Nuclear Disarmament Monitor
December 11, 2025
In a new white paper on arms control, disarmament, and nonproliferation released Nov. 27, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs reaffirmed its long-standing policy of no-first-use of nuclear weapons and a nuclear strategy of self-defense, while providing an only limited glimpse into the nuclear power’s rationale for an ongoing large-scale strategic build-up. The document, which has been anticipated by Chinese experts for more than a year, is the most definitive statement of Chinese policy on nuclear weapons in some 20 years. In the intervening decades, occasional Chinese white papers on national defense have touched on nuclear issues in varying depth.
The new white paper, issued by China’s State Council Information Office, is the first comprehensive statement of Chinese nuclear policies since the public revelation in 2021 of a fast-expanding Chinese nuclear force that now stands at around 600 operational warheads according to the Pentagon – although not all have been deployed. U.S. intelligence predicts that the government of Chinese President Xi Jinping will continue increasing this force through at least 2030, at which point China will deploy roughly 1,000 operational warheads, “most” of which will be able to reach the United States.
China’s white paper provides little detail to answer questions about the motivations behind its nuclear build-up, but it does assert that the country has “promoted the modernization of its nuclear forces to safeguard China’s own strategic security and overall global strategic stability.” But the extensive criticism of U.S. policies in the white paper makes clear what China wishes to identify as the source of threats to its “strategic security.”
The document blames Washington not only for seeking “absolute strategic superiority,” but also “adjusting its nuclear policies, stubbornly maintaining a massive nuclear weapons stockpile while further reinforcing its nuclear deterrence and war-fighting capabilities.” It also accuses the United States of “blurring the line between missile defense and strategic offense on purpose.”
Additionally, the white paper highlights U.S. plans to promote “the forward deployment of intermediate-range missile systems in the Asia-Pacific region and Europe,” which have been justified in Washington in large part as a response to a perceived inferiority to Beijing in conventional long-range strike capabilities.
One area in which the white paper directly addresses a development already noticed by foreign intelligence is the potential deployment of a more responsive nuclear force. The document says that, in pursuit of a “lean and effective” deterrent, China is improving “strategic early warning, command and control, missile penetration, and rapid response, as well as its survivability.” This speaks to but falls short of confirming the claim made by U.S. intelligence that China is developing all the components to enable a variant of a “launch-on-warning” posture for its siloed forces.
The paper also reiterates China’s traditional policy that a “special and primary” responsibility for nuclear disarmament rests with the countries possessing the largest nuclear arsenals, a formulation which Beijing has relied on to avoid serious arms control discussions. Instead, China supports a “just and reasonable process of gradual reduction towards a downward balance that maintains global strategic stability and undiminished security for all,” the paper says.
Once again, the paper provides China an opportunity to renew its call for a five-nuclear-power (P5) agreement on adopting no-first-use policies and object to extended deterrence umbrellas. In the document, “China doubles down on rejecting the idea that the U.S. nuclear umbrella helps restrain allied proliferation,” observed Tong Zhao, an expert in Chinese nuclear weapons at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, in a Nov. 27 social media post.
Finally, the white paper is notable for its clear support for the “purposes and objectives of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty,” coming shortly after U.S. President Donald Trump accused China, among other states, of covert nuclear testing during a Nov. 2 interview with 60 Minutes.--XIAODON LIANG, LIBBY FLATOFF, LIPI SHETTY, and NAOMI SATOH
Uncertainty Lingers as White House Mulls Testing Options
The U.S. commitment to the global norm against nuclear testing hangs in the balance following reports that President Donald Trump received briefings from top officials on potential options for implementing his Oct. 30 announcement that the United States would resume testing of nuclear weapons “on an equal basis” with other nuclear-weapons states. Neither Secretary of Energy Chris Wright nor administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Brandon Williams believe that a resumption of U.S. tests would be feasible, CNN reported Nov. 14, citing anonymous sources with knowledge of a briefing by the two to White House officials.
Since mid-November, however, there has been no clarification of a formal shift in U.S. policy on nuclear testing. A long-awaited National Defense Strategy has not yet been released, and the NNSA has not published its annual report on the weapons stockpile.
Speaking on Dec. 7 at a defense policy conference, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth repeated Trump’s statement that the United States would “test nuclear weapons and nuclear delivery systems on an equal basis as others,” but he failed to provide any further detail on what that statement might entail.
In Congress, Democratic legislators have introduced bills to block a resumption of U.S. testing in both houses. The national defense authorization act, a compromise version of which was released Dec. 7, neither blocks nor authorizes funds for nuclear testing.
The early reaction to Trump’s Oct. 30 nuclear testing threat was overwhelmingly negative. On Oct. 31, the United States was the sole country to vote “no” on a previously non-controversial UN First Committee resolution – offered annually – supporting the global moratorium on testing and the test ban treaty.
The reaction in foreign capitals accused by Trump of covert testing in his Nov. 2 60 Minutes interview have varied. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov repeated his country’s position that it would “respond in kind,” to any test by another nuclear power in Nov. 11 comments to Russian press agency TASS. This follows a Nov. 5 meeting of the Russian Security Council at which President Vladimir Putin instructed officials to study preparations for a resumption of testing.
In contrast, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson called on the United States to earnestly abide by its obligations under the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and its commitment to a ‘moratorium on nuclear testing.’”
Russia Still Awaiting U.S. New START Response
Russia has yet to receive an official response from the United States to its Sep. 22 proposal to informally extend the central limits of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) by one year, Sergei Shoigu, the secretary of Russia’s Security Council, said Dec. 10.
“No talks or consultations are needed for the United States to support our approach,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Nov. 11 in a briefing to Russian media. “We know what the Americans have, and the Americans know what they have. Let’s take a year to, so to speak, cool down, analyse the situation, stop measuring everything by the Ukraine yardstick, and focus on the great powers’ responsibility to maintain global security and stability,” Lavrov said.
While Russian officials continue to draw attention to the New START proposal, leaks from ongoing talks between U.S. and Russian negotiators suggest at least some elements of both governments foresee strategic arms control as a potential component of a broader Ukrainian peace framework.
A draft 28-point plan, leaked to media in mid-November, included a proposal that the United States and Russia “agree to extend the validity of treaties on the non-proliferation and control of nuclear weapons, including the START I Treaty.” START I, signed in 1991, was the first treaty that required U.S. and Soviet/Russian reductions of strategic nuclear weapons, and included a strategic launcher cap of 1,600 and a warhead cap of 6,000.
A European counter-proposal drafted by the United Kingdom, France, and Germany, largely perceived as a messaging vehicle, proposes with no further detail a “Fair Start” agreement.
New START is set to expire on February 5, 2026. Rose Gottemoeller, who served as the lead U.S. negotiator in talks with Russia that produced the treaty, argues in the December issue of Arms Control Today that, “Trump could improve Putin’s offer by proposing that both sides resume implementation measures and do so quickly.”
“This would allow each party to have up-to-date knowledge about the status of the other’s strategic nuclear forces when the treaty does go out of force in just over two months’ time. Our mutual knowledge would be “level set” after a period when Moscow and Washington had to depend only on national technical means for monitoring the other’s forces. The result is bound to be a mutual improvement,” she writes.
U.S. Nuclear-Armed Submarines Could Dock in Australia
U.S. Virginia-class attack submarines, set to regularly dock in Australia on a rotational basis as a part of the Australia, United Kingdom, United States (AUKUS) partnership, may carry nuclear weapons as a result of the re-establishment of the U.S. nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile (SLCM-N) program.
Australian defense officials admitted during a Dec. 4 parliamentary debate that the U.S. policy of neither confirming nor denying the presence of nuclear weapons aboard submarines could mean the unwitting presence of U.S. nuclear weapons at Australian docks. But the officials argue that this would not constitute a violation of Australia’s obligations under the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty (Treaty of Rarotonga), which prohibits “the stationing of nuclear explosive devices” in the states-parties’ territories.
The AUKUS partnership aims to provide Australia a conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarine capability and to enhance joint capabilities between the three partner nations. In March 2023 the partnership announced an “Optimal Pathway,” a program under which U.S. and UK submarines would rotate–as early as 2027–through Australian naval facilities as part of a Submarine Rotational Force-West. These rotations are intended to better-prepare Australia to operate the Virginia-class submarines that are set to be delivered to Australia through the AUKUS partnership in the 2030s.
HMAS Stirling, an Australian naval base, will have a presence of “one UK and up to 4 US, conventionally armed, nuclear powered submarines,” under the plan.
The news contradicts former assurances made in 2023 by the Australian government that allied rotational submarines would be conventionally armed only. At the time, the administration of former U.S. President Joe Biden had decided not to acquire the SLCM-N, but the U.S. Congress overrode that decision in its fiscal year 2024 defense bills. Under the recently released fiscal 2026 defense authorization bill, Congress proposes to authorize a “middle-tier acquisition pathway to speed up development and deployment” to move the timeline for limited deployment of the SLCM-N from 2034 to 2032.
UNGA First Committee Adopts More than 60 Resolutions
The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) convened its First Committee on Disarmament and International Security from Oct. 8 to Nov. 7.
The UNGA released Dec. 1 its summary press release on the First Committee’s 80th session, which included the adoption of 60 resolutions. Top themes included military use of artificial intelligence (AI), lethal autonomous weapons, and proliferation/conflict concerns within the Middle East.
Resolutions concerning the military use of AI and the integration of AI into nuclear command and control, despite winning overwhelming approval at the UNGA, were opposed by the United States and Russia.
ACA Senior Fellow Michael Klare observes that the U.S. “no” votes were, “consistent with President Donald Trump’s call for U.S. victory in what he has termed a ‘race’ to achieve ‘global dominance in artificial intelligence.’”
Pentagon Reviews Golden Dome Implementation, Funds Interceptors
The Department of Defense is reviewing an implementation plan for the Golden Dome missile defense architecture while issuing the first contracts for development of space-based interceptors to industry. According to Dec. 7 comments by Gen. Michael Guetlein, the Space Force officer tapped by President Donald Trump to lead the program, the Pentagon recently awarded eighteen contracts for prototype space-based interceptors. Although the department previously issued solicitations for both boost-phase and mid-course interceptor concepts, it remains unknown how many awarded contracts address each of these requirements. The Pentagon also cleared Dec. 2 more than one thousand contractors for eligibility to bid on future work related to Golden Dome that the department estimates may be worth up to $151 billion.
On Nov. 19, Russian and Chinese officials met in Moscow to discuss “missile defence and missile aspects of strategic stability,” according to a press release by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. According to the readout, the two sides discussed “joint analysis of the relevant destabilizing factors that generate strategic risks for global and regional security.” This follows a May 8 joint statement issued by the two countries that described the U.S. Golden Dome program as “deeply destabilizing.”
Defense Policy Bill Adds to Nuclear Spending
Negotiators from the two houses of Congress released Dec. 7 a compromise version of the national defense authorization bill for fiscal year 2026 which would authorize additional spending above the president’s budget request of $700 million on the Columbia-class submarine program and $1.2 billion on the Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). These add-ons would bring total authorized annual spending on the programs to $11 billion and $5.3 billion. The bill would also raise spending on missile defense and military space programs, as well as several nuclear weapons complex recapitalization projects. Congress has yet to settle on final appropriation levels for these programs, which may diverge from the amounts authorized.
The proposed final legislation, which passed the House Dec. 10 and will soon be considered by the Senate, would also impose annual reporting requirements on the Golden Dome missile defense program and sustainment of the Minuteman III ICBM. It would expand the authorities of the Nuclear Weapons Council over the National Nuclear Security Administration and establish a “Rapid Capabilities Program” for the development of new nuclear weapons within five years of project initiation.
The bill also sets a deadline of 2034 for initial operational capability of the nuclear-capable sea-launched cruise missile, while requiring a limited number of these weapons be available by 2032. These provisions, and other aspects of the bill, will be detailed in the next issue of Arms Control Today.
Russian Missile Fails Mid-Launch, Heavy ICBM Suspected
A test of a Russian intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) failed shortly after launch from the Dombarovsky missile base, near the town of Yasny, one of the few facilities in the country from which long-range missiles are tested. Images and video shared on social media sites show the missile rising 200-400 meters, then detonating midair before crashing back to the ground. The test failure occurs amid heightened Russian strategic messaging about its nuclear deterrent and long-range missile modernization efforts.
The exact missile type involved has not yet been officially confirmed by the Russian government, but independent experts believe it was a RS-28 Sarmat ICBM. This in-development heavy ICBM has had a checkered testing history, with a recent failure in September 2024 destroying a dedicated test silo at the Plesetsk missile base. As recently as Nov. 5, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the Sarmat would undergo “combat trials” before deploying on duty in 2026. The Sarmat could be armed with up to 10 multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles, according to the Federation of American Scientists.
Footage of the incident shows a visible purple toxic cloud left behind after the explosion. Defense Express, a Ukrainian media and consulting outlet, reported the purple color is characteristic of a highly toxic propellant known to be used in Soviet and Russian missile designs. The fuel consists of nitrogen tetroxide and unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine, which is known for its use as hypergolic fuel, though highly hazardous. One of the main concerns with this toxic propellant are the risks it poses to humans and the environment.
Investigation Opened after Unidentified Drones Breach French Nuclear Base
French military personnel disabled several unidentified drones that were spotted Dec. 4 overflying France’s Ile Longue naval base, which houses France’s strategic nuclear missile submarines. “The marines fired a jammer, not a firearm,” to neutralize the drones according to local public prosecutor Frederic Teillet.
The drone incursion “did not threaten sensitive infrastructure,” Capt. Guillaume Le Rasle confirmed to the French newspaper Liberation.
The incident follows numerous unidentified drone sightings over critical infrastructure around Europe. Defence Minister Catherine Vautrin opened an investigation into the incident, but Teillet stated, “No link to foreign interference has been established.” Similarly, few of the recent incidents elsewhere in NATO Europe have been confirmed as foreign or sabotage intelligence operations.
European Commission Vice President Kaja Kallas, at a Nov. 20 press conference in Brussels, discussed a new anti-drone defense system being developed by the European Union “in close coordination” with NATO. The system is expected by the end of 2027.
Disarmament Calendar
- Jan. 3: 32nd Anniversary* of the START II Treaty
- Jan. 22: 5th anniversary of the entry into force of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons
- Jan. 24: 80th anniversary of UN General Assembly Resolution 1(I), which created the UN Atomic Energy Commission (UNAEC) and charged it with making proposals for “the elimination from national armaments of atomic weapons” and the use of atomic energy “only for peaceful purposes.”
- Jan. 27: 75th anniversary of the first atmospheric nuclear test explosion at the Nevada Test Site
- Feb. 5: New START Expires
In Case You Missed It
“The CTBT, the Global Nuclear Test Moratorium, and New U.S. Threats to Break the Norm,” Daryl G. Kimball, Arms Control Association White Paper, Dec. 11.
“Nuclear Notebook: The changing nuclear landscape in Europe,” Hans M. Kristensen, Matt Korda, Eliana Johns, Mackenzie Knight-Boyle, Federation of American Scientists, Dec. 10.
“Tried and Tested: Why the CTBT Must be Preserved,” European Leadership Network, Dec. 4.
“China’s Arms Control, Disarmament, and Nonproliferation in the New Era,” The State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, Nov. 27.
“YouGov Survey: Nuclear Weapons,” Nov. 26.
“Virtual Briefing: Renewed U.S. Nuclear Explosive Testing? Moving From Confounding Nuclear Testing Threats to a Constructive Test Ban Policy,” Arms Control Association, Nov. 21.
“When it comes to nukes and AI, people are worried about the wrong thing,” Joshua Keating, Vox, Nov. 20.
“The Question of Russia's ‘Small’ Nuclear Tests,” Nicole Grajewski, Axes and Atoms, Nov. 7.
“The ‘Zapad’ exercise and how Lukashenko learned to love the Bomb,” Gabriela Rosa-Hernández, Decker Eveleth, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Nov. 6.
“Rebuttals to Common Arguments for Deploying More U.S. Strategic Warheads,” Xiaodon Liang, Arms Control Association, Oct. 29.
Andrew Facini and Lily Boland, “The Consequences of Tactical Nuclear Weapons Use: A Foresight Approach to Weapons Effects and Response Pathways,” Council on Strategic Risks, Oct. 23.
*Correction: The email version of this newsletter incorrectly stated that Jan. 3 is the 24th anniversary of the signing of START II. It is the 32nd anniversary.