Trump announces immediate resumption of US nuclear weapons testing

Trump said that the United States would resume testing its nuclear arsenal “immediately,” without providing further details.

The announcement came after Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier on Wednesday that Moscow had successfully tested an underwater drone capable of carrying nuclear warheads, in defiance of US warnings.

Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform: “Because of the testing programs conducted by other countries, I have directed the Department of War to begin testing our nuclear weapons on an equal footing,” adding that tests would resume “immediately.”

He emphasized that the United States possesses more nuclear weapons than any other nation, praising his own efforts to “completely modernize and renew the existing weapons.”

He added, “Russia comes second, and China is a distant third but both will be on par within five years.”

According to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), nine countries possess nuclear weapons: Russia, the United States, China, France, the United Kingdom, Pakistan, India, Israel, and North Korea.

Out of the 12,331 nuclear warheads worldwide, ICAN reports that Russia holds 5,500, while the United States has 5,044.

Between 1945, when the first atomic bomb was tested in New Mexico on July 16, and 1992, the United States conducted 1,054 nuclear tests and carried out two nuclear attacks on Japan during World War II.

The last US nuclear test took place underground in September 1992, with a yield of 20 kilotons, at the Nevada National Security Site.

In October 1992, President George H. W. Bush imposed a moratorium on nuclear testing, which continued under successive administrations. Since then, nuclear tests have been replaced by non-nuclear and subcritical experiments using advanced computer simulations.

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ANHA