arms race
Military buildup rivalry
An arms race is a competition between nations to accumulate military weapons, each side building up arsenals in response to the other's advances.
The term emerged from Cold War nuclear rivalry between the United States and Soviet Union.
Extended to any escalating competition: an arms race among tech companies to develop AI.
- missileSelf-guided airborne weapon
- deterrencePrevention via threatened consequences
- red buttonUrgent action trigger
- nuclearOf atomic energy
- mutually assured destructionReciprocal nuclear annihilation threat
Cold War · brinkmanship · Cuban Missile Crisis · Warsaw Pact · competition · superpower rivalry · escalation · proxy wars · arming · containment policy · NATO · tension · atomic age · Pentagon · military industrial complex · ordnance · spending · Star Wars program
- nuclear waratomic bomb, nuclear holocaust, nuclear arsenal, hydrogen bomb, ICBM
- Cold War Diplomacydétente, detente, summits, SALT talks, START
- Cold War economicsMarshall Plan, containment policy, economic sanctions, trade embargo, economic warfare
- 20th CenturyWorld War I aftermath, Cuban Missile Crisis, atomic bomb, New Deal, Nazi Germany
- Cold WarBerlin Wall, Iron Curtain, Warsaw Pact, Cuban Missile Crisis, Eastern Bloc
- Nuclearnuclear reactor, atomic bomb, nuclear energy, atomic bombs, uranium
arms racedisarmament
Reducing or eliminating weapons
arms reduction · demilitarization · denuclearization · nuclear disarmament · arms control
arms racenonproliferation
Restricting weapons dissemination
détente · strategic partnership · peace treaty · diplomatic accord · collective security
arms racepeace process
Efforts to end hostilities
peacebuilding · pacifism · peace movement · reconciliation · swords to plowshares
race, arms, racing, armament, disarmament, armaments, rearmament, arms races