WASHINGTON — United States President Donald Trump will demand that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping commit to slashing their nuclear arsenals during an unprecedented three-way summit in China next week, the White House confirmed on Friday.
Yet the administration expects no breakthrough. White House aides openly concede the historic encounter in Shenzhen will yield zero immediate signatures, positioning the face-to-face clash instead as an opening salvo to drag an unwilling Beijing into global arms limitation talks.
The high-stakes confrontation will take place on Thursday on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum. White House spokesperson Olivia Wales outlined Trump’s push to elevate atomic stockpiles above standard trade friction.
He will discuss the reduction of nuclear weapons in the world, whose proliferation president Trump believes is very dangerous.
Olivia Wales, White House Spokesperson
Trump's unilateral decision to force disarmament onto the Shenzhen agenda has triggered friction inside the host nation. Chinese officials built the summit around regional trade architecture, supply chains, and economic cooperation. For decades, Beijing has stonewalled American overtures on strategic weapons, asserting that arms control talks belong strictly between Washington and Moscow because of the sheer disparity in warhead counts.
The numbers explain the tension. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute tracks Russia as the world's largest custodian of stored nuclear warheads, followed closely by the United States. China sits in third position, but its accelerating warhead production has alarmed Washington’s defense establishment. That strategic balance grew far more precarious after the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START)—the landmark bilateral pact capping deployed Russian and American strategic warheads—expired earlier this year without a replacement framework.
| Strategic Nuclear Asset Track | Current Geopolitical Standing |
|---|---|
| Russian Federation | World's largest warhead stockpile; New START expired |
| United States | Second-largest warhead stockpile; demanding trilateral framework |
| People's Republic of China | Third-largest stockpile; rapidly expanding production lines |
| Summit Host Venue | APEC Summit, Shenzhen, China |
| White House Expectation | Zero immediate agreement; initiation of trilateral track |
"We do not expect to get to any kind of agreement," a senior Trump administration official said, acknowledging Beijing’s resistance. "This is the beginning of hopefully a conversation that can be productive going forward."
Neither the Chinese nor the Russian embassies in Washington responded to requests for comment.
Weyond nuclear warheads, Trump plans to press both leaders on the escalating United States-Israeli military confrontation against Iran. But the White House drew a hard boundary around Eastern Europe. Trump will not introduce the Russia-Ukraine war into the trilateral room.
Administration officials defended that carve-out by pointing to recent private diplomatic channels already running between Washington and Moscow.
We've had many meetings recently with the Russians, but China is not really a part of that track, so it doesn't seem appropriate to have the Ukraine discussion there.
Senior Trump Administration Official
Trump will also forgo a separate bilateral meeting with Putin in Shenzhen. Elon Musk will join Trump's official traveling delegation to China, though administration officials confirmed the tech billionaire will not sit in on the trilateral session with Xi and Putin. Musk’s exclusion ensures zero formal discussions take place regarding Ukraine's battlefield access to satellite communications networks operated by his aerospace firm, SpaceX.
Trump will bypass North Korean leader Kim Jong Un entirely during the tour, squashing speculation of a snap DMZ summit. The American president departs Washington on Monday for the four-day regional sprint, touching down in China before heading to the Philippines to wrap the diplomatic mission.