Khaberni - U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Sunday that the nuclear weapons tests ordered by President Donald Trump will not include nuclear explosions at the current time.
Wright added during an interview with Fox News: "I think the tests we are talking about now are system tests... These aren’t nuclear explosions. These are what we call subcritical explosions."
Wright, whose department is responsible for testing American nuclear weapons, said that the tests involve all other parts of the nuclear weapon to ensure they work and are capable of causing a nuclear explosion.
Wright mentioned to Fox News that the tests would be conducted on new systems to help ensure that the new nuclear weapons are better than the previous ones.
Prior to his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea on Thursday, Trump said he had ordered the U.S. military to immediately resume the nuclear weapons testing process after a 33-year hiatus, in a move that seemed like a message to the nuclear powers China and Russia.
He reaffirmed these statements on Friday, but did not directly answer when asked whether this would include the underground nuclear tests that were common during the Cold War.
Wright said the United States conducted experimental nuclear explosions in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, and collected detailed information and measurements about the explosions.
He added: "Thanks to our scientific and computing capabilities, we can now simulate exactly what will happen in a nuclear explosion with incredible accuracy."
He continued: "We are now simulating the conditions that led to that, and what would result from changing the designs of the bombs."
