U.S. Senator Angus King (I-ME), in a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC), grilled Vice Admiral Richard Correll, the Commander of United States Strategic Command, about President Donald Trump’s decision to resume nuclear weapons testing.
Trump announced that he was planning to resume nuclear tests “because of countries’ testing programs” and said he planned “to start testing our nuclear weapons on an equal basis.” However, neither Russia nor China are testing nuclear weapons. Russia has confirmed testing of a nuclear-powered cruise missile, but a nuclear weapon itself has not been tested.
The only country to hold any nuclear weapon test since the de factor moratorium in the 1990s is South Korea.
“Are any other countries doing explosive testing of nuclear warheads?” King asked Vice Admiral Correll on Thursday.
“To my knowledge, the explosive testing, the last explosive nuclear testing was by North Korea, or DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea), and that was in 2017 to be publicly confirmed,” Correll responded.
“But Russia and China have not done explosives that we know of, is that correct,?” asked Sen. King.
“No, for China, the last publicly acknowledged test was in 1996,” replied Correll.
King then asked about Trump’s pledge to start the testing “immediately.”
“I’m sorry, ‘We are testing our nuclear weapons on an equal basis.’ It could be that what he is talking about is delivery systems. Is that not correct? Just recently we learned about the new Sky Fall Russian missile. Is that a reasonable interpretation of what he is saying, rather than explosive testing of weapons,” questioned Sen. King.
Correll responded that he doesn’t “have insight into the president’s intent” but agreed that could be an interpretation.
Senn. King concluded, “We hope that is clarified in the coming days.”