Nuclear Policy News – May 27, 2020

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Top News:

U.S. nuclear forces are ready and deter all adversaries, including N. Korea: Pentagon official
Korea Herald

Live nuclear testing could resume in ‘months’ if needed, official says
Defense News

Utah downwinders denounce Trump’s talk of restarting nuclear tests
Salt Lake Tribune

United States

Live nuclear testing could resume in ‘months’ if needed, official says
Defense News5/26/20
A live nuclear test could be arranged within “months” if requested by the president, a top defense department nuclear official said Tuesday, following a report that the Trump administration has discussed the first American nuclear test in decades

Utah downwinders denounce Trump’s talk of restarting nuclear tests
Salt Lake Tribune5/26/20
The Trump administration is talking about restarting nuclear arms tests, which alarms Utah “downwinders” — who suffered cancer from atomic tests conducted upwind in Nevada decades ago.

OPINION: America should never conduct another nuclear test
Popular MechanicsKyle Mizokami
5/27/20
The White House has discussed conducting a new nuclear weapons test, the first in nearly three decades.

East Asia

U.S. nuclear forces are ready and deter all adversaries, including N. Korea: Pentagon official
Korea Herald5/27/20
The United States’ nuclear forces are ready and deter all adversaries, including potentially North Korea, a Pentagon official said Tuesday after the communist nation vowed to build its nuclear deterrence.

Russia and Europe

Russia building stealth bomber that may carry ‘invincible’ hypersonic nuclear missiles
Newsweek5/27/20
Russian state media has reported that Moscow has started work on a prototype of the country’s first stealth bomber, which is being designed to carry a wide range of weapons including hypersonic missiles

Russia’s ‘doomsday drone’ prepares for testing
Moscow Times5/26/20
Russia plans to test its unmanned “doomsday nuke” in its Arctic waters this fall, one year after a fatal nuclear-powered missile accident led to a radiation spike in a nearby city and grabbed international headlines.

South Asia

OPINION: Could a US nuclear test be a fortuitous opportunity for India?
ORF – Manoj Joshi
5/27/20
If the US breaks the informal ban that it has in place since its last test in September 1992, it provides India an opportunity to also follow suit, and confirm the design of its thermonuclear bomb, something it failed to do in 1998 tests.

Multilateral Arms Control

OPINION: The decaying state of the nuclear world order
ORF – Pulkit Mohan
5/27/20
A report published by the US State Department in April titled, Adherence to and Compliance with Arms Control, Nonproliferation, and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments, raised concerns around China’s increasing activity at the Lop Nur test site in 2019.

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