If Washington starts conducting atomic experiments again, Russia vows it would reply in kind.
In an effort to restore balance, President Vladimir Putin revoked Moscow’s endorsement of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), prompting the Russian Foreign Ministry to issue a warning to the US not to resume large-scale nuclear testing on Friday.
The ministry released a statement saying, “The United States must understand that conducting full-scale tests, for which the infrastructure in Nevada is reportedly prepared, will force us to respond in kind.”
In an effort to “improve the detection of underground nuclear explosive tests,” the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) of the US Department of Energy conducted an underground detonation at a location northwest of Las Vegas last month. According to the NNSA, “chemical high-explosives and radiotracers” were used in the explosion.
Moscow formally retracted its ratification of the CTBT on Thursday, citing the US Congress’s 25-year refusal to approve the 1996 pact “under far-fetched pretexts.”
According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, “this couldn’t go on forever.” It proved impossible to sustain the previous asymmetry in approaches to the CTBT that had arisen between Moscow and Washington at a time when the United States is pursuing a highly unfriendly course towards our nation.
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Russian nuclear forces carry out a significant test
Study up on Russian nuclear forces carry out a significant test
Since 1992, the US has not carried out a live nuclear test. Russia has made it clear that it will not restart testing first and that it will act if the US puts pressure on it.
But the US nuclear arsenal needs to be greatly expanded, regardless of the cost, according to a congressional advisory group, and the Pentagon recently revealed plans to construct a high-yield variant of the B61 gravity bomb.
An unidentified “anomaly” that will need to be looked into led the US Air Force to destroy an unarmed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) during a test earlier this week. Since early September, this was the second test of that kind. The US intends to replace the outdated missiles with a new model that should be available in the 2030s.
