American Experience

	Nuclear Weapons Test Map Since 1945 there have been a total of 2,057 known nuclear tests worldwide. The United States and the former Soviet Union conducted the majority of these with the U.S. performing 1,030 tests from 1945 - 1992 and the Soviet Union carrying out 715 between 1949 and 1990. In 1963 both the Soviet Union and the United States signed the Limited Test Ban Treaty which prohibited nuclear weapons tests in the atmosphere, in outer space, and underwater. Additionally, the treaty banned underground tests that would cause "radioactive debris to be present outside the territorial limits of the State under whose jurisdiction or control" the explosions were conducted.

1. Alaska (US) -- 3 Tests
2. Johnston Island (US) -- 12 tests
3. Christmas Island (UK & US) -- 30 tests
4. Malden Island (UK) -- 3 tests
5. Fangataufa Atoll (France) -- 12 tests
6. Mururoa Atoll (France) -- 175 tests
7. Nevada (US) -- 935 tests
8. Colorado (US) -- 2 tests
9. New Mexico (US) -- 2 tests
10. Mississippi (US) -- 2 tests
11. South Atlantic Ocean (US) -- 12 tests
12. Algeria (France) -- 17 tests
13. Russia (USSR) -- 214 tests (many at Novaya and Zemlya)
14. Ukraine (USSR) -- 2 tests
15. Kazakhstan (USSR) -- 496 tests
16. Uzbekistan (USSR) -- 2 tests
17. Turkmenistan (USSR) -- 1 test
18. Pakistan (Pakistan) -- 2 tests
19. India (India) -- 4 tests
20. Lop Nur (China) -- 41 tests
21. Marshall Islands (US) -- 66 tests
22. Australia (UK) -- 12 tests

In September, 1996 the United Nations General Assembly voted to adopt the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits all "nuclear weapons test explosions and all other nuclear explosions." As of September 1998, 150 nations had signed the treaty, and 21 nations had ratified it. Notable exceptions are India and Pakistan, both of which conducted nuclear tests in May, 1998.

To read the text of the Limited Test Ban Treaty go to http://www.acda.gov/treaties/ltbt1.htm.
To read the text of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty go to http://www.prop1.org/2000/ctbttxt1.htm.

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