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US President Donald Trump said he would like to see Washington, Beijing, and Moscow discuss reducing their nuclear arsenals.
“Tremendous amounts of money are being spent on nuclear, and the destructive capability is something that we don’t even want to talk about,” Trump told World Economic Forum attendees in Davos during a video address, while also stressing the war in Ukraine needed to end soon.
The president said he had pushed for nuclear arms cuts in his first term. “So we want to see if we can denuclearize, and I think that’s very possible. And I can tell you that President Putin wanted to do it. He and I wanted to do it. We had a good conversation with China, they would have been involved, and that would have been an unbelievable thing for the planet.”
The US is in the middle of a once-in-a-generation nuclear modernization effort that is expected to cost at least $1.5 trillion, but many conservative foreign policy experts have argued that a larger build-up is necessary due to China’s nuclear build-up.
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Trump also said he wants to meet with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin “soon” over ending the war in Ukraine. Trump added that he told Xi Jinping he hoped China would work with the US to end the conflict.
When asked about whether a settlement could be achieved in the next year, Trump replied, “You’re going to have to ask Russia. Ukraine is ready to make a deal.”
Putin is reportedly concerned about the state of the Russian economy, sources told Reuters, as sanctions, labor shortages, and record military spending have all added to the strain. Russia’s elite are also increasingly open to the idea that rising inflation and high borrowing costs means a settlement to the war would be in their interest.
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- President Donald Trump has the chance to reduce nuclear risks in Europe and the Middle East, and end a three-way arms race between the US, Russia, and China, Princeton astrophysics professor Robert J. Goldston argued.