Trump wants to revive nuclear tests

President Trump has ordered the Pentagon (Department of War) to restart nuclear testing, reviving a Cold War military programme which was suspended soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. However, what did the president have in mind when he made his announcement in a Truth Social posting? He implied that rival nuclear powers were carrying out tests and that it was crucial for the US to start “testing our nuclear weapons on an equal basis”. What does this mean? Neither Russia nor China, America’s “big power rivals”, have been engaged in nuclear testing since a moratorium was agreed. The last US test was in 1992, Russia stopped testing in 1990 and China in 1996, the same year the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty was signed. The only countries which have carried out nuclear tests since then have been North Korea- the last one was in 2017 - as well as India and Pakistan, both of whom completed underground testing in May 1998. Britain’s last test, codenamed Operation Bristol, was in November, 1991, and France has not carried out a nuclear test since January, 1996. The only other nuclear power, Israel, has never acknowledged it has such weapons and the only indication of a suspected nuclear test was in 1979. Trump specifically mentioned that Russia had just tested a nuclear torpedo codenamed Poseidon. Was it this which persuaded him to make his order to the Pentagon? He also said that “with others doing testing, I think it’s appropriate that we do also”. Russia did carry out a recent test but the torpedo was the first of its kind to be powered by a miniature nuclear reactor to give it unlimited range under the ocean. The Poseidon is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, but the test did not involve any type of detonation. The US has never given up testing its own nuclear missile forces, silo-based, submarine-launched and air-launched. But each test has always been fitted with dummy warheads. The only nuclear testing has been based on laboratory calculations. It’s imperative to ensure the safety of these weapons, in particular the plutonium fuel used as the fissile material. So the US relies on supercomputers to conduct digital simulations of a nuclear explosion. The laboratory tests are carried out by the Department of Energy and the National Nuclear Security Administration, not by the Pentagon. The other nuclear weapons countries carry out similar laboratory testing. The US originally carried out nuclear tests in the atmosphere, mostly on remote atolls in the Pacific Marshall Islands but also in Nevada, about 65 miles north of Las Vegas. The last such test was in 1962 after which the U.S switched to underground testing. With the build-up of nuclear weapons, particularly by China and North Korea, Trump appears to believe that the moratorium on testing can no longer be justified. He said the US had more nuclear weapons than any other power, but China would catch up in five years. The reality is that Russia is believed to have the most nuclear warheads, about 5,580, according to the Washington-based Arms Control Association, of which an estimated 1,718 are operationally deployed. The US has 5,225, with about 1,770 deployed. The remainder are held in storage. China will not be anywhere near the total US and Russian stockpiles within the next five years. But, according to Pentagon estimates, China has doubled its warhead inventory from 300 in 2020 to 600 today and will have more than 1,000 by 2030, all of which will be operational. What impact would a resumption of US testing have on the rest of the world’s nuclear club? Inevitably, the risk is that Russia and China would follow suit, undermining any hopes of a future strategic arms reduction treaty, involving both Moscow and Beijing. North Korea might also be tempted to carry out an atmospheric test which it threatened to do over the Pacific in 2017. BUY MY NEW SPY THRILLER, AGENT REDRUTH, SEQUEL TO SHADOW LIVES, AVAILABLE FROM AMAZON, WATERSTSONES, ROWANVALE BOOKS AND OTHER DECENT BOOKSHOPS.