Donald Trump has once again put Afghanistan back in Washington’s foreign policy spotlight. Speaking in London alongside British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the US president said his administration was exploring ways to bring Bagram air base - once the heart of a US-led multilateral military presence in Afghanistan - back under US control.

The base, abandoned during the chaotic US withdrawal in July, 2021, sits just 40 kilometres north of Kabul and for two decades was a sprawling hub for US and NATO-led operations. In the years it was operational, 14 nations operated at, or through Bagram. In addition to the US, these included UK forces, and elements from France, Germany, South Korea and more.

In London, Trump said “We’re trying to get it back because they need things from us,” adding that “one of the reasons we want the base is, as you know, it’s an hour away from where China makes its nuclear weapons” according to Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty. At the UK press conference Trump claims the US "gave it to them for nothing" the BBC reported.

That remark alone pointed to what many military analysts have been reporting for months: that the US president’s ongoing interest in Afghanistan, and Bagram is less about helping get Kabul back on its feet and more to do with containing Beijing.

For their part, however, Taliban officials have dismissed the notion of handing the base back, though they have not ruled out closer political and economic ties with the US.

According to the BBC, a Taliban foreign ministry representative said that the very idea of the US in the future maintaining a military presence in the country had been "completely" rejected prior to the Taliban returning to power.

Reports in the Wall Street Journal on September 19, however, suggest quiet discussions are already underway with the idea of allowing Bagram to serve as a US “launch point” for counterterrorism missions.

Whether or not domestic Chinese repositioning of their nuclear capabilities will one day be deemed an act of 'terrorism' by Trump is still being scoffed at by some in the US but the China-angle on his desire to station US forces back at Bagram complicates things further.

In addition, while Trump points to nuclear sites being “an hour away”, the nearest known Chinese facility, the Lop Nur test range on the remote eastern edge of the Xinjiang region is around 2,000 kilometres northeast of Bagram.

Still, US officials have reportedly grown increasingly anxious about Beijing’s expanding nuclear arsenal, which the Pentagon now estimates at 600 warheads and climbing. Radio Free Asia in June claimed “China’s nuclear arsenal is growing faster than any other country’s, by about 100 new warheads a year” citing the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

For now, the idea of US troops back at Bagram feels remote but given the February 2020 “Joint Declaration between the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the United States of America for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan” and the last part of a clause stating “The United States will refrain from the threat or the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of Afghanistan or intervening in its domestic affairs”, it appears that once again a foreign leader is indeed willing to rewrite the rules of engagement with Afghanistan – only this time using China as the justification.