WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- President-elect Donald Trump said Thursday on Twitter that the United States should greatly "expand its nuclear capability," appearing to embrace an end to decades of bipartisan presidential efforts to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in U.S. defenses and strategy.
Trump's midafternoon post may have been a response to President Vladimir Putin of Russia, who in a speech earlier Thursday called for continued improvement of his country's nuclear abilities so it can "reliably penetrate any existing and prospective missile defense systems."
Shortly after Putin's comments were reported by the news media, Trump said on Twitter that the United States must "strengthen and expand" its nuclear forces "until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes." He did not elaborate.
Asked to clarify what the president-elect meant by the need to "expand" U.S. nuclear ability, Jason Miller, the incoming White House communications director, said in a statement that Trump was referring to "the threat of nuclear proliferation and the critical need to prevent it -- particularly to and among terrorist organizations and unstable and rogue regimes."
[TRUMP: Timeline of president-elect’s career + list of appointments so far]
Miller added that the president-elect had in the past "emphasized the need to improve and modernize our deterrent capability as a vital way to pursue peace through strength."
The president-elect's transition website says he "recognizes the uniquely catastrophic threats posed by nuclear weapons and cyberattacks," adding that he will modernize the nuclear arsenal "to ensure it continues to be an effective deterrent."
Only a president can order the use of nuclear weapons, and deterrence is normally a complicated subject debated in academic treatises and negotiated over years by diplomats.
It remained unclear from his use of the word "expand" whether Trump would try to reverse agreements such as the New START treaty, which Russia and the United States signed in 2010 and commits both nations to modest reductions in strategic nuclear forces.
The United States and Russia already are racing to modernize their nuclear arsenals, replacing aging missile systems with smaller, more modern weapons that are harder to stop and more precise.
The United States also is moving ahead with a modest system of missile defenses in Europe, a program that has deeply angered the Kremlin, which rejects arguments that it is aimed solely at the threat from Iran.
Obama, Trump on nukes
In one of his first major speeches in 2009, President Barack Obama told a crowd in Prague that the United States would lead an effort to pursue rules and treaties that would result in a world without any nuclear weapons.
Obama has had some limited success in pursuing that vision during his eight years in office.
He convened a regular nuclear nonproliferation summit aimed at stopping the spread of nuclear material around the world, with special concerns about the material falling into the hands of terrorist groups. More than a dozen nations have eliminated their caches of nuclear materials, and scores more have hardened security at their storage facilities to prevent theft by potential terrorists.
But during Obama's time in office, North Korea conducted several nuclear weapons tests. The latest, in September, produced a more powerful explosion, indicating that the country was making progress in its efforts to build a functional nuclear warhead.
Despite Obama's rhetoric about pulling back from nuclear weaponry, his administration has embarked on a sweeping modernization of the U.S. nuclear arsenal that is estimated to cost up to $1 trillion over three decades. It features new factories, refurbished nuclear arms and a new generation of weapon carriers, including bombers, missiles and submarines. The new bombers are to carry a new super-stealthy cruise missile meant to slip through enemy air defenses.
During the presidential campaign, Trump said that he would not rule out the use of nuclear weapons even though he called their potential use "a horror."
In an interview, the president-elect also suggested that Japan and South Korea might have to obtain their own nuclear weapons, which would be a reversal of U.S. policy that for decades extended promises of protection to allies and foreclosed the need for them to go nuclear.
Trump repeatedly has called for closer relations with Russia and has spoken favorably about Putin. Democrats have questioned his ties to the Kremlin, particularly after U.S. intelligence officials assessed that Russia had interfered in the U.S. election on Trump's behalf.
Putin addressed his country's nuclear capabilities during an annual year-end meeting of the Russian Defense Ministry. He said Russia should enhance missile complexes that can "penetrate existing and future missile defense systems."
The United States currently has about 7,000 nuclear weapons in the stockpile, including about 1,750 strategic warheads deployed in missile silos, on bombers and in submarines around the world, according to the Federation of American Scientists. That is down from more than 30,000 warheads at the height of the Cold War. Russia has about 7,300 nuclear weapons, the federation says.
Conway aboard
Trump has spent the week at Mar-a-Lago, his south Florida resort, meeting advisers and interviewing candidates for a handful of Cabinet positions that remain unfilled.
The president-elect also was building up his White House staff, announcing Thursday that campaign manager Kellyanne Conway would serve as a counselor. The move will put Conway in close proximity to the president, though she also is expected to remain a visible presence promoting Trump's agenda in the media.
Conway, who has publicly grappled with whether to join the administration or to lead an outside political group to help Trump, will be part of the senior leadership team in the West Wing with responsibility for messaging and other priorities.
"Kellyanne Conway has been a trusted advisor and strategist who played a crucial role in my victory," Trump said in a statement. "She is a tireless and tenacious advocate of my agenda and has amazing insights on how to effectively communicate our message. I am pleased that she will be part of my senior team in the West Wing."
Conway became the first woman in history to manage a winning presidential campaign. The news release from Trump's transition team stated that, because of Conway's leadership, Trump's victory "shattered the glass ceiling for women."
Trump also announced veteran Republican operatives Sean Spicer as his press secretary and Miller as communications director. Hope Hicks, Trump's long-serving campaign spokesman, also is joining the White House in a senior communications position.
Trump also had a private exchange Thursday night with billionaire industrialist David Koch, with whom he clashed during the 2016 presidential race and whose conservative policy objectives have often diverged from Trump's agenda.
The huddle at Trump's Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Fla., was witnessed by several people and orchestrated by Trump's friend, Newsmax Media chief executive Christopher Ruddy, according to two Trump associates familiar with the conversation. They requested anonymity since they were not authorized to speak publicly.
A Trump transition spokesman was unavailable for comment.
Disclosure difficulties
Some of Trump's most prominent Cabinet nominees -- with their millions in assets and complex business arrangements -- are moving unusually slowly through the government's arduous financial-disclosure examinations.
On Thursday, the ranking Democrats on all 16 Senate committees released a joint statement saying they would block confirmation votes until each nominee of Trump had cleared an FBI background check, completed a financial-disclosure statement and ethics agreement approved by the federal Office of Government Ethics, and "satisfied reasonable requests for additional information."
Republican U.S. Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, and Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland, that panel's ranking Democrat, engaged in a public spat over Cardin's request for three years of tax returns from Exxon Mobil's chief executive, Rex Tillerson, who has been picked to be the next secretary of state.
"As is long-standing precedent for nominees considered by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the committee has not asked Mr. Tillerson to provide copies of his tax returns," Corker said.
And U.S. Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, sent letters to the top ethics officials at 17 government agencies asking if they had been in touch with officials of the Trump transition, whether they had received financial-disclosure statements, and whether any Trump nominee "refused to provide any information that you believe is necessary to conduct a conflicts analysis as required by law."
"Given the large and complex financial holdings and boundless, serious potential for conflicts of interest," U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said in an email, "these nominees need to turn over all relevant financial and background information so that senators can thoroughly review their record before going forward with any hearings."
Several of Trump's Cabinet picks would be among the wealthiest public servants in modern history. That alone presents a significant financial-vetting challenge to Senate Republicans, who hope to begin confirmation hearings in a few weeks.
For nominees with extensive financial holdings, preparation for confirmation hearings can take weeks or even months, as was the case with Penny Pritzker, a billionaire who is President Barack Obama's commerce secretary.
Three people who have discussed Trump's nominees with officials involved in the screening, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private deliberations of a highly secretive government agency, were told of the slow pace, which has alarmed Senate Democrats.
Many of Trump's nominees come with a complex web of financial interests and investments. They include Tillerson; Steven Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs partner, picked to head the Treasury Department; the billionaire investor Wilbur Ross, chosen as commerce secretary; and Betsy DeVos, the president-elect's choice to run the Department of Education.
Lawmakers already have raised questions about Tillerson's seeming reluctance to turn over his personal financial information. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has tentatively set Jan. 11 for the start of Tillerson's confirmation hearing.
Information for this article was contributed by Michael D. Shear and James Glanz, David E. Sanger, William J. Broad, Jennifer Steinhauer and Maggie Haberman of The New York Times; by Julie Pace, Lynn Berry, Joan Lowy and Jonathan Lemire of The Associated Press; and by Philip Rucker and Robert Costa of The Washington Post.
A Section on 12/23/2016