Day for the total elimination of nuclear weapons: history and objectives

Like every year, September 26th is the Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, established eleven years ago by the United Nations General Assembly. The anniversary was born with Resolution 68/32 which, adopted by the UN during the summit meeting of 26 September 2013, appeals to the need to "urgently adopt a global convention on nuclear weapons with the aim of prohibiting the possession, development, production, acquisition and use of nuclear weapons and to provide for the total destruction of existing ones". The Day aims to promote the goal of nuclear disarmament to guarantee international peace and security, raising awareness among the world population on the topic.

Nuclear weapons: what are they?

Nuclear weapons are devices that exploit nuclear fission or fusion reactions. These are mainly bombs and explosive warheads for missiles. The first nuclear weapon in history was tested in 1945 during the famous Trinity test: the expression which, coined by Robert Oppenheimer, the American physicist who built the first atomic bomb, indicates the first detonation of a nuclear device ever. Conducted by the United States Army as part of the Manhattan Project, the test was carried out on July 16, 1945 in the Jornada del Muerto desert in New Mexico.

The goal of eliminating nuclear weapons

As the UN specifies, nuclear disarmament has been one of the crucial objectives of the United Nations since the first Resolution in 1946. The debate on the topic has expanded over the years, becoming recurrent in all conferences and meetings of the world intergovernmental organization. In 1968 the member states then signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which is based on the principles of disarmament, non-proliferation and peaceful use of nuclear power. Signed by the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, the NPT prohibits "non-nuclear" signatory countries from obtaining devices of this type and, at the same time, "nuclear" states from transferring those they already possess. Ten years later, the first special session on disarmament of the United Nations General Assembly also took place in 1978, from which the Conference on Disarmament was born. Today, the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons represents a further opportunity to underline the importance of achieving this objective, underlining the benefits - in terms of security and also economics - that would derive from the total elimination of nuclear weapons.

Countries that possess nuclear weapons

“Nuclear-weapon” states are countries that have built, tested and are in possession of weapons of this type. These are Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, France and China: all countries that have signed up to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. To these are also added India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel, which however have not joined the NPT. According to data from the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), reported by the Institute for International Research - Disarmament Archive and updated to May 2023, the United States has deployed nuclear weapons in NATO bases in Italy, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Turkey. They are also present in France and the United Kingdom, countries that have their own. In Italy, in particular, there are 35 B-61 tactical nuclear warheads at the Aviano and Ghedi bases.