Pentagon issues ominous message about nukes within hours of China saying it was ready for war

The Pentagon has issued a powerful message to enemies secretly planning strikes on America.

'We'll find you, hold you accountable,' the Department of Defense (DOD) said Wednesday, announcing the completion of a new nuclear attack scenario

This 'Prominent Hunt exercise' saw special units don white hazmat suits as they simulated nuclear detonations 'to validate the team's ability to gather evidence to support presidential decision-making during a nuclear attack scenario.'

The team participated in a simulated nuclear detonation and collected ground evidence to determine where it came from and how it got there, which is known as nuclear forensics.  

'National technical nuclear forensics is absolutely a part of nuclear deterrence by messaging to our adversaries that the US government has the capability, should there be a nuclear detonation,' said Brian Kohler, the director of Nuclear Forensics, Energy and Survivability within DOD's Office of Nuclear Matters.

While the exercise took place from January 26 to 31, the DOD only shared the update this week and within hours of China saying it was ready for a tariff war or 'any other type of war'.

China's statement was in response to President Donald Trump's vow to impose further tariffs on the nation.

During Trump's Tuesday address to Congress, he revealed that further tariffs would hit on April 2, including 'reciprocal tariffs' and non-tariff actions aimed balancing out years of trade imbalances.

The DOD emphasized that such training exercises have been conducted twice a year  since 2012.

FBI Albany Public Affairs Officer Sarah Ruane said: 'I believe planning for this one began back in the spring.' 

She added that these drills are not due to any recent or ongoing world events. 

Nuclear forensics works by analyzing the isotopic composition, chemical impurities, and physical characteristics of a nuclear material sample to determine its origin and history.

It essentially acts like a 'fingerprint' to trace the source of the material, similar to how DNA analysis is used in criminal investigations.

Timothy Jacomb-Hood, the senior scientific advisor for the Office of Nuclear Matters, said these special units are specifically looking for radioactive debris that can be analyzed. 

'When a nuclear detonation occurs, you see the traditional mushroom cloud. And in that cloud are the debris that we want to collect,' Jacomb-Hood said. 

'But we need to do various models of the detonation and the local weather to determine where the best debris [is] going to fall.' 

During the Prominent Hunt exercise, teams scoured the area for samples and sent them to DOD labs were scientists used specialized technologies to uncover the 'fingerprints.'

Drew Walter, deputy assistant secretary of defense for nuclear matters, said the ground collection task force accomplished their goal successfully and was validated. 

'Our DOD team demonstrated their readiness to collect forensics-quality debris samples, working with their FBI and National Nuclear Security Administration partners,' Walter said 

'Our ability to gather post-detonation debris and perform nuclear forensics analysis is a key element of our nuclear deterrent.'

The next Prominent Hunt is scheduled for August.

Congress mandated nuclear forensics in the early 2000s as a response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.   

One of the goals of the mandate was to enhance the ability to use forensic evidence from the nuclear debris to discover who was responsible for a nuclear detonation on American soil.

But those explosions that Prominent Hunt focuses on are not from nuclear missiles like those that might come from a nuclear-armed adversary nation.

When people think of nuclear detonations, their first thought is ballistic missiles and bomber aircraft, said Timothy Jacomb-Hood, the senior scientific advisor for the Office of Nuclear Matters. 

Nuclear forensics, however, focusing on stopping terrorist attacks by means of improvised nuclear device or by states who plan to deny responsibility for an attack. 

'These types of attacks won't be traceable from a launch within a nation,' said the DOD.

The exercise focused on the idea that if a bomb goes off in a city, collecting ground debri will be critical to finding where it came from and how it got there. 

'In those scenarios, you're less certain, and you need to know with total confidence who was responsible for this attack so that we can inform our senior leaders, and they can determine the appropriate response,' Jacomb-Hood said.