It has test-fired missiles from there before, and its three nuclear weapons tests were carried out in the east.
The Mumbai killings fueled renewed tensions between South Asia's long-time rivals, who have fought three wars since independence and conducted tit-for-tat nuclear weapons tests in 1998.
More than 1, 000 ex-servicemen say their lives were destroyed after the UK carried out a series of nuclear weapons tests in mainland Australia, the Montebello islands off the west Australian coast and on Christmas Island, in the Pacific, between 1952 and 1958.
Pyongyang formally withdrew from the negotiations in late 2009 and has conducted two nuclear-weapons tests since then.
While the treaty has not entered into force, the world still uses the treaty's monitoring system (the CTBT Organizations International Monitoring System) to detect nuclear-weapons tests.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Why we need to test nuclear weapons
North Korea's recent nuclear-weapons tests, missile launches and threats are fueling nationalistic calls in Seoul and Tokyo for those countries to respond and significantly enhance their own defenses.
Although Pakistan must take the blame for the latest round of violence in Kashmir, India's decision last year to conduct nuclear-weapons tests set the stage for a clash.
Since we are unable to build new weapons or conduct nuclear tests on old weapons, our most significant challenge may be keeping our existing deterrent credible.
On their own, Pyongyang's military threats and tests of nuclear weapons aren't worrying bond investors much.
In a prime example of Orwellian doublespeak, this program is called "science- based stockpile stewardship" even though it is less scientific since it precludes the most prolific source of empirical data on nuclear weapons, namely, nuclear tests.
The ongoing conflict in Kashmir - a simple question of sovereignty that has spawned two wars between Pakistan and India since 1947 - took on added significance earlier this year when both nations conducted underground tests of nuclear weapons.
He suggests a recommitment by the nuclear powers not to test their weapons--there have been no nuclear tests since 1996--in exchange for a commitment by all nations to stop enriching uranium.
Underscoring the concerns are calls by hawkish South Korean and Japanese politicians to consider whether their governments should pursue nuclear weapons after North Korea began a series of atomic-weapons tests in 2006.
This unverifiable treaty would have made it impossible for the United States to perform the sorts of underground nuclear tests that assure its weapons work when they are supposed to, and don't when they are not.
The 1998 tests have since given nuclear weapons an extended half-life.
Repeated U.S. government analyses have established that as long as the United States relies upon nuclear weapons for its security, it is going to have to conduct periodic tests to ensure that such weapons are reliable, effective and safe.
The theory is that by so doing, other nations will be deterred from conducting nuclear tests or otherwise embarking upon nuclear weapons programs.
We have allowed a steady decline in investment in the science-based Stockpile Stewardship Program that promised to assure the safety, effectiveness and reliability of our nuclear weapons in the absence of below-ground tests.
But there are two serious questions that worry genuine doubters: can America's nuclear weapons be kept safe and effective without explosive tests, and can the promise of a comprehensive test ban be comprehensively verified?
Notably, Under Secretary of State Nick Burns has pursued in recent months diplomatic initiatives on such sensitive matters as North Korea's missile tests and Iran's nuclear weapons ambitions that have mutated the President's policies beyond recognition - and played into the hands of critics who accuse the Bush national security team of lacking coherence and competence.
On top of this they have developed nuclear weapons and in 1995-96 they conducted more tests when there was no need to.
These steps include the completion of a new strategic weapons treaty with Russia, a rebalancing of US nuclear policy towards a reduction in the potential use of nuclear weapons and their development, and a commitment to ask the US Senate to ratify the treaty banning nuclear tests.
This includes tests of high-explosive triggers useful for nuclear weapons, and the redesign of a missile nose-cone to take what looks like a nuclear warhead.
Unfortunately, we have no scientifically rigorous and certain way of ensuring the safety and viability of nuclear weapons without at least realistic, low-yield underground explosive tests.
And here lurks another danger: the further research goes into new types of nuclear weapons, the greater the pressure there will be for explosive tests to prove that they can work.
According to Brahma Chellaney, a noted expert on nuclear and security issues at the Center for Policy Research in Delhi, "threshold" is not a technical term but an expression coined by analysts to describe countries that have successfully conducted weapons tests but have not declared themselves to be nuclear states.
We can no longer safely defer the tests required to ensure that our present, aging nuclear weapons will work when they are supposed to and are as safe as we can make them so that they won't work when they are not supposed to.
Recent explosive tests of the non-nuclear triggers needed for building more nuclear weapons are thought to be part of an effort to adapt designs for missile-mountable warheads to use plutonium.
Each year, the Pentagon and the Energy Department must certify to the president that the nuclear weapons stockpile is safe and reliable and that there is no need to resume tests involving the detonation of nuclear warheads and bombs in underground caverns, as was done until 1992.
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