Two nuclear shifts were already underway. The Iran war is making both harder to reverse
The war in Iran is already reshaping strategic thinking far beyond the Middle East. Across the world, governments are realising that sovereignty ultimately rests on energy resilience and credible deterrence.
Governments are increasingly concluding that exposure to an adversary’s weapons or supply chain disruptions is a defining liability of the current international order. Two parallel responses are emerging: renewed interest in nuclear deterrence and a return to nuclear energy as a foundation of national resilience.
The war has reinforced a lesson that policymakers in Seoul, Warsaw, and Riyadh have been quietly absorbing for years but can no longer ignore. States without nuclear weapons remain fundamentally exposed to high-end military coercion through mass precision strikes that are more difficult to defend against. For defence planners, the strategic conclusion is that if you can’t intercept enough inbound missiles and drones, you must deter them.
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