And Rohlfing leaves us with important and hopeful reminders.

We don't have to live with this sword of Damocles hanging over our head. We have a toolkit of new solution sets and technology and we know how to use arms control to produce a safer future.

Hideko Tamura Snider, the survivor of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima shares her main message that we should, "Create hope and work towards peace so that no one ever experiences what we went through... I hope for not a another nuclear bomb."

Geist: There haven't been debates on nuclear spending. We should demand that candidates discuss nuclear matters and their plan moving forward.

And a reminder from me, there is a nation-wide campaign working at the grassroots to abolish nuclear weapons: Bringing Communities Together to Abolish Nuclear Weapons

preventnuclearwar.org

What can US citizens do to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons?

Rohlfing: Speak up, reclaim our agency, approach our elected officials and ask what they are doing to keep us safe. We need to educate ourselves, there are policy initiatives we can achieve to create a safer and more secure world.

Rohlfing: We need intellectual innovation in this space. Of all philanthropy, less than 1/10 of 1% goes to nuclear issue, that number is declining. Need people to get re-engaged and save us from where we are headed.

Geist: Has hope because we don't appear to be on a trajectory to reach the number of weapons at the Cold War peak.

And he is worried about the multi-polar landscape we are in now.

We need new ideas and people from new fields to address our new challenges. Need intellectual diversity.

Ed Geist, policy researcher at the RAND Corporation, joins the conversation and discusses the growing demand for nuclear experts and anxieties about AI and nuclear weapons. In his book he concludes that AI will not make nuclear war winnable, but the strategic landscape is changing.

Rohlfing: What does this generation need to do to ensure nuclear weapons are not used?

My answer - organize! advocate! make our voices heard to our decisionmakers that there are better, safer ways to ensure our security. Our take action page is a good place to start www.ucsusa.org/take-action/...

Hennigan: The Department of Defense is saying that they need to invest in the nuclear triad. This will be a nearly $2 trillion investment in the coming decade.

Rohlfing: We need to ask ourselves - why do we heave these weapons? Are they useful? Do we need to live with this terror?

Hennigan: The US is building new missiles, bombers, and submarines - and new weapons for the first time in a long time, and the plutonium pits that go inside these weapons.

Rohlfing: We've been unable to imagine a paradigm that doesn't require the threat of nuclear annihilation. We have deeply entrenched thinking. We need to question the idea that nuclear deterrence is the only way to stay safe. It is time for a deep rethink about our strategy.

Rohlfing explains the definition of strategic and tactical nuclear weapons.

This is our UCS explainer on the subject: www.ucsusa.org/resources/ta...

Threats of nuclear war are not low, but they are lower than some of the most concerning moments during the ongoing war on Ukraine. We are not out of the woods by any stretch.

Vladimir Putin's nuclear weapons comments and threats are deeply troubling. Nuclear weapons threats should never be made lightly. It is deeply troubling. The Biden administration has been keeping an eye on these threats. Fears were palpable in fall of 2022 given the state of the war on Ukraine.