Russia and China tick Doomsday Clock toward midnight as Hiroshima bombing hits 80 years

Wednesday marks the 80th anniversary of when the U.S. employed the first ever nuclear bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima, followed by the bombing of Nagasaki three days later on Aug. 9. But despite nearly a century of lessons learned, nuclear warfare still remains a significant threat.

"This is the first time that the United States is facing down two nuclear peer adversaries – Russia and China," Rebeccah Heinrichs, nuclear expert and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told Fox News Digital.

Heinrichs explained that not only are Moscow and Beijing continuing to develop new nuclear capabilities and delivery systems, but they are increasingly collaborating with one another in direct opposition to the West, and more pointedly, the U.S.