President Donald Trump called on US military leaders to resume testing US nuclear weapons in order to keep pace with other countries such as Russia and China.
Because of other countries testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis, he wrote on social media just before meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea.
The US has more nuclear weapons than any other country, Trump said, with Russia second and China a distant third. It has not conducted nuclear weapons testing since 1992.
It comes just days after Trump denounced Russia for testing a nuclear-powered missile, which reportedly has an unlimited range.
Trump's post acknowledges the tremendous destructive power of nuclear weapons, but he emphasized that he had no choice but to update and renovate the US arsenal during his first term in office.
He also stated that China's nuclear programme will be even within 5 years.
While Trump's post did not include specific details on how the tests will occur, he indicated that the process will begin immediately.
This marks an apparent reversal of a long-standing US policy. The last US nuclear weapons test was in 1992, following a moratorium announced by former Republican President George HW Bush as the Cold War came to an end.
Trump's announcement coincided with Xi's arrival in South Korea for their first in-person meeting since 2019, as he traveled aboard Marine One.
The last recorded US nuclear bomb test took place on September 23, 1992, at an underground site in Nevada.
This was the 1,054th nuclear weapons test conducted by the US, according to the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which was instrumental in developing the world's first atomic bomb.
The Nevada Test Site, located about 65 miles north of Las Vegas, remains operational. It could potentially be authorized for nuclear weapons testing again, according to the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History, which is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution.
