Analysts Doubt Trump’s Claims of Super-Weapons Better Than Nukes

Trump says US has powers 'never used before'

Twice in the past few weeks when discussing Afghanistan, President Trump has talked up the ability of the US to inflict massive damage with some non-nuclear weaponry. In August, he claimed this could kill 10 million Afghans in a week. And this week, he again talked of the US having a power that it has “never used before” and which no one has ever seen anything like.

When Trump has talked about wiping parts of the world off the map or doing huge destruction, it had historically been understood as nuclear threats. Recently, however, Trump has emphasized that he’s “not even talking about nuclear power.”

One expert, former Obama aide Jon Wolfsthal, suggested the possibility that Trump is just wrong, maintaining that “nuclear weapons remain the most powerful weapons in the US military arsenal,” and Trump’s promise to use something better “is not based on any facts or real world assessment.”

It’s not clear what Trump’s super weapons might even conceivably be, or what he might be mistaking the US as having. There has certainly never been a military report pointing to such arms, nor any sign the US ever tested anything of the sort.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.