US Nuclear Weapon Testing Won’t Involve Any Explosions, Energy Secretary Says

Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Nov. 2 that no nuclear explosions will take place during the nuclear weapons testing ordered by President Donald Trump.

Wright told Fox News the tests are intended to assess certain parts of a nuclear weapon to make sure “they deliver the appropriate geometry” and can set up a nuclear explosion.

“I think the tests we’re talking about right now are system tests,” Wright said in a Fox News interview that aired on Nov. 2. “These are not nuclear explosions. These are what we call non-critical explosions.”

His remarks follow President Donald Trump’s social media post on Oct. 29 saying that he had instructed the Department of War to start testing nuclear weapons “on an equal basis” with tests conducted by adversaries.

Wright said during the interview that the Trump administration is working on modernizing the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile and that the tests will be carried out on the new systems.

“The testing that we’ll be doing is on new systems, and again, these will be non-nuclear explosions. These are just developing these sophisticated systems so that our replacement nuclear weapons are even better than the ones they were before,” Wright said.

“They’re reliable in all circumstances, under all conditions, and they deliver the performance they were designed for.”

He noted that the government shutdown has slowed down the government’s modernization effort. The Department of Energy stated last month that the agency will furlough about 1,400 workers as the government shutdown drags on.

Trump posted the announcement just before he was set to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in South Korea. He did not specify whether the tests would be underground, underwater, or atmospheric.

The United States last conducted a nuclear weapons test underground in September 1992. Nuclear tests in the atmosphere, space, or underwater have been banned since the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty, which permitted continued underground nuclear testing for several decades.

The decision to resume nuclear weapons tests comes amid high-profile weapons tests by major nuclear-armed U.S. adversaries, including Russia and North Korea.

Just hours ahead of Trump’s visit to South Korea on Oct. 29, North Korea announced that it had carried out a test on its nuclear-capable cruise missile in the sea to its west.

Russia carried out a test last month of its Burevestnik cruise missile, a nuclear-powered weapon that Moscow claimed possesses unlimited range and the ability to evade existing missile defenses, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Energy Department oversees the National Nuclear Security Administration, the agency responsible for maintaining and enhancing the safety and effectiveness of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile.

Joseph Lord contributed to this report.