So no nuclear test explosion after all, Mr President

The US Energy Secretary Chris Wright has made it clear that despite Donald Trump promising to restart nuclear tests, there won't actually be nuclear explosions involved. He said the tests would be sub-critical. What this means is that in laboratory tests, the plutonium atomic fuel would never get to a critical - ie detonation - stage but would get close enpough to evaluate the effectiveness of both the fissile material and the technological means to reach that critical state. But this sort of testing is already carried out at the special US laboratory in the Nevada desert, known as the Principal Underground Laboratory for Subcritical Experimentation (PULSE.)The scientists and engineers there simulate the conditions inside a nuclear weapon and then put it under pressure to a certain level. They use supercomputers and a huge X-ray machine called Scorpius which peer through the plutonium to see what's going on. Some of the plutonium is pretty old, perhaps 80 years old, so the X-rays show whether the fissile material is still functioning properly. Being the president of the United States, Trump will know all this. So it's not clear what he had in mind when he said the US was about to renew nuclear testing unless there is something he has not told us. I'm thinking super-classified intelligence which reveals Russia and China are redeveloping their old nuclear test sites and are planning to do what Trump says the US is going to do in the future. BUY AGENT REDRUTH, MY NEW SPY THRILLER PAPERBACK AS A CHRISTMAS GIFT. PUBLISHED BY ROWANVALE BOOKS AND AVAILABLE FROM AMAZON, WATERSTONES AND OTHER BOOKSHOPS.