Nuclear weapons:
The government is running on a Continuing Resolution (CR) until the end of January. It’s possible to have another shutdown depending on how tough the Dems want to be. The legislative process is starting to move again, with the annual Defense Authorization Act up first and then appropriations. Both give funding increases to nuclear weapons programs, delivery systems and Trump’s “Golden Dome.”
Cost overruns in nearly all things remains the rule. Golden Dome could cost up to $4 trillion, be destabilizing and never be 100% effective. Putin has already taken steps to circumvent it and China may well be doing the same, particularly with hypersonic delivery systems. The arms race continues, likely to be accelerated by artificial intelligence as well.
Nuclear weapons testing: No specific new developments but this article by ex-LANL Director Sig Hecker is good:
| Lessons From Los Alamos |
| Last month, U.S. President Donald Trump rekindled a decades-old debate about nuclear testing. “Because of other countries testing programs,” he wrote on social media, “I have instructed the Department of War to start testing our Nuclear Weapons on an equal basis…” A return to testing at this time would likely benefit U.S. adversaries more than it would the United States. Worse still, it might rekindle an even greater and broader arms race than in the first few decades of the Cold War. |
| Siegfried Hecker | Foreign Affairs |
| Read More |
Article continued:
“My greatest concern about resuming full-scale nuclear testing is that it will fuel another dangerous arms race at a time when global tensions among the great powers are high. Engaging in another arms race is contrary to Trump’s comment that “it would be great if we could all denuclearize, because the power of nuclear weapons is crazy.”
Instead of suggesting an immediate return to nuclear testing, then, Trump should focus on returning to arms control measures to ensure strategic stability with Russia and with China. Hopefully, these measures would lead to a reduction in U.S. and Russian nuclear forces and reduce incentives for China to increase its arsenal. For nuclear testing, he should help erect the highest possible barriers for any country to test by leading an effort to ratify the CTBT. To settle the question of evasion of low-yield tests or hydronuclear experiments, the president and his counterparts in Beijing and Moscow would need to show the political will to agree on a verifiable low-yield limit. That will almost surely require onsite inspections, which were demonstrated to be possible in 1988.
The bottom line is that even though the United States could derive important benefits from resumed nuclear testing, it would lose more than it stands to gain.”
Trump eviscerates the National Environmental Policy Act: Shortly after taking office Trump eliminated Council on Environmental Quality NEPA implementation regulations and ordered Departments to “reform” their implementation regulations. One tangible result is that DOE has now come out with a notice that it will issue a Sandia National Laboratories Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement without a draft and related public comment period and hearing. It will simply go directly to a final Sandia SWEIS and issue a formal Record of Decision at the same time (which is doubly bizarre given that “scoping” was a decade ago). DOE also noticed the same thing for a plutonium facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
Surplus plutonium: The Trump Administration has a crazy idea to give surplus weapons-grade plutonium to commercial entities for use in nuclear energy reactors. In keeping with the tenor of the Trump Administration where everything is transactional, the DOE Secretary could personally benefit from it, the proliferation risks be damned.
Some 3 years ago DOE had a Surplus Plutonium Disposition PEIS and Record of Decision approving shipping pits from Pantex to LANL, PF-4 reducing the pits to plutonium oxide, shipping that to the Savannah River Site for dilution with a classified material called stardust, and then shipping it all back across the country to WIPP. There is no indication of any further NEPA work.
Nuclear safety is being eroded: The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is still without a quorum as the Trump Administration has failed to make any nominations. Without a quorum the Safety Board cannot issue any formal recommendations that DOE is required to respond to (but sadly not required to abide by). The good news is that the Safety Board is not otherwise visibly impaired. There are still site reps and weekly reports.
DOE wants to delete “As Low As Reasonably Achievable” (ALARA) regulations. ALARA means keeping public and occupational radiation doses as low as possible. Attacking ALARA in effect also attacks the Linear No-Threshold Principle that maintains that there is no “safe” dose of radiation, no matter how small. This is principally designed to boost the nuclear energy industry but the memo is also under the auspices of the NNSA Administrator, hence it would apply to all of DOE. See Nuclear Watch’s press release on the subject.
Accelerating Arms Race
| Most Democrats and one-third of Republicans think it’s likely the U.S. will get into a nuclear war in the next decade |
| A new YouGov poll on nuclear weapons finds that nearly half of Americans believe it’s likely the U.S. will get into a nuclear war in the coming decade, and most are worried about personally experiencing a nuclear war. A majority believe nuclear weapons are making the world less safe, but opinions are mixed on whether the U.S. should dismantle all of its nuclear weapons. |
https://www.newsweek.com/china-reveals-nuclear-force-upgrades-deter-adversaries-11121483 China Reveals Nuclear Force Upgrades To Deter Adversaries, Nov 27, 2025
China has revealed how it is improving its nuclear forces to ensure the reliability and effectiveness in deterring adversaries, as major nuclear powers—including the United States and Russia—race to modernize their arsenals and field new weapons.
The disclosure was made on Thursday in a Chinese white paper released by the State Council, which addresses the East Asian power’s policy on arms control, disarmament and nonproliferation, including nuclear weapons testing and missile defense systems.
“Nuclear disarmament should be a just and reasonable process of gradual reduction toward a downward balance that maintains global strategic stability and undiminished security for all, and should be proceeded in a step-by-step manner,” the document said.
