Advertisement
US-China relations
ChinaMilitary

US Senate warns of China’s nuclear capabilities hours before Xi-Trump summit

Beijing engaged in ‘unprecedented nuclear expansion’ in recent years that includes ‘hundreds of new missile silos’, senator tells hearing

3-MIN READ3-MIN
9
Listen
DF-5C nuclear missiles are displayed during a military parade in Beijing in September 2025. Photo: Reuters
Yuanyue Dangin Washington
A US Senate hearing on nuclear capabilities issued a warning about China on Wednesday, hours before US President Donald Trump was due to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Senator Roger Wicker, the Mississippi Republican who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in his opening statement that China has been engaged in an “unprecedented nuclear expansion” in recent years.

China, Wicker said, had “rapidly constructed hundreds of new missile silos, expanded mobile missile and ballistic missile submarine forces and invested in long-range bombers”, and called this “a strategy designed to surpass the United States in the coming decade”.

02:37
Trump orders US military to resume nuclear weapons tests for first time in 33 years

Wednesday’s hearing was held to receive testimony on the Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)’s atomic energy defence activities in review of the Defence Authorisation Request for the financial year 2027 and the Future Years Nuclear Security Programme.

Advertisement
The record-breaking US$1.5 trillion defence budget request submitted by the White House last month included funding to modernise the American nuclear arsenal.
“Today, President Trump will meet with President Xi in the next few hours. I suspect the question of whether to resume nuclear testing may arise,” Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, said.
Advertisement
Trump will hold two rounds of talks with Xi on Thursday and Friday. His delegation includes US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, who becomes the first Pentagon chief in decades to join the delegation of a sitting US president’s state visit to China.
Washington has been pressing Beijing to join the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New Start), the last remaining binding nuclear arms-control accord in force, which expired in February.
Advertisement
Select Voice
Select Speed
1.00x