The American Department of Defense is drafting a new nuclear strategy that is considering the use of shorter-range tactical nuclear weapons in case of a war with China or Russia, reported the NBC on August 5. NBC News reported on Aug. 5. Chinese state media Global Times warned that the policy under discussion appeared to overlook the risk of retaliation, while a Russian official said it could further heighten tensions.
Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby is working on a policy that would expand U.S. options beyond long-range strategic weapons and allow for greater consideration of shorter-range tactical nuclear weapons during a regional conflict with Russia or China.
While the U.S. developed and fielded a variety of tactical nuclear weapons during the Cold War to be deployed on difefrent platforms, the only tactical warheads in the current U.S. arsenal are the B61 gravity bombs. This type of weapon, originally developed in the 1960s, is to be delivered by fighter aircraft such as the F-35, F-15, and F-16, rather than dedicated bombers.
Tactical nuclear weapons are those designed to be used on the battlefield or against active military targets, as opposed to strategic targets like industrial centers, logistics hubs, or cities.
The potential shift reflects longstanding concerns that Russia and China have been developing and expanding their tactical nuclear capabilities while U.S. policy has relied more heavily on strategic nuclear weapons, Breaking Defense reported. The publication noted that tactical weapons could give adversaries a way to create a situation in which a U.S. president faces a difficult choice between accepting limited losses and responding with potentially devastating force.
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Quoting five sources familiar with the new plan, NBC News reported that Colby is expected to very soon brief the military top leaders at the US Strategic Command in Nebraska on the new roadmap.
Colby also delivered a keynote address titled “The Shaping and Formation of the NDS [National Defense Strategy]” on Aug. 5 at the 2026 United States Strategic Command Deterrence Symposium in Omaha, Nebraska. According to Breaking Defense, he announced the start of the policy review at the event.
At the Nebraska symposium, Colby said Washington needs more “rational nuclear options” for responding to potential regional conflicts.
“What I would fear more” than a “mass attack” on the U.S., he said, “is a regional war … a kind of local war, a conventional war that might have local employment, God forbid, of [nuclear] weapons that could escalate from there,” he said during his talk.
Adm. Richard Correll, head of U.S. Strategic Command, spoke with reporters about the policy review after Colby left the stage, according to Breaking Defense. Correll declined to comment on internal discussions but said the Trump administration had not changed its “declaratory policy when it comes to nuclear and strategic capabilities.”
At the same time, Correll said the Pentagon intended to expand the options available to the president and increase the “decision space for any conceivable escalation scenario.”
The New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), the main U.S.-Russia agreement limiting their strategic nuclear arsenals, lapsed in February this year. The treaty was signed by U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Prague in 2010 and entered into force in February 2011. It placed limits on and established verification measures for U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear arsenals capable of striking each other’s territory.
NBC News quoted a Defense Department source who argued that the expiration of New START made a new approach necessary.
“If you actually want extended deterrence to be credible, you have to provide the nation’s political leadership with nuclear capabilities that common sense indicates you could actually use,” the defense source told the outlet.
“Otherwise you’re reducing our leadership’s options to extreme choices that the adversary won’t find credible.”
Global Times: New US nuclear policy could lead to ‘retaliation’
Chinese state media Global Times said the policy review could be used by the Trump administration to “justify” the development of “tactical nuclear weapons” while portraying external threats as a reason for expanding the U.S. nuclear arsenal.
Global Times quoted Zhang Junshe, a Chinese military affairs expert, in an interview published Aug. 6. Zhang said the underlying purpose of the policy review was “to impose strategic deterrence against China, Russia and other nations, constituting blatant nuclear blackmail.”
Zhang criticized Colby’s proposal and described as highly dangerously the “normalizing” of nuclear weapons as battle-ready weapons.
“Technically, the US has the capability to develop tactical nuclear weapons across air, land and sea platforms, and could even equip land-based hypersonic cruise missiles with nuclear warheads,” Zhang said. He added that nuclear deterrence relies on very high threshold for use and cited fears of the massive destructive aftermath.
“By deliberately lowering the nuclear threshold, the US will only undermine global nuclear stability and fuel a new arms race,” Zhang claimed.
China has been rapidly expanding its nuclear arsenal in recent years, with U.S. intelligence authorities estimating that the country will have over 1,000 warheads of all types by 2030. Beijing’s stockpile is dwarfed by that of the American and Russian arsenals, with each possessing over 5,000 nuclear warheads, according to the Federation of American Scientists.
Moscow has also raised concerns about the U.S. nuclear policy review. Dmitriy Trenin, president of the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC), warned that Washington could further escalate tensions with its adversaries if it adopts Colby’s proposed framework and ultimately positions U.S. tactical nuclear weapons in Europe and Asia, Russian newspaper Kommersant reported on Aug. 5.
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