P resident Donald Trump’s order to the Pentagon to resume nuclear testing following a hiatus of over 30 years should not come as a surprise. Even before the latest announcement, the United States was already in the midst of modernising its nuclear forces, going back at least to the Obama administration. This shift in policy on nuclear testing is as much a product of the changes in the global nuclear landscape as it is about the quality, safety, reliability, and performance of the American atomic arsenal.

Globally, there are existing or designated nuclear weapons states (NWS), which are either refining their existing weapon designs or developing new ones. There are also four outlier non-nuclear weapons states (NNWS), which are not members of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) but possess

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