Washington: US President Donald Trump has said he wants the United States to expand its nuclear arsenal. In an interview with Reuters, he said it would be wonderful if no nation had nuclear arms, but otherwise the US must be top of the pack.

His latest comments on nuclear weapons echo a tweet he sent a few weeks after his election win, in which he pledged to increase the country’s capability. The new strategic arms limitation treaty (New START) between the US and Russia, requires both the countries to reduce the number of strategic nuclear warheads deployed by each side to no more than 1,550 by 2018. According to the US nonpartisan Arms Control Association, the US has 6,800 nuclear weapons and Russia has 7,000.