Nuclear is the new “n-word,” according to Donald Trump.
The president, sharp as ever, rambled at an assembly of America’s top commanders Tuesday morning about nixing “woke” ideology from the armed services and bringing “battleships” back.
He also discussed the threat of nuclear war, telling America’s military leadership that the country’s nuclear capabilities were still far ahead of its enemies’. Trump’s rant on nuclear warfare, however, came packaged with an odd detail: that the term nuclear was, to Trump, akin to the “n-word”
“You don’t have to be that good with nuclear. You could have one-twentieth what you have now and still do the damage that would be, you know, that’d be so horrendous,” he told the crowd.
Trump used the hate-speech abbreviation to emphasize how dangerous it is to “throw around” the term nuclear, but the comparison didn’t land.
“I call it the n-word,” Trump said. “There are two n-words, and you can’t use either of them.”
Trump: It was really a stupid person that works for him mentioned the word nuclear. I call it is N word. There were two N words and you can’t use either of them. pic.twitter.com/sSn5doBn8v
— Acyn (@Acyn) September 30, 2025
He then attempted to assuage concern of potential fallout by recounting how he recently directed a nuclear submarine to counter Russian threats.
“We were a little bit threatened by Russia recently, and I sent a submarine, nuclear submarine, the most lethal weapon ever made,” Trump said. “Number one, you can’t detect it. There’s no way. We’re 25 years ahead of Russia and China in submarines.”
Trump further claimed that America’s arsenal was vast enough to make it the last man standing in any type of nuclear conflict. Exactly how America’s citizens would fare during such an event, however, was unclear.
“Frankly, if it does get to use, we have more than anybody else,” Trump said. “We have better, we have newer, but it’s something we don’t ever want to even have to think about.”
Nuclear war was at the epicenter of public concern during America’s Cold War face-off with the USSR. Around the height of the conflict in 1983, ABC aired a made-for-TV movie titled The Day After that intended to publicize the potential horrors of nuclear fallout. The fictitious film focused on the Kansas City area, showcasing the body horror and devastation wreaked by nuclear bombs.
At the time, it was the most viewed television film in history, reaching nearly 39 million households. Its impact on the country—and U.S. foreign policy—was seismic. President Ronald Reagan viewed the film at Camp David, later writing in his journal that it left him “deeply depressed” and keen to reshape American nuclear policy.
Four years later, the film was also broadcast on Soviet state television, influencing Soviet mindsets while Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev negotiated the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.
It has been speculated that Trump—a man of television himself—was also deeply influenced by the film. In a June interview with Engelsberg Ideas, former presidential adviser Fiona Hill (who served as a witness during Trump’s first impeachment inquiry) posited that the film could have played a significant role in the MAGA leader’s perception of nuclear armageddon, and how that fear could funnel into a nuclear arms race.
“Trump is very much a man who visualises things and sees everything in a television context,” Hill said. “I’m sure that he would have seen The Day After. I’m sure that such depictions and images, and others like them, left an impression on Trump. These depictions were the result of the War Scare and the standoff between the Soviet Union and the United States over the placement of SS-20 and Pershing missiles in Europe.
“When all is considered, you get the feeling that this moment, in 1983 to 1984, is a turning point for Trump,” she continued. Trump, according to Hill, made his first visit to the USSR the same year that Reagan signed the nuclear treaty, all in an effort to “try to put himself into that kind of position where he becomes the guy who can negotiate the end of nuclear weapons.”
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