The recent statement by the U.S. president Donald Trump places global peace in a critical position. In a post, Donald Trump has announced that he has instructed the Department of War to resume nuclear weapons testing. This statement comes after Russian President, Vladimir Putin, broadcasted that Russia has been testing nuclear-powered torpedo and a new cruise missile. Trump gave the reason that since other countries are testing nuclear, therefore U.S. would follow the trend immediately. His statement has been criticized by many experts. They believe Trump is even unaware of who tests nuclear weapons. Matthew Bunn, a nuclear weapons expert at Harvard University states that “Trump seems to think it’s the Department of Defence/War that carries out nuclear tests. In contrary, it’s the Department of Energy.” Moreover, the Centre for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation describes nuclear tests as “generally controlled explosions of nuclear devise, such as bombs or warheads.” in this context they believe that Russia’s missile and torpedo tests do not meet that strict definition. Therefore, it is safe to say that other states which Trump refers to (China and Russia), are not testing nuclear weapons for decades; last time Russia in 1990, and China in 1996.
Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists, criticized the announcement, as he predicted that “if the U.S. started testing a nuclear weapon, it would almost certainly open the gates for other nuclear weapon states to follow”, hence, leading to nuclear arms race and global uncertainty. To illustrate, he explained that the New START treaty will expire in February 2026 and the resumption of nuclear tests “will be another nail in the coffin of nuclear disarmament and nuclear arms control.” In addition, he believes that “this is a very serious issue, very irresponsible and very confusing.”
Additionally, he believes that in this regards South Asian nuclear rivals, India and Pakistan, would also be interested in conducting nuclear tests to improve their nuclear weapons technologies. However, this prediction might not be entirely true. Pakistan has a well laid out nuclear test policy. Also, Pakistan was not the first state in South Asia to test nuclear and will not be the first country to resume nuclear testing in the region. Pakistan prefers peace over conflict, which is very much evident after the Pahalgam incident where Pakistan offered investigation, yet India opted for attacking its nuclear rival. Other than that, India was the first country in South Asia that conducted nuclear tests to which Pakistan had to maintain its deterrent posture. Even after the defeat in Operation Sindhoor, India focuses on increasing its warheads, while Pakistan is focusing on diplomatic relations.
On the other hand, the U.S. and Russia have around 90% of the world’s total number of nuclear weapons; going for more would be a naïve act, as it would come without considering its implications. Jamie Kwong, a fellow in the nuclear policy Programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, believes that this situation would have a domino effect where once again states would race towards securing themselves through nuclear arms, making nuclear disarmament almost impossible. The resumption of nuclear testing by the U.S. could prompt not only China and Russia to do the same but also other states that possess any threat and in the realist paradigm, threat and uncertainty always subsists in the international arena. To illustrate, If the U.S. starts testing its nuclear, Russia too will follow and so would China. In this scenario, it would be hard for disarmament regimes to stop India. Thereby, India would get a chance to enhance its aggressive posture and offensive nature by testing nuclear, since it was the first to nuclearize South Asia. In this situation, Pakistan would have no choice but to follow the defensive outlook for deterrence purpose. However, Pakistan would not be the first to test nuclear.
Experts believe that the statement by the U.S. president was provoking a nuclear arms race and could raise the risk factor in an already dangerous moment where the majority of signs displayed that the world was heading in the direction of a nuclear arms race – even though it has not yet begun. With such policies the world faces a rising nuclear threat. Currently, the world is full of conflict such as a flare-up between India and Pakistan (both nuclear states), the Ukraine-Russia war, and the Israel-Iran confrontation- where Israel has a policy of neither confirming nor denying the acquisition of nuclear weapons and Iran is a country the West accuses of trying to build nuclear weapons, which it denies. Such statements, if put into actions, can further enhance uncertainty and states would rethink their decisions towards nuclear non-proliferation. In this regards, executive director of the Washington-based Arms Control Association, Daryl Kimball, believes that the U.S. reopening of nuclear testing might be “a mistake of historic international security proportions”. One can only hope that in such a situation peace and nuclear non-proliferation prevails rather than nuclear arms race.
Be the first to comment