The action follows Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement on Wednesday that Moscow has successfully tested an undersea drone powered by nuclear technology, despite warnings from Washington.
In a social media post that particularly mentioned China and Russia, Trump stated, “I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis because of other countries’ testing programs.”
Trump also praised his own efforts to undertake “a complete update and renovation of existing weapons,” pointing out that the United States has more nuclear weapons than any other nation.
“China is a distant third, but will be even within five years,” he continued, adding that Russia is in second place.
Russia, the United States, China, France, the United Kingdom, Pakistan, India, Israel, and North Korea are the nine nations that the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) claims have nuclear weapons. Russia holds about 5,500 of the approximately 12,331 nuclear warheads that ICAN counts, while the US owns 5,044.
Trump stated that the process will “begin immediately,” although he did not specify the specifics of the testing that would be conducted.
Putin declared on Wednesday that the second weapons test in a few days had successfully tested an underwater drone with nuclear propulsion and capability.
Putin said there was “no way to intercept” the unpiloted drone torpedo known as “Poseidon” in televised remarks from a military hospital in Ukraine that treated injured Russian servicemen.
According to him, Poseidon can reach any continent in the world, travel more quickly than traditional submarines, and dive deeply. Trump chastised Putin following Sunday’s first cruise missile test, stating that he should put an end to the conflict in Ukraine “instead of testing missiles.”
A scheduled Trump-Putin summit in Budapest was canceled last week. During World War II, the United States carried out 1,054 nuclear tests and launched two nuclear assaults on Japan between 1945 (the first atomic bomb test was conducted in New Mexico on July 16) and 1992.
In September 1992, a 20-kiloton subterranean explosion at the Nevada Nuclear Security Site marked the last nuclear test explosion in the United States.
A moratorium on additional testing was put in place in October 1992 by then-President George H.W. Bush, and it was maintained by succeeding administrations. Non-nuclear and subcritical tests utilizing sophisticated computer simulations took the place of nuclear testing.
As the leaders of the two largest economies in the world meet in person for the first time during the Republican president’s second term, Trump is in South Korea to meet with Xi.
