{"id":17213,"date":"2025-11-10T20:58:58","date_gmt":"2025-11-11T04:58:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=17213"},"modified":"2025-11-10T20:58:59","modified_gmt":"2025-11-11T04:58:59","slug":"trump-and-putin-bring-nuclear-threat-back-into-spotlight-el-pais","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=17213","title":{"rendered":"“Trump and Putin bring nuclear threat back into spotlight”, El Pais"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

NUCLEAR WEAPONS<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The US president\u2019s intention to resume tests, along with the Russian leader\u2019s boasts about his atomic arsenal, heighten uncertainty with just four months to go before the last arms-limitation treaty expires<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Trump
A nuclear test by the United States Armed Forces, in March 1955 at the Nevada National Security Site.AP<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

CARLOS TORRALBA<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Madrid –\u00a0NOV<\/abbr>\u00a010, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few minutes before meeting with Xi Jinping in Busan, U.S. President Donald Trump stated that he had ordered the United States Department of Defense to \u201cimmediately\u201d resume nuclear weapons tests<\/a>. The announcement sparked a mixture of alarm and confusion among the negotiating team that had traveled with the Chinese leader to the South Korean city, as well as in Beijing, Moscow, and even Washington. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The U.S. president hinted that the world\u2019s leading power might once again detonate atomic bombs \u2014 a practice only North Korea has carried out this century \u2014 just hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin boasted of successfully testing a nuclear-powered underwater drone capable of devastating entire cities. All of this comes just months before the last treaty limiting U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals expires, marking the potential end of the nuclear control era established during the Cold War.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s post on October 30 on Truth Social<\/a> \u2014 the social network he owns \u2014 while en route to his meeting with Xi was ambiguous and contained numerous falsehoods. \u201cWe have more nuclear weapons than anybody,\u201d the message began, even though Russia possesses more that the United States<\/a>. Trump also falsely claimed China \u201cwill be even within five years.\u201d The Republican argued that during his first term there had been \u201ca complete update and renovation\u201d of U.S. atomic bombs, although in reality the Pentagon is about to launch the first major modernization of its nuclear arsenal since the Cold War \u2014 a project originating under the Obama administration, with a planned investment of $1 trillion over the next decade (roughly Switzerland\u2019s GDP).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Above all, Trump\u2019s post from Busan raised many questions about whether the president was referring to resuming nuclear tests, which have been under a de facto moratorium for more than 30 years, or testing strategic nuclear weapons delivery systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump was less ambiguous a couple of days later, when asked in a televised interview whether he had ordered nuclear tests in the strict sense \u2014 that is, whether the United States would detonate atomic bombs for the first time since 1992. \u201cI\u2019m saying that we\u2019re going to test nuclear weapons like other countries do, yes,\u201d he told CBS<\/a> from his golf club in Florida, before boasting that the U.S. arsenal could \u201cblow up the world 150 times.\u201d \u201cYou have to see how they work,\u201d the president said, adding that Russia, China, Pakistan, and North Korea conduct secret nuclear tests \u2014 \u201cthey don\u2019t talk about it […] they don\u2019t have reporters that going to be writing about it,\u201d he argued. \u201cWe\u2019re the only country that doesn\u2019t test,\u201d Trump concluded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beijing, Moscow, and Islamabad quickly responded to Trump\u2019s accusations, asserting that they comply with the informal moratorium prohibiting nuclear tests since the late 1990s. That same day, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright tried to calm concerns, stating: \u201cThe tests we\u2019re talking about right now are […] not nuclear explosions.\u201d \u201cYou\u2019re testing all the other parts of a nucelar weapon to make sure they deliver the apporopriate geometry and set up a nuclear explosion,\u201d Wright told Fox News.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Daniel Salisbury, a researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, considers it \u201cunlikely\u201d that Washington will resume underground nuclear tests. \u201cIn theory, the U.S. retains the capability to perform a nuclear test within 36 months. However, the reopening of the Nevada National Security Site [where nearly a thousand nuclear tests were conducted in the last century] would be a remarkably controversial, expensive and lengthy proces,\u201d he argued in an article<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s incendiary announcement from Busan, more than a message to China \u2014 which it was \u2014 seemed to respond to veiled threats against the U.S. made by Putin just hours earlier. During a visit to a military hospital in Moscow, the Russian president said he had just conducted a test of \u201csuper weapon\u201d: the Poseidon torpedo, a nuclear-powered underwater drone designed to travel thousands of miles and create a radioactive tsunami capable of destroying coastal cities. The power of its nuclear warhead is \u201csignificantly higher than that of our most advanced Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missile,\u201d said Putin, surrounded by soldiers wounded in Ukraine. \u201cThere is nothing like this unmanned vehicle anywhere in the world,\u201d he added. \u201cAnd there is no way to intercept it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few days before boasting about the supposed successful Poseidon test, the Russian leader informed senior military commanders, during a televised meeting, that they had completed \u201ca final successful test\u201d of the Burevestnik: a nuclear-powered cruise missile capable of carrying atomic warheads and, according to Putin, \u201cwith unlimited range.\u201d Both Poseidon and Burevestnik are strategic weapons of mass destruction, designed to strengthen Russia\u2019s deterrence capability and intended only for use in the event of a nuclear attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is not unusual for the Russian military to test its most advanced weapons, nor the Kremlin to showcase them. In 2018, during his state-of-the-nation speech, Putin boasted of \u201csix super weapons\u201d in development, including the Poseidon torpedo and Burevestnik \u2014 a missile \u201cwith a practically unlimited range, unpredictable flight path [\u2026] [that] is invulnerable to all existing and future anti\u2011missile and air\u2011defence weapons,\u201d he noted at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even more significant is the timing of the Russian president\u2019s announcement of the successful Poseidon and Burevestnik tests. After months of frantic diplomatic activity, during which Trump seemed confident he could bring Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy to the same negotiating table, the U.S. president\u2019s efforts to end the war between the two former Soviet republics appear to have cooled. A few days before Putin praised the capabilities of Poseidon and Burevestnik, the White House canceled a planned meeting between Trump and Putin in Budapest and imposed sanctions on Lukoil and Rosneft, two giants of the Russian oil industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nuclear blackmail as a pressure tactic<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

With the large\u2011scale invasion of Ukraine launched by Russian troops in February 2022, tanks and trenches returned to the Old Continent \u2014 and so did nuclear blackmail to intimidate Kyiv\u2019s allies. Most analysts agree that the Kremlin\u2019s boasts about its atomic arsenal should be interpreted less as direct threats and more as a diplomatic pressure tool; a way to remind the West \u2014 especially Washington \u2014 that if Russia felt cornered and unable to achieve its objectives in Ukraine, the risk of a nuclear apocalypse would increase.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following Trump\u2019s announcement in South Korea, the Kremlin reacted swiftly. \u201c\u201dWe hope that, regarding the Burevestnik and Poseidon tests, the information was properly communicated to President Trump,” presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the TASS news agency<\/a>. \u201cThese tests cannot be regarded as nuclear ones in any way.\u201d After Trump claimed in his CBS interview that Russia was conducting secret nuclear tests, Putin flatly denied the accusation but warned that Russia would resume testing weapons of mass destruction if Washington made the first move.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The growing use of nuclear rhetoric comes less than four months before the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) \u2014 the last bilateral agreement in force limiting the atomic arsenals of Russia and the United States \u2014 expires. Other pillars of this arms\u2011control framework \u2014 such as the Intermediate\u2011Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, signed by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987, or the Anti\u2011Ballistic Missile Treaty, agreed between Richard Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev in 1972 \u2014 have long since collapsed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Negotiating with China<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

With the end of the security framework established by Washington and Moscow more than 50 years ago looming, Trump insists that any future arms-control agreement must include China. Beijing shows no interest in such talks, arguing that its atomic arsenal is very limited compared to that of the United States. In July 2024 \u2014 after the sale of several U.S. air-defense systems to Taiwan \u2014 the Xi government suspended all arms-control talks with Washington.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Around 90% of the 12,240 nuclear bombs estimated by the Federation of American Scientists to exist in the world are stockpiled in Moscow and Washington. The other seven nuclear powers (China, France, the United Kingdom, Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea) have just over a thousand combined. The Pentagon estimates that China currently possesses 600 nuclear warheads and projects it will have over 1,000 by 2030.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When New START \u2014 signed by Barack Obama and then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Prague in 2010 \u2014 expires in February, it will usher in a period of uncertainty. \u201cThe absence of agreed limits will increase distrust and raise the risk of misunderstandings and miscalculations,\u201d argued Georgia Cole, a researcher at the British think tank Chatham House. \u201cUnfortunately, given the current geopolitical tensions, it is very unlikely that a new nuclear control treaty will be signed in the near future.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is precisely Medvedev, the current Vice Chairman of Russia\u2019s Security Council, who has most frequently resorted to nuclear blackmail since the start of the invasion of Ukraine. In September, the former Russian president warned European leaders \u201csimply cannot afford a war with Russia.\u201d In a post on Telegram, he srgued that such a conflict could escalate into \u201ca war using weapons of mass destruction.\u201d Medvedev added that the end of the nuclear-control era marks the beginning of \u201ca new reality all our opponents will have to reckon with.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few weeks ago, while Washington debated the possibility of sending long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine \u2014 which would allow Kyiv to strike targets in Moscow and St. Petersburg \u2014 Medvedev directly threatened the U.S. president: \u201cThe supply of these missiles could end badly for everyone. First and foremost for Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The risks of a new nuclear arms race are not limited to the arsenals of Russia, the United States, and China. \u201cThe relationship between India and Pakistan remains very tense and volatile, and North Korea continues to advance in developing atomic weapons,\u201d said Cole. She notes that \u201ceven though the United States and Israel claimed that the [June] bombings of Iranian nuclear facilities were highly effective,\u201d it appears that the Islamic Republic \u201cstill retains some of its capabilities<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Adding fuel to the controversy in Washington over atomic weapons, Kathryn Bigelow\u2019s drama A House of Dynamite<\/em><\/a>premiered a few weeks ago, playing with the idea of an imminent nuclear attack on the United States. Reflecting the Pentagon\u2019s concern, an internal Missile Defense Agency document obtained by Bloomberg<\/a> argued that the catastrophic scenario portrayed in the film is \u201cinaccurate\u201d and that the movie \u201cunderestimates the power of the United States.\u201d Noah Oppenheim, the screenwriter of A House of Dynamite<\/em>, told CNN<\/a> that his intention was precisely \u201cto invite a conversation about an issue which we think is tremendously important and doesn\u2019t get enough attention, which is the fact that we have all these nuclear weapons that exist in the world and that pose a great threat to all mankind.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sign up for <\/em>our weekly newsletter<\/em><\/a> to get more English-language news coverage from EL PA\u00cdS USA Edition<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NUCLEAR WEAPONS The US president\u2019s intention to resume tests, along with the Russian leader\u2019s boasts about his atomic arsenal, heighten uncertainty with just four months to go before the last arms-limitation treaty expires CARLOS TORRALBA Madrid –\u00a0NOV\u00a010, 2025 A few minutes before meeting with Xi Jinping in Busan, U.S. President Donald Trump stated that he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17213"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001004"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17213"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17214,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17213\/revisions\/17214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}