America’s resumption of nuclear testing has serious consequences for its network of alliances

While heading to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping for trade negotiations, US President Donald Trump published a short statement on October 29 that seemed to indicate that the United States would soon resume nuclear testing.

Trump said on the Truth Social website: “Due to the testing programs conducted by other countries, I have instructed the War Department to begin testing our nuclear weapons on an equal basis, and this process will begin immediately.”

What Trump means by this is unclear at best, and the US Secretary of Energy has opposed it, adding to the ambiguity of the situation. While some assumed that this constituted a direct order to resume nuclear testing, the statement that the United States would conduct the tests on an “equal basis” indicates that it is more about experimenting with delivery systems, or conducting very low-yield experiments on materials and subcomponents, and not on the warheads themselves.

The US President said that he had begun conducting tests on an “equal basis,” but neither China nor Russia had conducted large-scale nuclear tests since they signed the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

However, there are claims that they may conduct small-scale “supercritical” nuclear tests, meaning that the test achieves a sustained chain reaction.

Trump apparently referred to these allegations during an interview with the “60 Minutes” program, which was broadcast last week. These experiments could theoretically be conducted on a small enough scale to avoid detection, and they are very difficult to track through intelligence means.

Also, narrow-scale “supercritical” experiments generate less information than full-scale experiments on warheads, as the interaction between different materials inside a nuclear warhead cannot be directly tested during a full-scale nuclear explosion.

These tests also require specialized facilities that the United States has not invested in, and may take years of investment to perform. The current “subcritical” testing facility for the United States, officially known as “U1A,” is currently being modernized at a cost of about $2.5 billion, and may not be ready until 2030.

Major defects

Trump’s announcement also came as Russia tested two next-generation nuclear delivery systems: Burevestnik, a nuclear-powered cruise missile with some questionable technical characteristics, and Poseidon, a nuclear torpedo designed to destroy coastal cities. Trump may want the United States to begin testing nuclear systems at a rate comparable to that of China and Russia.

However, resuming nuclear testing and increasing flight testing may have major drawbacks. On the one hand, it is not clear how quickly the United States can resume nuclear testing. On paper, the United States retains the ability to resume nuclear testing within 24-36 months of issuing a presidential decision, but it is unclear how realistic this timetable is. The nuclear testing site in Nevada is in poor condition and will likely require significant investment in resources.

Conducting large-scale nuclear tests would not bring significant benefits, and would be tantamount to abandoning their commitment to the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, and other signatories to the treaty, such as Russia and China, may follow suit.

China benefits more than others from technical data from the resumption of testing, as its current data is limited. It conducted only 45 nuclear tests before the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, while the United States conducted more than 1,000 tests.

Resuming nuclear testing could also lead to dangerous diplomatic consequences as public dissatisfaction in allied countries grows. For nearly a decade, the United States has tried to maintain its reputation on nuclear issues, with countries questioning the slow progress made toward nuclear disarmament.

Despite commitments to continue good faith disarmament negotiations under Article VI of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, progress on nuclear disarmament has declined over the past decade, with Russia, China, and the United States investing in new weapons systems.

Wide popularity

Meanwhile, some countries lost patience with the lack of progress and supported the more stringent Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which prohibits signatory states from producing, transferring, or allowing the storage of nuclear weapons on their territory. 95 countries have signed the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, and it is widely popular in countries allied with the United States, including Australia, Japan, and the Netherlands.

The resumption of nuclear testing may also arouse public opinion in these countries and make resistance to signing the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons politically unacceptable. This will have serious consequences for the network of alliances that the United States has established to deter Russia and China. For example, the United States is currently developing nuclear weapons designed to be deployed on attack submarines. If countries such as Australia and Japan sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, they will be prohibited from harboring nuclear weapons on their soil, and the United States will be required to declare that the submarines… The attack vessel does not carry nuclear weapons on board.

But the United States follows a strict policy of not declaring the presence of nuclear weapons anywhere, and previous attempts by New Zealand to force visiting American warships to declare the presence of nuclear weapons led to the United States suspending its defense commitments to New Zealand. A similar situation may occur in other allied countries if those countries join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which causes serious problems for the United States’ network of alliances and its ability to deter its adversaries. About “Foreign Policy”

Relentless efforts

The United States has made strenuous efforts to make clear that flight tests of nuclear-capable systems, such as the regular tests of the Minuteman 3 missile from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, are part of routine testing and are not intended to send any message to adversaries.

In order to reduce tensions that missile tests may raise, the United States notifies other countries before conducting the tests. China recently did the same, after testing an intercontinental ballistic missile over the Pacific Ocean in September 2024, which is a commendable advancement in risk reduction. Conducting more flight tests to keep up with Russian and Chinese actions would undermine this progress.