Trump Orders Resumption of Nuclear Tests

President Donald Trump directed the Pentagon to resume testing U.S. nuclear weapons, ending a 33-year moratorium that began in 1992. He announced the order on Truth Social, saying the process should begin “immediately,” minutes before a meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in South Korea. Trump framed the move as matching other countries’ testing programs, claimed the United States now has more nuclear weapons than any other country, and referred to the Defense Department as the “Department of War.” Observers said it was unclear whether he intended full-scale explosive tests—resuming such detonations would face significant legal, technical and treaty constraints and the U.S. last conducted a nuclear detonation in 1992. Critics warned the order could breach international agreements, be hampered by lost institutional know‑how and infrastructure, and the Pentagon and Chinese authorities had not immediately commented.