The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) 1996, which prohibited “any nuclear weapon test explosion or any other nuclear explosion” was signed by 187 countries, including Russia, China and the United States. All countries in the world, even non-signatories, abide by the terms of the treaty, and there have been no nuclear tests, except by North Korea, in the 21st century ~ despite the US and China not ratifying the agreement, Russia rescinding its ratification in 2023, and India and Pakistan not signing the agreement at all.
Therefore, US President Donald Trump’s post on Truth Social, on 30 October 2025, just before his meeting with Chinese President Xi Ping, that, ‘because of other countries testing programs’, he had instructed the US Department of War to ‘start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis … immediately,’ set the cat among the pigeons. That Trump was himself confused could not be denied; Trump addressed his order to the Pentagon rather than the Energy Department, which administers nuclear tests. Trump’s allegations about countries (China, Russia and Pakistan), conducting nuclear tests on the sly, are not independently verifiable, with seismic monitoring not recording any large nuclear weapons tests since 1996.
Notably, all three countries, China, Russia and Pakistan, have denied testing nuclear devices in violation of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. However, Trump’s fulminations have drawn a sharp response from the countries named by him. In a televised appearance Russian President Vladimir Putin said that he had instructed the Foreign and Defence ministries to bring proposals “on the possible start of work on the preparation of nuclear weapons tests.” Similar threats have not emanated from China and Pakistan, but both may follow Russia ~ if Trump carries out his threat of testing nuclear weapons. Contrary to perception, the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty does not entirely prohibit testing of nuclear devices.
The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty expressly prohibits only supercritical tests ~ which involve a limited amount of nuclear material but produce a chain reaction – and full nuclear explosion tests. But the treaty does allow a nuclear-armed country to conduct subcritical testing i.e., tests that do not initiate a chain reaction ~ to assess the reliability of their nuclear material and associated hardware. Also allowed is the testing of delivery systems, to ensure that nuclear-armed missiles and projectiles work as intended.
Modernisation of nuclear weapons and increased testing of nuclear-delivery systems ~ activities allowed under CTBT ~ tend to destabilise the fragile nuclear equilibrium that has held for the last thirty-odd years. That said, path-breaking technological advancements in critical fields, including AI, have heralded a more dangerous nuclear age, where all nuclear-armed states, US, China, Russia, Britain, France, India, Israel and Pakistan, have increased their nuclear capabilities manifold.
According to assessments by US agencies, taking advantage of the exceptions allowed under CTBT, China is modernising, diversifying and expanding its nuclear arsenal exponentially ~ with its 2020 stockpile of 200 nuclear warheads projected to grow to 1500 by 2035. Additionally, since 2020, China has started construction of approximately 350 new missile silos. The US-Russia New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) 2010, which limits the nuclear arsenal of both countries to 1,550 deployed warheads, does not stop them from modernising their weapons. Significantly, START expires in 2026, and Russia had suspended its participation in 2023.
However, both Russia and the US have informally agreed to extend it by a year. Despite such pragmatism, sub-terranean developments point to continued one-upmanship; after holding nuclear launch drills and testing a nuclear-powered Poseidon super-torpedo, Russia tested its new nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed cruise missile Burevestnik in October 2025. According to analysts, with its vast infrastructural and IT advantage, the US continues in pole position, by maintaining a test moratorium.
Simultaneously, the US has modernised its nuclear arsenal by experimentation, computer simulation technology and tests allowed under the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Alarmingly, strategic arms control agreements have been allowed to lapse. The world has become an unsafe place with a maverick like Trump at the helm of the world’s most powerful country; one who does not think twice before threatening other countries with war, and promoting strife by its satellites, as also vainglorious men like Xi and Putin, in power in China and Russia, who mirror Trump’s antics. The US return to nuclear test explosions, will definitely trigger testing by other nuclear-armed states. Thus, the spectre of an arms race and a possible environmental Armageddon, is not too far from realisation.
The casual way and the vague words Trump used to announce his intention of resuming nuclear testing ~ through social media ~ reflects an erosion of responsibility and age-old norms. True to his habit of playing fast and loose, in a television interview on 2 November, Trump alleged that Russia and China had been secretly testing nuclear weapons and that the United States would follow their lead, but do so publicly; however, on 5 November, Trump publicly stated that he was “working on a plan to denuclearize the three of us,” i.e., US, Russia and China.
This nuclear uncertainty is in addition to the uncertainty unleashed by the narrowly averted trade war between the USA and China. To recapitulate: responding to a 9 October announcement of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, which imposed new limits on rare-earth exports, and required battery-makers to obtain a licence to export goods, kit or ingredients, President Trump threatened to impose an extra 100 per cent tariff on Chinese goods, as well as retaliatory controls on critical US exports to China. Ultimately, saner counsel prevailed and true to his reputation of TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out), after meeting President Xi in South Korea, Trump put off the 100 per cent tariff on Chinese goods and new export controls by a year. China on its part promised to delay the new restrictions on export of rare earths. China also said both sides had agreed to expand their farm trade, meaning thereby that US soybean exports were likely to be resumed.
Busy with their own strategic calculations, the two richest nations, responsible for 42 per cent of the world’s GDP, hardly noticed how a trade war between them would have impacted poorer nations ~ breaking long-established supply chains, and driving up prices of many commodities, including food grains. On his part, for almost the last four years, the Russian President has been engaged in a war with Ukraine, which has seriously affected economies the world over, and which has resulted in food shortages in many poor countries, and famine-like conditions in the Horn of Africa. Such insensitivity on the part of the world’s most powerful countries, bodes ill for humanity. According to the United Nations Organisation, while rich countries vie for superiority:
* Only 35 per cent of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 targets, are on track or making only modest gains. Nearly half are progressing too slowly, and 18 per cent are actually regressing.
* Over 800 million people in the world still live in extreme poverty and hunger. One in 11 people still face hunger. Billions live without safe drinking water and sanitation.
* Women continue to shoulder 2.5 times more unpaid care work than men. * Persons with disabilities remain under-served across sectors.
* Climate records are being shattered; extreme climate events take place with alarming regularity, with 2024 being the hottest year in history.
* CO2 levels are the highest in over two million years. * Over 120 million people are displaced – more than double the number in 2015.
* Debt service costs for low- and middle-income countries hit $1.4 trillion, draining resources from critical development. In this bleak global scenario, wasting scarce resources on mindless wars, and games of one-upmanship, is downright criminal. All countries on earth should heed what William Shakespeare had written four centuries ago: “O, it is excellent to have a giant’s strength; but it is tyrannous to use it like a giant” (Measure for Measure, Scene 2, Act 2)
(The writer is a retired Principal Chief Commissioner of Income-Tax)