The world’s fastest computer has been able to perform (as of Dec. 1996)

The correct answer is C because in December 1996, the Intel ASCI Red supercomputer became the first machine to achieve a peak performance of over one teraflop. A teraflop represents one trillion operations per second, which is mathematically expressed as 10 to the power of 12. This milestone marked the transition of supercomputing into the teraflop era, surpassing the previous gigaflop speeds which were at the level of 10 to the power of 9. Therefore, 10 to the power of 12 operations per second was the record at that specific time.