To fight the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union increased overall military spending and assembled massive arsenals of nuclear weapons.
| Worldwide Nuclear Stockpiles, 1945–1975 | ||||
| Country | 1945 | 1955 | 1965 | 1975 |
| United States | 2 | 3,057 | 32,135 | 27,235 |
| USSR | 0 | 200 | 6,129 | 19,443 |
| United Kingdom | 0 | 10 | 310 | 350 |
| France | 0 | 0 | 32 | 188 |
| China | 0 | 0 | 5 | 185 |
| Israel | 0 | 0 | 0 | 20* |
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*Estimated SOURCES: Adapted from Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Resources Defense Council, and Nuclear Weapons and Nonproliferation (2007). |
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QUESTIONS FOR ANALYSIS