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The Russians almost launched a first strike against the U.S., thinking they were retaliating AGAINST a first strike by the U.S. A high-up military officer made a calculated risk to stand down, and that's the only reason we didn't have a war.
It wasn't a "higher up military officer": it was Boris Yeltsin. He was handed the trigger, and decided not to use it.

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But nations like China, and very soon North Korea, Iran, and Iraq, are developing long range missiles that could reach the United States. So within 5 to 10 years, it will not just be Russia and China that could launch a missile strike on the United States, but many others as well.
China currently has the capacity to strike the west coast of the US with about 5 missiles. North Korea's demonstrated capacity is to hit Japan, Russia, China and South Korea. Iran's capability is somewhat less.

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The Iraqi government was using a nuclear power plant in 1981 to create weapons grade plutonium, to build nuclear weapons. In 1981, the Israeli government did an air-strike and bombed that plant to the ground. It was officially condemned by the other nations of the world, but those same nations behind the scenes breathed a huge sigh of relief that the nuclear plant was destroyed.

I think the U.S. should do the same, in North Korea and these Muslim countries, as Israel did in Iraq, before it is too late. And world opinion be damned.
I'm inclined to agree. Non-proliferation is in everyone's best interests. If that principle is enforced by airstrikes, then we're all better off.

Of course, I also think the US, Russia, China, France, Israel, and the UK should dispose of most of if not all of their nuclear arsenals, on the same rationale.