WASHINGTON – US president Donald Trump said on Thursday that he has ordered the Pentagon to start nuclear weapons testing to equal China and Russia, just minutes before opening a high-stakes summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. 

The move comes after Russian president Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Moscow had successfully tested a nuclear-capable, nuclear-powered underwater drone, in defiance of Washington’s warnings. 

“Because of other countries’ testing programs, I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis,” Trump wrote in a social media post. The United States has been a signatory since 1996 to the Comprehensive Nuclear- Test-Ban Treaty, which bans all atomic test blasts, whether for military or civilian purposes. 

It was not immediately made clear if Trump was referring to testing nuclear warheads, which the United States last did in 1992, or testing weapons systems capable of carrying atomic warheads. 

Trump also claimed that the United States has more nuclear weapons than any other country, praising his own efforts to do “a complete update and renovation of existing weapons.” 

“Russia is second, and China is a distant third, but will be even within five years,” he said. 

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in its latest annual report that Russia possesses 5 489 nuclear warheads, compared to 5 177 for the United States and 600 for China. 

In total, SIPRI estimates that the nine nuclear-armed countries – Russia, the United States, China, France, the United Kingdom, Pakistan, India, Israel, and North Korea possess more than 12 200 warheads. 

Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that it had been “many years” since the United States had conducted nuclear tests. 

“We don’t do testing. . . we’ve halted it years, many years ago,” he said, adding that it was “appropriate” to start again because others are testing. 

“I’d like to see denuclearisation… denuclearisation would be a tremendous thing,” he added. 

He claimed, “It’s something we are actually talking to Russia about, and China would be added to that if we do something.” 

Trump kept the location and dates for testing vague during the news conference but said earlier it would “begin immediately.” 

‘Abide by obligations’ 

The Republican president was in South Korea to meet with Xi, with the leaders of the world’s top two economies coming face-to-face for the first time in Trump’s second term. 

China later urged the United States to “earnestly abide” by a global nuclear testing ban. 

“China hopes the United States will earnestly abide by the obligations of the comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty and its commitment to a ban on nuclear testing and take concrete actions to safeguard the global nuclear disarmament,” foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said. 

The US conducted 1 054 nuclear tests from July 1945 to 1992, including two during WWII. Its last test was in September 1992 at Nevada. President George H.W. Bush imposed a moratorium in  October 1992, continued by others. Nuclear testing shifted to non-nuclear experiments and computer simulations. Meanwhile, Putin announced the successful testing of a nuclear-powered underwater drone, the second in days. 

In televised remarks from a military hospital treating wounded Russian soldiers in Ukraine, Putin said there was “no way to intercept” the torpedo drone “Poseidon.” He claimed Poseidon can travel faster than submarines, dive deeper, and reach any continent. 

Trump criticised Putin after a Sunday cruise missile test, saying he should end the Ukraine war instead of testing missiles. 

A planned Trump-Putin summit in Budapest last week was cancelled. -Nampa/AFP