--- title: What Donald Trump Would Have to Do to Launch Nuclear Weapons description: While there may not be a physical button, Trump does ultimately have sole authority to authorize the use of these weapons. canonical: https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/ author: Alana Abramson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-01-03T18:35:23.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-12T08:44:09.001Z article:section: Politics og:title: Here's Exactly What Donald Trump Would Have to Do to Launch Nuclear Weapons og:description: There's not an actual "nuclear button." og:url: https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb91eed4f7db1abbf/6988f707bc6cfc3d013e48ba/trump-nuclear-weapons-facebook.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2405 og:image:height: 1353 og:image:alt: US-POLITICS-TRUMP-TAX og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Here's Exactly What Donald Trump Would Have to Do to Launch Nuclear Weapons twitter:description: There's not an actual "nuclear button." twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb91eed4f7db1abbf/6988f707bc6cfc3d013e48ba/trump-nuclear-weapons-facebook.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Here's Exactly What Donald Trump Would Have to Do to Launch Nuclear Weapons > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=06d59e08-c4fc-4d87-beb6-3ca2bb0c6d8e&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Here’s What Donald Trump Has Said About Nuclear Weapons [Watch (HLS stream): Here’s What Donald Trump Has Said About Nuclear Weapons](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/ryN0TFt3.m3u8) (1:13)  _Published 2016-08-03. Donald Trump’s campaign on Wednesday denied a report that said the Republican presidential nominee had repeatedly asked an international foreign policy expert why the U.S. couldn’t use nuclear weapons._  by [Alana Abramson](https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/)  ## Alana Abramson Jan 3, 2018 6:35 PM UTC Donald Trump’s campaign on Wednesday denied a report that said the Republican presidential nominee had repeatedly asked an international foreign policy expert why the U.S. couldn’t use nuclear weapons.  by [Alana Abramson](https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/)  ## Alana Abramson Jan 3, 2018 6:35 PM UTC President Trump raised concerns when he [argued](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/948355557022420992) on Twitter that he has a “bigger and more powerful” nuclear button than North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. In reality, there’s no button. Instead, it’s a protocol designed to allow the President to quickly launch a nuclear strike. The president still has the sole authority to launch a nuclear attack, though the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing in November to assess possible changes to that process, and there is an ongoing debate about ways to reform the process. “I assume the president knows there is no button and he was speaking euphemistically and to let it be known that he has the sole ability to order the use of a far larger number of nuclear weapons than Kim Jong Un,”said Kingston Reif, the Director for Disarmament and Threat Reduction Policy at the Arms Control Association. Here’s how the president would actually launch a nuclear weapon. ### Trump decides to order an attack or a counter-attack Should a nuclear attack on the United States be imminent, Trump would receive information from the nuclear command and control system about it, and the President would typically confer with his military advisers before making a decision on how to respond. It’s also possible that the president could decide to preemptively launch a nuclear strike. As [a congressional primer](https://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/IF10521.pdf) on the procedure notes, the United States has no rules against a preemptive strike, but some in Congress have argued that, in that case, the president should not have the sole power to to do this and should require additional approval. Either way, however, the next step is for Trump to identify himself to the command center who can actually implement the strike. ### Trump identifies himself to the Pentagon As President, Trump carries an ID card known as the “biscuit” that enables him to identify himself to officials at the Pentagon with unique codes letting them know he is authorizing a nuclear strike. He would also need to specify the type of attack he wanted to carry out; the different options are delineated in the nuclear football. The U.S. has 800 warheads that are available for use within minutes of ordering a nuclear launch, says Reif; Approximately 400 warheads that are land based intercontinental ballistic missiles and roughly the same amount of submarine launched ballistic missiles. (As a side note, a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff [claimed](http://theweek.com/articles/489930/did-bill-clinton-lose-americas-nuclear-launch-codes) in a 2010 memoir that an aide to President Clinton lost the biscuit and hid the mistake for months.) ### Strategic Command launches the missiles Once Trump has successfully conveyed his orders, Strategic Command, which has operational control over U.S. nuclear forces, would implement them. Reif says that the process of launching the warheads should take a little over 15 minutes—less if you don’t use submarine launched ballistic missiles—a system that was designed during the Cold War, when it was believed that the Russians had warheads that could reach the United States in under 30 minutes. If only “Deterring such a threat and responding to such an attack was thought to require the capabilities to rapidly launch us weapons before Soviet warheads could detonate on U.S. soil and that would have left very little time for the president to consult with his advisers. Hence the consolidating authority in the hands of the President alone,” Reif explained. ## Transcript [00:00] Nuclear, nuclear, nuclear, nuclear, nuclear weapons, [00:02] nuclear weapons, nuclear weapon, nuclear weapon, [00:04] nuclear weapon, nuclear weapon. The biggest [00:08] problem we have today is nuclear, nuclear [00:11] proliferation, and having some maniac some madman [00:15] go out And get a nuclear weapon. I hate proliferation. [00:19] I hate nuclear more than anything. My uncle was a [00:21] professor at MIT. He used to tell me about nuclear. [00:24] That's contradictory. No. No. At some point we have to [00:27] say you know what. We're better off if Japan protects [00:31] itself against this maniac in North Korea. Can you tell [00:34] the middle east we're not using a nuclear weapon on [00:35] anybody? I would never say that. I would never take [00:37] any of my cards off the table. How about Europe? We [00:39] won't use it in Europe. I'm not going to take it off the [00:41] table for anybody. You might use it in Europe? No. I [00:43] don't think so, but I'm not taking it. Why not just say it? [00:45] I'm using a nuclear weapon in Europe. I am not I am [00:47] not taking cards of the table. They always say Trump [00:50] wants Japan to go nuclear, I don't. I really don't. But [00:54] listen, when you have North Korea and you have Japan, [00:58] and they're very close to each other, and frankly, we're [01:02] sort of semi involved we don't wanna be involved At [01:05] some point it could happen anyway. They said I want [01:08] Japan to nuke. I want Japan to get nuclear weapons, [01:12] give me a break. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/"},"headline":"Here's Exactly What Donald Trump Would Have to Do to Launch Nuclear Weapons","datePublished":"2018-01-03T18:35:23.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-12T08:44:09.001Z","description":"To clairfy: there's not a real button","url":"https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/","keywords":["White House","Nuclear Weapons","Donald Trump","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb91eed4f7db1abbf/6988f707bc6cfc3d013e48ba/trump-nuclear-weapons-facebook.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alana Abramson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alana-abramson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb91eed4f7db1abbf/6988f707bc6cfc3d013e48ba/trump-nuclear-weapons-facebook.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"US-POLITICS-TRUMP-TAX","caption":"US-POLITICS-TRUMP-TAX","creditText":"Brendan Smialowski—AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/","name":"Here's Exactly What Donald Trump Would Have to Do to Launch Nuclear Weapons"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Here’s What Donald Trump Has Said About Nuclear Weapons","description":"Donald Trump’s campaign on Wednesday denied a report that said the Republican presidential nominee had repeatedly asked an international foreign policy expert why the U.S. couldn’t use nuclear weapons.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/ryN0TFt3/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-08-03T17:56:04.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/ryN0TFt3.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/","duration":"PT1M13S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/5085723/nuke-button-donald-trump-nuclear-weapons-north-korea/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```