Russia Issues a Warning to the United States About Potential Nuclear Testing under Trump

Russia Issues a Warning to the United States About Potential Nuclear Testing under Trump

In a recent statement, Russia's chief representative for arms control raised concerns about the possibility of the United States resuming nuclear testing under Donald Trump’s upcoming administration. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov expressed that amidst Washington's "extremely hostile" policies, Moscow would be considering its own options regarding nuclear capabilities. 

The revival of nuclear testing by both the U.S. and Russia—two of the world’s largest nuclear powers—could mark the beginning of a new and potentially dangerous chapter in nuclear arms development. This development comes nearly 80 years after the first-ever nuclear bomb test conducted by the United States in Alamogordo, New Mexico, in July 1945.

Currently, Russia, the United States, and China are all engaged in significant modernization programs for their nuclear arsenals at a time when Cold War-era arms control treaties are deteriorating. Ryabkov pointed out in an interview with the Kommersant newspaper that during his prior presidency, Trump adopted a hardline approach toward the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

"The global landscape is particularly challenging right now, and the American administration's various policies are extremely antagonistic towards us," Ryabkov remarked. "Thus, we must consider a range of options to protect our security interests, which could involve various measures and actions—and we are not excluding any possibilities."

During Trump's first term in office, the administration reportedly contemplated conducting the first U.S. nuclear test since 1992, according to a 2020 report by the Washington Post.

In 2023, President Vladimir Putin formally withdrew Russia's ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, bringing his nation’s stance in line with that of the United States. The treaty was originally signed by Russia in 1996 and ratified in 2000, while the U.S. signed it but has yet to ratify it.

Experts in arms control are expressing concerns that the United States may be inching towards a renewed testing phase as a means to advance new weaponry and simultaneously project strength towards adversaries such as Russia and China.

According to the Federation of American Scientists, Russia possesses approximately 5,580 nuclear warheads, while the United States has around 5,044, making them the two largest nuclear powers and responsible for about 88% of the global nuclear arsenal. In contrast, China maintains around 500 warheads.

From 1945 until the signing of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1996, more than 2,000 nuclear tests were conducted worldwide, with the United States conducting 1,032 tests and the Soviet Union 715, as reported by the United Nations.

Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Russia has not performed any nuclear tests. The last nuclear test by the Soviet Union occurred in 1990.

Putin has indicated that Russia would consider resuming nuclear tests should the United States proceed with its own. Recently, he has also reduced the threshold for initiating a nuclear strike in response to a wider array of conventional assaults, particularly after Moscow claimed that Ukraine had launched attacks deep within Russian territory using U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, only a limited number of countries have conducted nuclear tests, including the United States (last tested in 1992), China and France (1996), India and Pakistan (1998), and North Korea (2017), as noted by the Arms Control Association.