By ZEKE MILLER and MICHELLE L. PRICE Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Thursday that he wants to restart nuclear arms control talks with Russia and China and that eventually he hopes all three countries could agree to cut their massive defense budgets in half.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump lamented the hundreds of billions of dollars being invested in rebuilding the nation’s nuclear deterrent and said he hopes to gain commitments from the U.S. adversaries to cut their own spending.
“There’s no reason for us to be building brand new nuclear weapons, we already have so many,” Trump said. “You could destroy the world 50 times over, 100 times over. And here we are building new nuclear weapons, and they’re building nuclear weapons.”
“We’re all spending a lot of money that we could be spending on other things that are actually, hopefully much more productive,” Trump said.
While the U.S. and Russia hold massive stockpiles of weapons since the Cold War, Trump predicted that China would catch up in their capability to exact nuclear devastation “within five or six years.”
He said if the weapons were ever called to use, “that’s going to be probably oblivion.”
Trump said he would look to engage in nuclear talks with the two countries once “we straighten it all out” in the Middle East and Ukraine.
“One of the first meetings I want to have is with President Xi of China, President Putin of Russia. And I want to say, ‘let’s cut our military budget in half.’ And we can do that. And I think we’ll be able to.”
Trump in his first term tried and failed to bring China into nuclear arms reduction talks when the U.S. and Russia were negotiating an extension of a pact known as New START. Russia suspended its participation in the treaty during the Biden administration, as the U.S. and Russia continued on massive programs to extend the life-spans or replace their Cold War-era nuclear arsenals.
1) I believe you reported accurately what the President said, but he is not completely right. Ever since the Soviet Union dissolved, we negotiated a number of START treaties that reduced out nuclear stockpile from tens of thousands of weapons down to about 4300 for us and Russia. (China and the other nuclear nations were not a part of the treaty, I think.) That is about a 94% reduction from the total each of us made over the Cold War. So whatever damage was the fear during the Cold War, it is much less now, and never was close to “destroy the world 50, 100 times over.”
(2) We are not building new nuclear weapons to increase the count. We are, however, replacing them one-for-one when older weapons are retired, so the total remains the same under the treaty. This is being paid for through the DOE, not the DOD, and the DOE has turned it into an expensive boondoggle that should be looked held accountable. DOE has responsibility for the care and maintenance of nuclear weapons; the DOD has responsibility for weapon delivery systems (missiles and such).