Tulsi Gabbard warns world on brink of 'nuclear annihilation'

Daily Mail​

a day ago

President Trump's intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard has released a dire warning about imminent 'nuclear annihilation' in a video showing San Francisco getting bombed. The director of national intelligence posted a several-minute video on her personal X account Tuesday morning with an ominous message about impending nuclear peril. The footage begins with Gabbard noting how she recently visited Hiroshima, site of the WWII nuclear blast.
'It's hard to find the words to express what I saw,' she says. 'This attack obliterated the city, killed over 300,000 people, many dying instantly, while others died from severe burns, injuries, radiation, sickness and cancer that set in the following months and years. Nagasaki suffered the same fate, homes, schools, families, all gone in a flash.' Her post reveals that she walked away from the experience with a 'haunting sadness' that 'will stay with me forever.'
As she spoke, the video cut to footage of blast victims in 1945 and the flattened skylines of the bombed-out city remains. 'Yet this one bomb that caused so much destruction in Hiroshima was tiny compared to today's nuclear bombs,' she continued as renderings showed the colossal scale of modern day weapons. Gabbard then delivers a menacing verdict: 'We are closer to the brink of nuclear annihilation than ever before.'
Scenes in the post depicted a simulation of San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge shattering due to a nuclear explosion. Other seemingly AI-generated scenes showed the greenish dusk that could be caused from nuclear fallout as clouds choke out sunlight from reaching the ground. Though she did not highlight specific foreign adversaries the DNI did condemn unnamed 'political elite warmongers' who she accused of stirring fear.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence did not immediately return the Daily Mail's request for comment about the purpose and intended audience of the video. A recent ODNI threat assessment published in March sheds light on which countries have the capabilities Gabbard warns of.
'China remains intent on modernizing, diversifying, and expanding its nuclear posture. China's nuclear weapons and advanced delivery systems pose a direct threat to the Homeland and are capable of delivering catastrophic damage to the United States and threatening U.S. military forces here and abroad,' the annual threat assessment states.
'Russia has the largest and most diverse nuclear weapons stockpile that, along with its deployed ground, air and sea-based delivery systems, could inflict catastrophic damage to the Homeland,' it continues. The intelligence report also reveals that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un 'remains committed to increasing the number of North Korea's nuclear warheads and improving its missile capabilities to threaten the Homeland and U.S. forces, citizens, and allies.'
Iran was mentioned in the report, though the intelligence community's assessment is that they are not actively working to restart their nuclear weapons program. Trump has also been trying to secure a nuclear deal with Tehran, though negotiations are ongoing. Estimates suggest there are over 12,000 nuclear weapons across the globe currently, enough to kill billions of people worldwide.
Tensions over nuclear weapon use against adversaries have increased since the war in Ukraine broke out. In November 2024, for example, Russian President Vladimir Putin officially lowered the country's threshold for nuclear launches. 'As we stand here today, closer to the brink of nuclear annihilation than ever before, political elite warmongers are carelessly fomenting fear intentions between nuclear powers,' Gabbard says.