Perhaps in hindsight, building the Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant in an active seismic zone wasn’t very smart planning.

In a world bristling with nuclear flashpoints—from the trenches of Ukraine to the Gulf’s powder keg—U.S. leadership in nonproliferation is again finding its voice. But amid this resurgence, one urgent danger continues to fly beneath Washington’s radar: the Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant in Armenia.

Just 22 miles from Turkey and nestled within an active seismic zone, Metsamor is a Cold War relic—and a uniquely hazardous one. Built in the 1970s with Soviet engineering, the plant relies on a reactor design so outdated it lacks a containment vessel, a core component of modern nuclear safety. After a powerful 6.8-magnitude earthquake rocked Armenia in 1988, Metsamor was shuttered, only to be inexplicably restarted in the 1990s. Today, it hums along quietly, a nuclear time bomb embedded in the tectonic and geopolitical fault lines of the South Caucasus.

A catastrophe at Metsamor wouldn’t just be a local tragedy. The South Caucasus serves as a crucial corridor for East-West energy flows, channeling Caspian oil and gas to European markets while skirting Russia and Iran. A nuclear accident in Armenia wouldn’t stop at the border—it would send fallout across Turkey and Georgia, imperil European energy infrastructure, and convulse global markets already rattled by geopolitical upheaval.

But the risk is not just environmental. Metsamor is also a geopolitical lever—one firmly in Russia’s grip. Operated with assistance from Rosatom, Moscow’s state atomic agency, the facility gives the Kremlin a strategic foothold in the region. As the United States pushes back against Russian revanchism, Armenia’s continued dependence on Russian nuclear infrastructure represents a gaping blind spot.

Layered atop this is Armenia’s deepening partnership with Iran. Long before today’s headlines, Armenia quietly facilitated Tehran’s efforts to evade sanctions. A 2012 Reuters investigation found Armenian banks complicit in laundering Iranian funds and obscuring payment trails to evade Western scrutiny. In 2019, the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Yerevan-based Flight Travel LLC for aiding Mahan Air, an airline with ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

That partnership has only deepened. In 2022, Tehran and Yerevan inked a deal to expand the North-South Transit Corridor through northern Iran—a project that may open new pathways for sanctions evasion. And just weeks ago, Iranian nationals reportedly sought safe haven in Armenia, underscoring Yerevan’s role as a logistical and economic backstop for the Islamic Republic.

Meanwhile, another issue festers beneath the surface: a troubling prevalence of antisemitic sentiment within Armenian society. In January, the Anti-Defamation League released its latest global index on antisemitism, which ranked Armenia among the highest in Europe. A staggering 57% of Armenians surveyed agreed with negative stereotypes about Jews—an even higher percentage than respondents in Iran. These aren’t fringe views; they are systemic, ideological pathologies that ought to raise alarms in Washington.

This is not just about offensive attitudes. When a country harboring high levels of antisemitism also controls a vulnerable nuclear facility—operated with Russian support and sitting on a geopolitical fault line—it becomes a strategic liability, not just a moral concern.

If the U.S. is serious about nuclear security, countering authoritarian influence, and reinforcing a rules-based order, then Metsamor demands its attention. The dangers posed by the plant are not theoretical—they are urgent, layered, and getting worse.

Principled leadership begins with consistency. Washington has shown it can lead on global nuclear norms, from multilateral diplomacy with Iran to containment strategies in North Korea. Metsamor should be next. That could mean partnering with the International Atomic Energy Agency to mandate stricter safety inspections, or offering Armenia a financial and technical off-ramp to decommission the plant.

Metsamor is not just a holdover from another era—it’s a slow-motion crisis. One that, if ignored, could erupt into a disaster felt far beyond Armenia’s borders. If the United States truly wants to preempt the next nuclear emergency, it must act while there’s still time.