No nuclear weapons? Ukraine-Russian war will shape world’s arsenals

The headlines on the newsstands in Seoul blared fresh warnings of a possible **nuclear test by North Korea**.

Out on the sidewalks, 28-year-old office worker **Lee Jae Sang** already had an opinion about how to respond to North Korea’s fast-growing capacity to lob nuclear bombs across borders and oceans.

Our country should also develop a nuclear programme. And prepare for a possible nuclear war,” said Lee, voicing a desire that a February poll showed was shared by 3 out of 4 South Koreans.

It’s a point that people and politicians of non-nuclear powers globally are raising more often, at what has become a destabilising moment in more than a half-century of global nuclear nonproliferation efforts, one aggravated by the daily example of nuclear Russia tearing apart non-nuclear Ukraine.