Nuclear Weapons Update
Business is booming
The current issue of Arms Control Today [2] informs on a number of subjects that richly deserve widespread attention. I have selected three for this article, all of which are related to topics previously written about on this Substack.
Topic: Plutonium giveaway. Plutonium (the isotope 239Pu in particular) is the fissile material of choice in nuclear weapons, from the smallest, “tactical” atomic bomb to the largest yield thermonuclear weapon. The subjects of an earlier post [3] included the US Plutonium pit inventory and then current plans for production of more pits. Since that time, two notable things have happened: Congress in its infinitesimal wisdom has more than doubled the target production rate for the new pit factories, and, following up on Executive Order 14302 to promote nuclear power, the Department of Energy (DoE) has undertaken a program to give away 19.7 metric tons of Plutonium, including 7.1 metric tons of weapons grade material [4]. Of this, one metric ton is in metal form, which is immediately weaponizable, and the rest is in the form of oxides, which require chemical reduction to produce the metallic form. If you are wondering what that means, the critical mass of Pu is 10 kilograms, but that does not translate into needing at least 10 kg of Pu to build a bomb. The bomb used on Nagasaki, for instance, contained but 6.2 kg of Pu [5]. So it would be safe to say that the DoE is giving away enough weapons grade metallic Plutonium to make at least 160 nuclear weapons. Incidentally, there is essentially no connection between pit size and weapon yield. A pit comprised of 6 kg Pu would be fully capable of initiating a multi-hundred kiloton yield thermonuclear explosion.
There has been no public discussion as to the wisdom of giving away bomb grade Plutonium to private entities.
Additional troubling aspects of the Plutonium giveaway are its tasking of the recipients to develop their own processing facilities, including purification, and tasking them to deal with radioactive waste material. [6] The first of these is an inherent proliferation and diversion risk, allowing not only the purification to weapons grade but additionally the reduction to metallic form. Thus the 6.1 metric tons of high purity oxides will be convertible to metallic form by private entities; the material for ca 1,000 more bombs. As to the handling of radioactive waste, the DoE is handing over to the private sector a problem it has itself been unable to fully solve in decades. The legacy of Rocky Flats, where it was necessary to have armed FBI agents accompany officials charged with shutting down and cleaning up the Plutonium processing plant, lives on. In a sane world, Congress would take advantage of Lindsey Graham’s death to force a cleanup at the Savannah River site and to scale back its planned expansion. There is no reason to expect an improvement in the situation with private entities, focused on trying to keep their lofty promises of profitability and cheap power, in charge.
Topic: Two new “tactical” nuclear weapons. There is an ongoing charade involving Congress and the services over so-called “theater” or “tactical” nuclear weapons, in which every year since Trump’s first presidency, the services submit a budget request that does not include development or procurement of such weapons, and every year Congress adds money for that purpose. Until this year, the scope was limited to a submarine launched cruise missile with a nuclear warhead, abbreviated SLCM-N. Now, however, two new weapons have been added to the mix: An air-launched, nuclear-armed cruise missile for the F35, and a land-launched missile. It would not be cynical to hypothesize that the rationale for these two new weapons is that if the Navy has one, the Army and Air Force must each have one too.
Part of the problem with the new proposal is its opacity. Ordinarily the Administration is required to perform Nuclear Posture Reviews and report to Congress if a review calls for any changes. Since the Trump administration has decided not to conduct such a review, Congress has essentially decided to obey in advance by pre-authorizing the new systems.
In [7] I outlined arguments against tactical nuclear weapons, and illustrated some of the problems resulting from their use via a concrete example, the explosion of a tactical-sized atom bomb in the US.
Topic: No First Use update. No First Use refers to a vow not be the first to employ nuclear weapons in a conflict. In my previous post [8] reference was made to a proposal had been proffered for a No First Use treaty signed by the major nuclear powers (meaning the US, PRC and Russia), and that would be a useful first step in undertaking negotiations toward the goal of eventual nuclear disarmament. The proposal was made by China, the only nuclear-armed state that has disavowed First Use. Now an article in [2] by Tianjiao Jiang provides a Chinese view on the roadblocks to Sino-US nuclear arms negotiations. China’s position is that they should not enter into negotiations to reduce their nuclear arsenal so long as the US and Russia each have several times as many nuclear weapons as China. (The limits on deployed warheads under the now-defunct New START treaty were about 1770 each for Russia and the US; China is estimated to have 600 warheads.) If the Chinese are to be taken seriously, the best way to slow the rapid buildup of their nuclear arsenal would be for the US and Russia to negotiate substantial and verifiable reductions to their nuclear weapons counts. The Chinese are also reported to believe that the US refusal to even discuss No First Use is a signal that the US intends to launch a first strike against China using nuclear weapons. Frankly it is easy to see their point: The US (and Russia) are both engaged in nuclear modernization programs, and by all signals the US intends to increase the size of our nuclear arsenal. We refused to entertain Russia’s offer to extend New START for a year while negotiating a follow on treaty, and have unambiguously stated a willingness to initiate a nuclear war. (Russia’s position on No First Use is ambiguous.) It is not as though the US is playing catch up; in 2025, for example, the US spent more on nuclear weapons than the other eight nuclear-armed nations combined, and in that year our budget increase was more than China’s entire nuclear weapons budget for the previous year. There is no catching up to be done on our part, at least in the nuclear weapons arena. If we were sincere in wanting a world not threatened by nuclear annihilation, we would accept the invitation to discuss No First Use, make mutual arms reductions talks with Russia a national priority, and reign in our bloated nuclear weapons programs.
I promised to constantly remind my readership of the need for everyone who believes in freedom and democracy to behave in accordance with those beliefs, every day. To remind ourselves of what that means, see
Notes
[1] No Lilliputians were harmed in the production of this image. Also, this is a straight photograph; no so-called “AI” was employed in its production.
[2] Arms Control Today, Volume 56 Nr. 6, July-August 2026. https://www.armscontrol.org
[3] https://stephenschiff.substack.com/p/plutonium-its-the-pits In addition there are posts discussing small modular reactors, including designs that use Plutonium as fuel. The most recent is https://stephenschiff.substack.com/p/small-modular-reactor-update
[4] DoE Office of Nuclear Energy (2025), Surplus Plutonium Utilization program, RFA Nr. DE-FOA-0003594, p. 6. This and the DoE document listed below can be accessed via https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/department-energy-seeks-transform-surplus-plutonium-nuclear-fuel
[5] https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/harold-agnew-carrying-plutonium-core-nagasaki-fat-man-bomb-1945/
[6] DoE, Surplus Plutonium Q&A November 17, 2025, Q.14, 16, 29, 33-35
[7] https://stephenschiff.substack.com/p/tactical-schmach-tical-a-nuke-is