Op-Ed: Nuclear Weapons Should Be Brought to Mars

By Gen. Sherman O’Riley
Published May 23, 2026

Since the Cold War, the idea of mutually assured destruction has dictated international geopolitics. After all, if a war between two nuclear-capable nations would lead to the end of the world, why would we ever start such a war? MAD has been the most important reason for our long age of peace on Earth, with most wars being small incursions with relatively unimportant belligerents. That is why we need to bring the principle of MAD to Mars by bringing nuclear weapons.

This sounds really grim. And it’s fair to think that way; it’s normal to not want to live in fear of immediate death by nuclear bomb. But, the alternative is much worse. While Mars is peaceful right now, imagine what happens when we run out of land to colonize, or someone discovers a valuable natural resource. That is when people start to fight. Fighting over land. Fighting over resources. Fighting is what we want to avoid at all costs. The best way to do that is by bringing a deterrent: nuclear weapons. No one will want to fight if fighting means that everyone on Mars dies, maybe even starting wars on Earth. Who would want to be the reason why Mars is no longer habitable? No one. And that’s why MAD is so effective: nobody is going to kill themselves for land, especially land that might end up being destroyed.

Just as President Theodore Roosevelt said, we must “speak softly and carry a big stick”. We already know how to “speak softly” with other nations on Mars, what we need is our big stick. Nuclear weapons are the biggest stick of them all.

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