would last a decade at most. None the less it is still a theory. After all we have detonated over 2,000 nuclear weapons since 1945 already and we have not gone all ice age!!! There is a risk of sever sun burns and cancer though!!!! I personally pray for calmer heads to prevail, because even a limited nuke exchange will ruin my retirement plans!!!

        1. But there’s is a difference between 2000 experimental kiloton-scale nukes detonated over a whole 30 years in isolated areas , and
          a reckless destruction-aimed 3-hour nuclear war involving Megaton smart nuke missile tech! Those two scenarios don’t compare if you are to argue about there being or there not being a nuclear winter. Look, for ex, the Tsar Bomba detonation, how it was done up near the Northern Pole away from the country’s mainland.

  2. The numbers speak for themselves. However I am curious if anyone has updated information concerning yield and whether air burst or ground burst for targets. What I have seems to be old, 800kt old Soviet warheads and 5mt for Chinese warheads.

    I know missile silos would most likely would be ground burst but other targets? It makes a difference in planning for fallout. Assuming you are not in the kill zone that is.

  3. Does it bother anybody else that… the much-touted red telephone hotline between the U.S. and Russia… intended to be the last-ditch line to prevent miscommunication before nuclear Armageddon… is an old analog rotary dial desk phone?

    One ringy-dingy… two ringy-dingy…..

    (just kidding… for some reason “Laugh In” just popped into my mind…I’ll go back to my chores)

    1. It bothers me that the fate of the human population rests on the decisions of two mentally impaired men.

      1. Hermit us,
        Ultimately the fate of human existence lies only with Our Father in Heaven. Kings, Rulers, Dictators only have a momentary say, but God already knows what they will do, and uses their deeds to HIS own will.

        1. Amen, that’s right. It is true that we live in a scary age where the fate of a billion men is in the hands of the wicked politicians. But yet still above all, God controls everything and uses kings and men to fulfil His own Great Will. For example that of Pharaoh, whose heart was hardened so that God could show His might. Or the famous Pharaoh-like incident where God raised up dictator kings during world war 2 such as Stalin and Hitler to kill those Jews and run them back to their long-lost Jewish Homeland. Finally it all goes back to God. A great servant of God called Brother Branham preached how that God will use the hard-hearted communist men to bring atomic/nuclear fire judgment to the west(America) and the whore of Revelation 17 and 18 where the Bible says they will burn her with fire in just 1 hour!!

    2. lol Dennis I remember that. Lilly Tomlin. ” We don’t care we don’t have to we’re the phone company ” People born after the Ma Bell break up won’t understand.

    3. Dennis,
      My concern is that they are using “IPhones”, and some Amazonian ad will pop up in the middle of a face to face. With our luck Old Poopy-Pants will order up some bedroom slippers for “little Putsey” instead of hard sanctions.

      1. 007,

        Remember the “Fickle Finger of Fate Award” they presented for particularly stupid behavior? The City of Dallas won that award on national TV after they sent a bill to a police officer’s widow to recover a half day’s pay after he was shot and killed in the line of duty halfway into his shift.

        Turned out….after that episode…the widow received several hundred thousands of dollars from people around the country sending checks to her in the amount the city docked her. Great embarrassment to the city…

  4. Wonder where the “Suitcase Nukes” are that supposedly were snuck out of the old Soviet Union in the 90’s ended up?

    Sitting for years in a pre-paid rental storage unit in “Anywhere USA” along with some baby clothes and an old dresser just waiting for the saboteur that came in through the southern border to retrieve it?

  5. Suitcase nuclear weapons from 1991 and prior would maybe be useful as part of a “dirty bomb”, but would not be fissionable any longer due to decay of tritium to helium3, a neutron poison in the core, and due to general degradation of high explosive around the core

    1. Nucdoc,
      Very interesting, thanks for the information and I am assuming by your screen name you are in the nuclear medicine field.
      My wife was a nuclear medicine technologists and retired last year.

      1. He could be a Doctor of Nuclear physics on the other hand. Ya know, like the 100s that work at places like Los Alamos or Livermore. I agree with his assessment. Nukes have a shelf life.

  6. I’m fairly up on the ~attempting~ of surviving a nuclear attack. What I don’t know is, how long would we be dealing with radioactive rain? A week, a month, year??? I have water supplies on hand and a “big lake over the hill”, walking distance if need be. Even a limited exchange will leave the grid down for months!
    Also, there is a freshwater spring about 300yrds from here. (Sweet water kinda). I’m thinking that would be good after a week, but up close where the water comes out to the air. Right?

    1. EPO3,
      If that spring is covered and sealed at the source, it might stay good and clean. Look at it this way, that spring water is bubbling up from beneath the earth. When did it last see the light of day? 2 weeks ago, 2 years ago, 2 millenia? Hard to know without testing it, but chances are that water will be clean due to a long recharge time of the spring system. ( bet AC could tell you the recharge time of that spring if you asked her nicely)
      As for radioactive rain, that will dissipate with time. I believe you can find some studies done on this by the Scandinavian countries after Chernobyl. Again it will depend on the extent of the nuclear exchange.

    1. Very impressive. When my wife and I got together with her coworkers for beers, their shop talk was like someone speaking Mandarin to me. Lots of isotopes, imaging, injections, doses, etc.

      1. ” Daughters of Radon Unite! Cast off the bonds of the nuclei and radiate!”
        – sorry, I’ve wanted to say that for the longest time. (I’ll go back in my hole now.)

  7. I just visited ready.gov and looked up nuclear explosions…the page with the big orange mushroom cloud. According to our government, in the event of a nuclear explosion, “Go to the basement or the middle of the building. Stay away from the outer walls and roof. Try to maintain a distance of at least six feet between yourself and people who are not a part of your household. If possible, wear a mask…” The website suggests “slowly building up supplies in advance” so the unprepared can do all the last minute shopping. Maybe it’s just me, but if I have to find shelter from a nuclear explosion, social distancing and covid masks would be the last things about which I would be concerned!

  8. Are you all smoking crack? Leftist Socialist countries? Are you high? Ive stumbled upon a website dominated by crack smoking right wing whack jobs. Yikes! There is no left in America. Never was. Democracy itself is a socialist principle. You know what socialism gets us? Roads, side walks, running water, flush toilets, schools, fire departments, police depts. Everything that’s good in this country we got through socialism. One more thing not that you care or bother to understand; its imperialism we should be against. Thats what took down the Soviets. China and Viet Nam fought a war? Were you high in history class? There isnt enough space here for the education you all need.

      1. Dennis:
        How absolutely true.
        Unfortunately the brainwashing is been going on for a very long time.

      2. Way things are going we might have to fatten them up to eat them…. Running joke with a buddy of mine, he’s a big dude and I always told him to put away food and supplies, because if he came to my place he could feed us for a week :-)

        Gotta keep a sense of humor these days….

        1. Double Tap,

          Wasn’t it Hannibal Lecter who said….”When the food runs out, we always have each other…”

      3. Trolls need fed, too…
        Their freezer section is out of microwavable meals.. Twinkies and Ho-Hos are in short supply.

  9. We have never been invaded, except for maybe the French. England doesn’t count because we were under their flag.
    China is our greatest threat, then North Korea. If the United Nations stand up against Russia then all out war will begin. This means to you and me…. Shipping will stop( and the truck drivers are already pissed). Which trickles down to nothing in the stores and no gas.
    If a strike hits within 50 miles of you then your considered a casualty of war.
    This is what this sight is about. Learning and survival. Every day we get closer, every day we prep. Hopefully most of those reading this are equipped and not sheeple. If you are a sheeple then step up to awareness and learn. What you learned today might just save you and your family!

  10. One of my big concerns is that the potential use modern low-yield tactical nuclear weapons will bypass the reasoning of MAD. Once one of those weapons is used, the dominos begin to fall.

  11. I live in the Southern Hemisphere, over here in the so called Dark Continent, some few point-something degrees below the equator. Should I be worried?? I think I am all good. Them missiles will be flying over Europe and the Pacific.

  12. My humble opinion is this: The Americas invented a game that they knew not how to play it, leave alone winning it. Then they invited the Soviet players into it thru their carelessness. Then the old Brit conquerors joined the game as is their nature. Then the excitement to join went on and on. But this nuclear war game has no winner: Inventor Uncle Sam got shocked by the MAD doctrine that controls the gameplay. That’s why he now got this ‘global watchdog’ duty of running up and down the Northern and the Southern Hemisphere poking into other nations agenda and bashing them to the ground if they don’t agree with him. The nuclear game rules are so hard to bear with. What an awful game to get involved in! Even the fans and the spectators and the gamblers will lose. What a game!! OO, that the Lord Jesus would hide me in His blessed wings made of feathers, they are the only sure bunkers I know of that can withstand these nukes that these ‘wise’ scientists have invented. Man has invented his own antidote. Oooo ye wise children of men! When will you learn of the real wisdom that cometh down from Above. Lets seek the Lord, peradventure His great Mercies be upon us and we be counted worthy to escape these terrible things that shall happen to our generation. The SIGNS ARE ALL OVER.

Comments are closed.