When Donald Trump retook the White House in January this year, he promised Americans that he would be “a man of peace", a leader who would end “wars across the world." Yet, ten months into his second presidency, Trump seems to be waging wars of his own – diplomatic, economic, and now potentially nuclear. After mollycoddling Pakistan’s madrasa-bred “Field Marshal" Asim Munir, ordering airstrikes on Iran, sparking off tariff wars with China and India, and failing to end the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Trump has found a new obsession: nuclear testing.

On 29 October, Trump directed the Pentagon to “immediately increase testing of nuclear weapons" and match Russia and China “on an equal basis." Announcing the directive on his Truth Social account ahead of his meeting with Xi Jinping, Trump wrote that the United States possessed “more nuclear weapons than any other country" thanks to his “complete renovation" of existing warheads during his first term.

Trump added, in a statement that bordered on self-contradiction, that he “hated" doing it but had “no choice." The United States, he declared, could not afford to remain the “only country that doesn’t test," as Russia and China allegedly continue to advance their own programmes.

His Truth Social post ended in typical Trumpian fashion: a self-congratulatory flourish, “Thank you for your attention to this matter! PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP."

The ‘Testing Order’ And Its Fallout

The timing of Trump’s announcement was no coincidence. It came just days after Russian President Vladimir Putin revealed that Moscow had successfully tested its nuclear-propelled Burevestnik cruise missile, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. Trump seized on this as justification to restart America’s own testing, telling CBS’s 60 Minutes that although the US already had enough nuclear weapons “to blow up the world 150 times," he could not allow other nations to test freely while America sat idle.

When pressed about the necessity of testing weapons already proven to work, Trump responded, “Because you have to see how they work." He added that “North Korea is constantly testing," implying that to remain a superpower, America must match others, test for test.

In typical fashion, Trump also turned a global issue into a domestic performance. “We’re an open society," he told CBS. “We have to talk about it, because otherwise you people are........

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