The Obsolescense of the Nuclear World Order and the Emergence of Genome Editing

The global world order is based on a solid, yet fragile foundation. While it is solid for being intact for decades with systems and organisations built around it, its fragility stems from the inability to predict the reason that will one day blow it up. Nuclear weapons constitute a cornerstone in this world order; those who possess the fatal weapon, “the nuclear bomb,” among other capabilities, are the ones who dictate the rules of the game. What is important to ask now is: with the huge advancements in science taking place every day, will nuclear weapons become obsolete?

Scientists have discovered ways of genome editing by which cells negatively affected by ionized radiation can be detected, repaired, and even engineered to become immune to radiation entirely. This raises profound uncertainties about the future. If the destructive power of nuclear weapons can be neutralized at the biological level, the foundation of nuclear dominance may begin to erode. This leaves us facing a series of difficult questions. Would the traditional leverage of nuclear powers still hold? If weapons of mass destruction (WMD) lose their strategic value, will a new form of deterrence take shape, or will the very concept of deterrence fade? Who might emerge as the next global power, and by what tools or technologies will influence be asserted? And perhaps most importantly: would today’s nuclear states allow such a transformation, or resist it fiercely to preserve their status?

For starters, Ionizing radiation is a type of high-energy emission released from unstable atoms in the form of electromagnetic waves, such as X-rays and gamma rays, or energetic particles like alpha, beta, or neutron radiation. Though ionizing radiation used in medical imaging or cancer treatment and that produced by nuclear weapons are similar in nature, the difference lies in the amount released and its intended purpose. In hospitals, radiation is administered in highly controlled doses to diagnose disease or destroy cancer cells under professional supervision. In contrast, nuclear weapons release a massive and uncontrolled burst of radiation intended for mass destruction. Likewise, nuclear power plants may leak ionizing radiation through nuclear waste, posing significant long-term environmental and health risks. Accordingly, given the contextual differences, the biological effects ultimately depend mainly on the absorbed dose.

CRISPR-Cas9 is a genetic tool originally derived from bacteria that works like a pair of targeted “molecular scissors.” It uses a guide molecule (sgRNA) to recognize a specific DNA sequence, while the Cas9 enzyme cuts at that exact location. When a cut is made, the cell attempts to repair its DNA, giving scientists the ability to delete, modify, or replace genetic material. This technology has become widely used in research to identify which genes influence how cells respond to ionizing radiation. By turning certain genes on or off in cancer cells and observing how these cells behave during radiation exposure, researchers can determine which genes make cells more resistant or more sensitive to treatment.

Current work mainly uses CRISPR to understand and improve the effectiveness of radiotherapy. If a gene is found to make cancer cells vulnerable to radiation, scientists can target that gene to strengthen treatment outcomes. Conversely, identifying genes that protect tumors from radiation helps guide strategies to counteract that protection. While this approach is still experimental, such discoveries are valuable because they allow more precise tailoring of therapy, potentially enabling doctors to use lower doses of radiation to achieve the same therapeutic effect.

Over time, the same logic may be applied to protecting healthy tissues. If researchers can identify genes that make normal cells particularly sensitive to ionizing radiation, these genes could theoretically be modified or temporarily suppressed to help shield healthy tissue during treatment or exposure. Similarly, by enhancing DNA repair pathways in noncancerous cells, CRISPR-based approaches might help reduce long-term damage from radiation. Although this remains a future direction, limited today mainly by safety and ethical constraints, the technology offers a promising foundation for developing strategies that mitigate harmful side effects of ionizing radiation while maintaining or improving its medical effectiveness.

While these complex scientific words might look irritating at the moment, they offer an important glimpse into how future medicine may protect populations from the broader dangers of radiation exposure. Today, gene-editing tools like CRISPR are mainly focused on helping cancer patients by limiting the damage caused by clinical radiation. Yet the same principles could eventually be applied to people exposed to radiation in crises, such as nuclear accidents, or even large-scale warfare. If scientists learn to reverse or prevent the cellular injuries caused by ionizing radiation, these tools could evolve from therapeutic treatment to proactive protection. Moving from complex scientific words to less complex, but no less irritating, political ones: if scientists succeed in achieving this, nuclear weapons will be obsolete, because, quite simply, they will be useless.

The current world order is built on the premise that great powers are the ones who have nuclear weapons. China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, also known as the P5, are the countries whose ownership of nuclear weapons, among other supporting variables, gave them the eligibility to own the veto power and the ability to threaten the usage of nuclear weapons in case of war. This has led to two main conclusions: while many factors, including economic strength and military might, determine who is a global power, ownership of nuclear weapons is a peculiar factor that distinguishes a great power. In other words, the current world order is shaped around nuclear powers. Secondly, nuclear weapons have paved the way for the well-known principle of Mutually Assured Destruction which, in a nutshell, means that two nuclear powers would not enter a war against one another or that when two nuclear powers enter a conflict, they will not use their nuclear weapons because in this case mutual destruction is guaranteed, India and Pakistan are a good example here.

Theoretically, this means that nuclear weapons, ironically, are a source of stability for peace and security and that it is a means of mitigation against great powers’ wars, AKA world wars. While this is not entirely false, the idea of nuclear weapons itself is an inherent reason for wars or their prolongation. For example, the never-ending dispute between Iran and Western countries is mainly due to the former’s ambitions to obtain nuclear weapons. Essentially, it is the U.S. fear for Israel’s security in the region. Moreover, the idea of owning nuclear weapons could be used as a justification for the eruption of wars, such as the case of the 12-day War between Iran and Israel, when the latter kept using the Iranian nuclear capabilities and the “nuclear bomb” as a justification for bombing Tehran. On the other hand, world leaders weaponise the idea without actually using it. For instance, Russian President Vladimir Putin has more than once hinted at the usage of nuclear weapons in the ongoing war with Ukraine. While it could be clear that it is a mere threat to Western powers, which could potentially attack Moscow. Accordingly, mere ownership of nuclear weapons gave Putin space to further attack Ukraine with some guarantee that no other power could risk entering a war with the nuclear state.

Accordingly, all of the above features of war and political hegemony, dictated mainly by nuclear powers, will be altered if a technology emerges that mitigates their impact and, as a result, their obsolescence. Importantly, today’s great powers would be tomorrow’s middle ones, and the opposite is true. Will Russia find a place for itself among the great powers if its nuclear capability is no longer in need? Would France’s messed-up internal politics and future economic uncertainty kick the European country out of the P5? Will even the P5 matter then? Will the current structure of the UN Security Council’s permanent members remain the same, or is a complete overhaul in sight?

While it might seem reassuring for some that nuclear weapons’ disappearance would eliminate the danger of a nuclear war, there is still a risk of the emergence of a new family of WMD. In the case demonstrated above, where genome editing can be an established way to reverse the effects of nuclear radiation, the same techniques can be used to inflict massive harm on specific populations, with deadly consequences. Whether it is genome editing or any other emerging technology, it is difficult to imagine a world with no lethal, mass-destructive weapons that could end wars in minutes. This means that current technological developments are ushering in a new future in which nuclear weapons might no longer occupy the same position on the political landscape. While this means that these brutal, deadly weapons might no longer be as threatening as before and that current global powers could be replaced by others, or at least some of them would no longer serve their acclaimed positions, it does not necessarily mean a more peaceful future. Realistically speaking, world politics thrives on conflict and war; the very existence of great powers on which global political balance rests necessitates brutal deterrent weapons. Should nuclear weapons disappear from the equation, some other weapon will emerge; otherwise, a vicious cycle of wars will begin until a newly acclaimed world hegemon emerges.

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Tamaddondoust, R. N., et al. 2022. “Identification of Novel Regulators of Radiosensitivity Using …” PMC [article]. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9369104/ PMC

“Ionizing Radiation and Health Effects.” 2023. World Health Organization, July 27, 2023. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/ionizing-radiation-and-health-effects World Health Organization

“Fluorescent Paints Spot DNA Damage from Radiation, Gene Editing.” 2019. NASA Spinoff. Originally published in 2019. https://spinoff.nasa.gov/Spinoff2019/hm_3.html NASA Spinoff