The October 2023 bipartisan Congressional Strategic Posture Commission’s report contained two important insights concerning the implications of China’s nuclear weapons buildup: 1) the United States will soon be threatened not by “one, but two nuclear peer adversaries, each with ambitions to change the international status quo, by force,” and 2) that China will achieve “…rough quantitative parity with the United States in deployed nuclear warheads by the mid-2030s.” Unfortunately, the situation is likely even worse. On August 12, 2021, the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command Admiral Charles Richard summed it up: “We are witnessing a strategic breakout by China….The explosive growth in their nuclear and conventional forces can only be what I described as breathtaking.”

The Commission’s assessment of the 2027-2035 Chinese nuclear threat, while better than any published Pentagon assessment in decades, is still based upon flawed executive branch analysis. The Pentagon’s assessment of the Chinese nuclear buildup is very ominous, but it is probably substantially too low. There has been a slow recognition of this growing nuclear threat in the Pentagon reports. The October 2023 Pentagon report on Chinese military power, published after the Commission report (the Commission data cutoff was in May 2023), voiced increased concern about the unprecedented Chinese nuclear buildup. It revealed that China was accelerating its extensive nuclear modernization and that the Chinese nuclear weapons expansion was “on track to exceed previous projections,” which included in the 2022 Pentagon China report’s an estimate of 1,500 weapons in 2035. The Chinese nuclear warhead numbers released in the 2023 report indicated that China had “more than 500 operational nuclear warheads as of May 2023,” and that it would have “over 1,000 operational nuclear warheads by 2030.” Counting “operational” nuclear weapons appears to have been selected in order to make the Chinese nuclear force look lower compared to that of the United States. The U.S. nuclear weapons numbers announced by the Biden Administration in 2021 included “active” (operational), inactive, and weapons awaiting dismantlement. It did not state how many “active” nuclear warheads the United States has.

In June 2023, for the first time since the United States developed nuclear weapons in the 1940s, the Biden Administration openly stated its acceptance of numerical nuclear inferiority. White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said that “…the United States does not need to increase our nuclear forces to outnumber the combined total of our competitors in order to successfully deter them.” Hence, the Biden Administration has every incentive to minimize public perception of the scope of adversary nuclear capability. This appears to be what the Pentagon is doing.

There is a large disconnect between the visible Chinese nuclear missile buildup and the Pentagon’s slow and minimal projected increase in the number of Chinese nuclear warheads. It appears that the assumptions in the Biden Administration’s threat assessment are designed to avoid reasonable conclusions concerning the motives and implications of the rapid growth of Chinese nuclear capabilities and the political objectives that motivate it. The Chinese military and nuclear buildup began when the threat to China had evaporated due to the demise of the Soviet Union. As the 2023 report of the bipartisan United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission pointed out, “Beijing continues to hold to the same aggressive course on foreign policy that it has been pursuing in recent years.” Bill Gertz observed that the report “…includes an alarming list of indicators that Beijing is preparing for war with the United States.”

The 2023 Pentagon China report stated that China had 500 ICBM launchers, 350 ICBMs, 72 armed SLBM launchers, 250 IRBM launchers, and 500 nuclear-capable IRBMs. Note that China is assessed as having substantially fewer ICBMs than ICBM launchers while having twice the number of IRBMs than IRBM launchers apparently because of a reload capability. Yet there is little difference between mobile ICBMs and mobile IRBMs and how they operate. The Chinese mobile DF-31A and the mobile DF-41 reportedly may also have a reload capability. No explanation for this difference between the treatment of Chinese mobile ICBMs and mobile IRBMs is provided in the Pentagon report. The assumption that the Chinese are building ICBM silos and mobile ICBM launchers much faster than they are constructing the missiles they will house and arming these missiles with fewer warheads than they can carry or arming their silos with their less capable ICBMs, makes little sense. In light of the low assessed Chinese nuclear warhead numbers, the reality that the Chinese are introducing multiple warhead (MIRVed) ICBMs and SLBMs seems to be almost ignored in the assessed Pentagon warhead numbers. The Pentagon has acknowledged that the MIRVed Chinese strategic missiles are the DF-5 ICBM, DF-41 ICBM and the JL-3 SLBM. (In addition, there are press reports that the new Chinese DF-31AG/DF-31B ICBM is MIRVed.) In 2021, General John Hyten, then-Deputy Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that the new Chinese DF-41 ICBMs can carry ten warheads. The 2022 Pentagon China report assessed it as carrying no more than three warheads. Thus, it appears that the Pentagon has assumed no Chinese nuclear weapons progress in the approximately 15 years since the DF-31 was deployed.

Most press sources, including China’s English language mouthpiece Global Times, say the DF-41 is capable of carrying ten warheads. In addition to the silo basing and the road-mobile DF-41 ICBMs, the DF-41 has also reportedly been tested from a rail-mobile launcher. The DF-5 is a large MIRVed ICBM which the 2022 Pentagon report credits as being able to carry “up to five MIRVs.” Noted China expert Richard Fisher says that an improved version of the DF-5 has been tested with ten warheads. The Pentagon reports contain no warhead number for the Jl-3 SLBM. Richard Fisher has credited it with up to six warheads. James R. Howe, Vice President of Vision Centric, indicated that the JL-3 could carry three to ten warheads. It is interesting to note that in 2019, President Xi stated that China’s sea-borne nuclear forces must advance by “leaps and bounds.”

China also has an extensive nuclear-capable bomber program including upgraded versions of H-6 (based on the Soviet Tu-16), a new heavy stealth bomber under development and is also developing a new stealthy medium bomber (the existence of which was finally confirmed in the Pentagon’s 2023 China report.) The nuclear weapons carried reportedly include ballistic and cruise missiles and presumably nuclear bombs. In 2023, General Anthony Cotton, Commander of the United States Strategic Command stated that, “The air-refuellable H-6N bomber is armed with new nuclear-capable cruise missiles and air-launched ballistic missiles that may be nuclear capable….”

The Strategic Posture Commission’s report noted that China is developing “…fractional or multiple orbital bombardment systems (FOBS or MOBS) that could potentially threaten an unwarned preemptive attack on the United States.” (Emphasis added). The 2023 report of the bipartisan United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission observed that, “China is also pursuing a space-based nuclear weapon that has the potential to threaten the U.S. homeland with a new global strike capability, and it is developing frontier technologies that could lead to a paradigm shift in warfighting.” This is a reference to the Chinese FOB/MOB system that also involves a hypersonic vehicle, but the orbital capability is more important. (While the minimal U.S. air defenses cannot intercept hypersonic gliders neither can they intercept ordinary ballistic warheads when released from low earth orbit.) The report also noted “…the possibility that China could permanently deploy nuclear weapons in space, effectively adding a fourth leg to its nascent nuclear triad.”

The October 2023 Pentagon report on Chinese military capabilities ignores the multiple orbital capability of this Chinese weapon. This is an important omission because a multiple orbital system can launch no warning Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) attacks on the United States, its allies and its military forces as well as attacks on critical time urgent targets such a nuclear command and control, bomber bases and Trident submarine bases. The October 2023 Pentagon China report does not even mention the nuclear EMP threat from China. Yet, even the 2005 edition of the Pentagon report noted that, “Some PLA theorists are aware of the electromagnetic effects of using a high-altitude nuclear burst to generate high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP), and might consider using HEMP as an unconventional attack, believing the United States and other nations would not interpret it as a use of force and as crossing the nuclear threshold.” The 2004 report of the Congressional Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack stated that, “China and Russia have considered limited nuclear attack options that, unlike their Cold War plans, employ EMP as the primary or sole means of attack.” In light of the very weak U.S. nuclear command and control system, zero warning orbital nuclear EMP attack is a serious threat.

There has long been a concern in Taiwan that China will use EMP weapons as part of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. In 2001, China expert Michael Pillsbury, in a hearing of the United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission, linked nuclear EMP attack to the Chinese “Assassin’s Mace” concept of defeating the superior by the inferior. In addition to the possibility of Chinese EMP attacks against the continental United States, there is concern that Chinese non-strategic ballistic missiles could be used for tactical EMP attacks. A 2005 report on a Hong Kong website owned by China’s official news agency quoted an unidentified Chinese official as saying that China might not only stage EMP attacks against Taiwan, but that it might also “conduct an announced nuclear EMP ‘test’ 1,200 km east of Taiwan to keep US forces at bay.” A declassified 2011 U.S. intelligence report discussed potential Chinese use of a nuclear EMP weapon against Taiwan by detonating the device at a non-optimum altitude of 30-40 km in order reduce the risk to China from the attack. This tactic could also be used against U.S. military bases without resorting to an all out EMP attack, with its inherent risk of in-kind retaliation.

China reportedly has long been developing “super” or enhanced EMP weapons. A September 2023 report by L.J. Eads, Ryan Clarke and Xiaoxu Sean Lin concluded, “China’s rapid advancements in the field of EMP weaponry have emerged as a significant concern for the strategic landscape of global security, particularly concerning the vulnerabilities of United States military and civilian operations.”

In 2021, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General John Hyten revealed that China had conducted hundreds of hypersonic missile tests. Chinese hypersonic missiles are reportedly nuclear-armed. The 2023 United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission report stated that, “In 2018, China also tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic prototype named the Starry Sky-2…” Nuclear-capable hypersonic missiles have a variety of strategic and tactical uses.

In addition to its domestic nuclear weapons development and testing program, China has obtained a large amount of detailed U.S. nuclear weapons design data through espionage. The House Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military Commercial Concerns with the People’s Republic of China, generally known as the Cox Committee, concluded:

The stolen U.S. secrets have helped the PRC fabricate and successfully test modern strategic thermonuclear weapons. The stolen information includes classified information on seven U.S. thermonuclear warheads, including every currently deployed thermonuclear warhead in the U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile arsenal. Together, these include the W-88 Trident D-5 thermonuclear warhead, and the W-56 Minuteman II, the W-62 Minuteman III, the W-70 Lance, the W-76 Trident C-4, the W-78 Minuteman III Mark 12A, and the W-87 Peacekeeper thermonuclear warheads. The stolen information also includes classified design information for an enhanced radiation weapon (commonly known as the ‘neutron bomb’)….

The disconnect between the very visible growth in Chinese strategic nuclear delivery vehicles (the public became aware of the massive Chinese ICBM silos construction program not because of the Pentagon but because non-governmental organizations detected them using commercial satellite imagery) and the relatively low assessed number of operational Chinese nuclear warheads, appears to be getting even less plausible. The 2022 and 2003 Pentagon reports said that at least 300 new ICBM silos for solid fuel ICBMs (plus an unannounced number of new silos for the liquid fuel DF-5/CSS-4) and that these silos could house a mix of DF-31A/CSS-10 Mod 2 (obviously assuming single warheads) and DF-41. The Pentagon’s assessed 500+ Chinese “operational” nuclear weapons in May 2023 cannot assume a significant number of MIRVed DF-41 even if one accepts the Pentagon report’s estimate of three warheads each. Apparently, the Pentagon report is assuming that the silos are largely empty and those that are loaded house older less capable single warhead DF-31A.

In addition to strategic nuclear weapons, China has a growing force of non-strategic or tactical nuclear missiles. Many of the Chinese medium- and intermediate-range missiles are dual-capable (nuclear and conventional.) In 2004, China expert (and later Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense) Brad Roberts wrote that Chinese ground-launched missiles were being developed for “nuclear conventional dual-use.” The 2006 Chinese Defense Ministry White Paper said that China has nuclear “tactical operational [i.e., ranges to about 1,000-km] missiles of various types.” In 2012, Russian expert Aleksey Arbatov said that China had 150 operational tactical nuclear ballistic missiles. The Pentagon’s China military reports have said that the Chinese DF-26 IRBM and the DF-21/CSS-5, including the anti-carrier version the DF-21D, are nuclear–capable. The Taiwanese Defense Ministry has said that the Chinese M-11/DF-11/CSS-7 missile “can fire a variety of warheads ranging from nuclear and chemical warheads to electromagnetic pulse warheads.” The Chinese DF-15 is reportedly nuclear-capable. The Chinese CJ-20 cruise missile is also reportedly nuclear-capable. The Pentagon reports do not credit China with nuclear artillery, despite the fact that a declassified CIA study revealed that one of China’s last announced high-yield nuclear tests may have been a nuclear artillery round. Russian sources report that China has nuclear artillery rounds.

According to a declassified CIA document, a number of the last known Chinese high-yield nuclear tests conducted in the 1990s were related to tactical nuclear weapons. There are concerns about continued Chinese low-yield nuclear testing despite its supposed nuclear testing moratorium. These can be used to develop new type of nuclear weapons, particularly of the low-yield type.

The Strategic Posture Commission’s report noted that, “China will also for the first time have survivable (mobile) theater nuclear forces capable of conducting low-yield precision strikes on U.S. and allied forces and infrastructure across East Asia, in contrast to its historic practice of fielding only larger yield weapons. Theater range low-yield weapons may reduce China’s threshold for using nuclear weapons.”

The Pentagon’s China reports have notoriously underestimated the growth of the Chinese nuclear threat. The current estimate of 500+ Chinese nuclear warheads is only slightly above the 2011 Taiwan Defense Ministry estimate of 450-500 nuclear warheads deployed by China’s Second Artillery which is only part of China’s nuclear force. Typically, the Pentagon reports have been about five years behind what has appeared in open sources, particularly those in the Far East. Russian estimates of the number of Chinese nuclear warheads have been far higher than even the current Pentagon 1,500 estimate for 2035. For example, in 2012, Russian Major General (ret.) Vladimir Dvorkin said that China then had about 1,600 nuclear weapons. Colonel General (ret.) Viktor Yesin, former Chief of Staff of Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces, stated that China had 1,600-1,800 nuclear weapons. Estimates of the Chinese nuclear force range up to three thousand nuclear weapons, in the case of Dr. Phil Karber, President of the Potomac Institute. (According to Grant Newsham, a China expert, in a Center for Security Policy publication, “…reportedly, senior-most US intelligence officials instructed that Dr Karber be discredited.”) Since these estimates date from the early years of the Chinese nuclear buildup, they are mainly non-strategic nuclear weapons.

In 2021, the South China Morning Post reported that “…a source close to the Chinese military said that its stockpile of nuclear warheads had risen to 1,000 in recent years, but less than 100 of them are active.” This apparently reflects the fact that in 2021 most of these weapons were tactical nuclear weapons which are commonly stored detached from delivery vehicles when this is possible. In 2001, Dan Stillman, former Director of Intelligence at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, stated that China’s nuclear weapons are not designed to be one-point safe like American weapons. (One-point safe means in the case of an accidental detonation of the high explosives there is only one in a million chance of exceeding greater than four pounds of high explosive equivalent yield.)

Even 15-20 years ago, reports of Chinese development of MIRVed strategic missiles were appearing in the Asian press. Other than a short reference to Chinese research on MIRV technology, the Asian press reports were ignored in the contemporary Pentagon reports. The 2017 Pentagon China report was wrong when it assessed that the new Chinese MIRVed JL-3 SLBM would not be deployed until next the late 2020s when the 096 ballistic missile submarines were operational. It was deployed on the existing 094 submarines by 2022.

Even as late as 2020, all the Pentagon report stated was that the number of Chinese nuclear warheads would double from the existing assessed level of the “low-200s” in the next ten years. This is only fraction of the over 1,000+ “operational” nuclear warheads that the Pentagon now projects for 2030. The 2021 Pentagon China report assessed that by 2030 the number of Chinese nuclear warheads was going to triple. In the 2022 Pentagon report, the new numbers indicated that the projected growth was about seven times (200+ in 2020 to 1,500 in 2035). It is likely that this trend will continue and the scope of the underestimates may even increase.

Since 2020, the Pentagon China reports have registered an annual increase of about 100 nuclear warheads. The projected increase over the next 12 years is just over 80 warheads per year. This is a small fraction of what would be expected as a result of the visible increase in Chinese silo and mobile ICBMs, Chinese introduction of MIRVed ICBMs and SLBMs, the large and growing force of Chinese nuclear-capable theater-range missiles, the Chinese deployment of hypersonic missiles and the development and deployment of new bombers. No other nuclear-armed nation has deployed nuclear-only strategic missile launchers much faster than they deployed the missiles and the warheads to arms them. Worse yet, the visible increase in Chinese nuclear capabilities may not be their whole program because China is very good about hiding its capabilities.

The basis of the relatively low projected increase rate is not explained in the Pentagon reports. Assuming it is not based on ideology or political correctness, it could be based on either assumed low levels of fissile material and/or limited warhead production capability. Even if the United States has accurate information on the facilities in which China produces nuclear weapons, production capability depends upon the number of shifts a day that the facilities are worked. By Western standards, manpower is cheap in China. Moreover, with thousands of Chinese underground facilities (which the Pentagon now reports), there could easily be Chinese production facilities the United States does not know about.

The 2023 Pentagon report outlines Chinese efforts to increase plutonium production. These include fast breeder reactors. Open source information indicates that China has more than enough fissile material to arm fully the new nuclear capable delivery systems that it is now deploying. A 2021 assessment published by the University of Nebraska indicates that China had produced enough plutonium for 1,300 nuclear warheads, assuming the capability of known Chinese production facilities. The low estimates of Chinese fissile material don’t even assume that China will use plutonium from civilian nuclear power reactors for nuclear weapons, presumably because the U.S. would not do so because of America’s attitudes concerning nuclear proliferation. James R. Howe estimates that China has enough fissile material for 3,878 nuclear warheads. He estimates that China can produce 12,931-kg of highly enriched uranium per year and when the new reprocessing plants come on-line, China could add 3,000 plutonium-based nuclear weapons. His “very conservative” estimate made in 2019 was that China would have  1,643-2,022 nuclear warheads by 2025, and 3,390-3,740 warheads by 2035, with maximum yields between 20 and 200-kt. Colonel General (ret.) Viktor Yesin has written that China could have “10,000 nuclear munitions, ” basing this on China’s estimated production of “up to 40 tons of weapons uranium” and “about 10 tons of weapons-grade plutonium” manufactured “as of 2011.” Howe’s analysis is probably the best that exists in open sources.

The large payloads of Chinese dual-capable theater-range missiles clearly have the potential to carry low-yield warheads using small amounts of fissile material. Even North Korea has reportedly done this. With precision or near precision accuracy, many nuclear targets do not require 20-200-kiloton warheads to destroy.

Why does the Pentagon substantially underestimate Chinese nuclear weapons numbers and capabilities? Part of it is probably relates to Chinese concealment and disinformation. While the existence of these Chinese efforts is often acknowledged, its relationship to the failed Pentagon assessments is just as often ignored. Historically, China did not want the United States to recognize the full scope of its nuclear buildup because the U.S. might do something about it. In 1982, in a moment of candor, Deng Xiaoping, who succeeded Mao, said China should “…hide our capabilities and bide our time.”

The existence of Chinese disinformation is recognized in the Pentagon reports, but seems to be largely ignored in its bottom line nuclear weapons assessments. In 2011, then-Principal Undersecretary of Defense For Policy James Miller stated that, “China is increasing the size of its nuclear arsenal, but is estimated to have only a few hundred nuclear weapons.” After repeating every year that China was increasing the number of its nuclear weapons, the 2020 Pentagon China report said the Chinese nuclear stockpile is “currently estimated to be in the low-200s…” The implication of this is that the number of Chinese nuclear weapons had seemingly declined since 2011, which is nonsense. Indeed, the 2020 Pentagon estimate was so low that the Editor in Chief of China’s English language mouthpiece Global Times took issue with it, stating that its “estimation of ‘low 200s’ underestimates the number of nuclear warheads in China,” adding “…that international estimation put the number of China's nuclear warheads at over 200 in the 1980s.”

Part of systemic underestimates probably relates to ideology and careerism within the threat assessment community. Promotion often comes from telling their leadership what .it wants to hear while retrospectively looking at track records is uncommon. What their leadership wants to hear often reflects the slowly dying inside-the-beltway fantasy that there is going to be a peaceful rise of China. A classic example of this is a November 2023 Foreign Affairs article which took Chinese propaganda justifications for its large nuclear weapons buildup at face value without assessing the accuracy or even the plausibility of the Chinese claims. It even tried to blame the Chinese nuclear buildup on the Trump Administration’s Nuclear Posture Review despite the fact that the programmatic and doctrinal changes that underlie the unprecedent Chinese nuclear buildup go back decades. Indeed, a 2003 Rand study concluded that, “…the Chinese nuclear threat to the United States could evolve into a smaller version of the former Soviet Union.”

As noted China expert Richard Fisher has pointed out, “China requires nuclear missile superiority because it wants to destroy democracy in Taiwan, wants to destroy the U.S.-led military alliance system in Asia, and wants to be the military hegemon on Earth by mid-century.” James R. Howe writes, “One obvious reason is that China is indeed ‘breaking out’—they intend to be a peer nuclear competitor in order to coerce the US to stand-down in the face of Chinese aggression.” He notes that Chinese policy is aimed at “…establishing itself as the preponderant power in Eurasia and a global power second to none.” A November 2023 Atlantic Council report by Greg Weaver states, “This role for Chinese nuclear forces essentially mirrors an element of Russian strategy and doctrine: initiate limited nuclear use to avoid defeat by coercing the adversary to terminate the conflict on one’s own terms, or at least on terms that one can accept. China’s growing arsenal of militarily effective theater nuclear capabilities backed by a highly survivable strategic nuclear deterrent enables this role. There is one potential circumstance in which this would most likely be considered by China’s leadership: if it faces the impending defeat of the PRC’s conventional invasion, and Chinese leadership assess that a protracted conflict is decidedly not in its interest.” Unfortunately, the situation is worse than this.

One of the most important insights in the Congressional Strategic Posture Commission’s report is that:

The People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) is a critical component of China’s deterrence strategy and its efforts to counter third-party intervention in a regional conflict, including conflicts started by China. China cites its “no first use” (NFU) policy in claiming it will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against any non-nuclear weapon state or in nuclear-weapon-free zones. However, China’s NFU policy likely includes contemplation of a nuclear strike in response to a non-nuclear attack threatening the viability of China’s nuclear forces or command and control, or that approximates the strategic effects of a nuclear strike. Beijing probably would also consider nuclear use if a conventional military defeat gravely threatened the PRC’s survival….

The PLA has begun implementing a launch-on-warning (LOW) posture called “early warning counterstrike,” where warning of a missile strike leads to a counterstrike before an enemy’s first strike can detonate. The PRC probably seeks to keep at least a portion of its force, especially its new silo-based units, on a LOW posture. The PLARF has conducted exercises since 2017 involving early warning of a nuclear strike and LOW responses.

The sources cited in the Commission’s report are actually the Pentagon’s 2022 China report. This recognition is long overdue. Strong evidence that Chinese “no first use” was propaganda has existed for over two decades. The Chinese “no first use” formulation is a cleverly worded deception which has not changed since 1964. As Colonel (ret.) Larry Wortzel pointed out that since, “The U.S. has already used nuclear weapons against Japan in August 1945…[thus] if China launched a surprise nuclear attack tomorrow, it would still not be the first nation to use nuclear weapons.” It sounds like “no first use” but it is not. When it was originally promulgated China was massively inferior in the technology of nuclear weapons, in their numbers and suffered from a comparable or even greater inferiority in delivery vehicles. The original intent was apparently to prevent the pre-emptive elimination of Chinese nuclear capability by the Soviet Union. According to Chinese Lieutenant General Zhao Xijun, then-Second Artillery Deputy Commander, in August 1969, “The Soviet Union was planning to use small nuclear bombs to destroy China’s nuclear missile bases,” to which Mao responded by conducting a “‘nuclear test’ [which] made Soviet authorities weigh the pros and cons and consider the situation very carefully.” The balance of nuclear power that resulted in the 1964 Chinese no first use propaganda has drastically changed creating new opportunities for China to employ offensive nuclear threats.

The similarity between China’s emerging nuclear doctrine and that of Putin’s Russia is increasingly evident. Delete the words “likely” and “probably” in the Commission assessment and what remains is very similar to President Putin’s nuclear escalation strategy. According to paragraph 19 of Putin’s June 2020 decree on nuclear deterrence states:

The conditions specifying the possibility of nuclear weapons use by the Russian Federation are as follows: a) arrival of reliable data on a launch of ballistic missiles attacking the territory of the Russian Federation and/or its allies; b) use of nuclear weapons or other types of weapons of mass destruction by an adversary against the Russian Federation and/or its allies; c) attack by adversary against critical governmental or military sites of the Russian Federation, disruption of which would undermine nuclear forces response actions; d) aggression against the Russian Federation with the use of conventional weapons when the very existence of the state is in jeopardy.

The United States-China Economic and Security Review Commission also noted the significance of the Chinese nuclear buildup stating that, “Beijing’s pursuit of space-based nuclear weapons and potential development of low-yield warheads could also complicate U.S. deterrence by offering the PLA greater flexibility to threaten or engage in limited nuclear use against U.S. forces in the region.”

The Pentagon’s recognition of this is recent and its full significance is absent in the Pentagon’s China reports. The 2018 Nuclear Posture Review report stated that, “Our tailored strategy for China is designed to prevent Beijing from mistakenly concluding that it could secure an advantage through the limited use of its theater nuclear capabilities or that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is acceptable.” However, in 2018, the massive Chinese ICBM silo construction program and some of its other nuclear programs had not become apparent and the Pentagon’s threat assessment failed to recognize the scope of Chinese plans for MIRVing.

There was evidence that China has been moving toward this for decades, some of it is even appears in the annual Pentagon China reports, at least in an understated manner. In 2002, in a book on the Chinese military, China expert David Shambaugh wrote that Chinese military doctrine “…envisions use of tactical nuclear weapons in a battlefield environment – either airbursts or fired from artillery,” and that China “envisions offensive limited nuclear war-fighting….at a regional, intermediate-range, theater level.” A 2004 publication of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Second Artillery (now called the Rocket Force), The Science of the Second Artillery Campaigns, became available in the West about 15 years ago. The text is unclassified in the United States, but apparently it is classified as “Confidential” in China and used for nuclear force officer training. The text makes it clear that China’s “no first use” policy will be abandoned in wartime. The document says, “The basic assault force” which would be made up of several missile brigades “…should possess strong combat capability, be fully outfitted, and possess ranges that meet nuclear counter strike requirements, and be able to assure first strike effectiveness.” (Emphasis added). It discusses “adjusting” or “reducing” the nuclear use threshold in wartime to deter conventional weapons attack.

In 2005, Colonel Wen Shang-hsien of the Taiwanese military stated that after the year 2000, China had adopted a nuclear doctrine which allowed for “a preemptive strike strategy” under which the China would use “…its tactical nuclear weapons in regional wars if necessary.”

In 2007, Chinese Major General Cai Yuqiu, Vice Principal of Nanjing Army Command College, stated, “As to whether we will use nuclear weapons first, the above principle can also be followed. If we have been repeatedly ‘attacked,’ then there should not be a limit for our counter-attack.”

The 2009 edition of the Pentagon report stated that “…periodic PRC military and civilian academic debates have occurred over whether a ‘no first use’ policy supports or detracts from China’s deterrent, and whether or not ‘no first use’ should remain in place. Questions also continue regarding whether or not a conventional strike on China’s strategic forces would nullify China’s ‘no first use’ pledge. These debates add a further layer of ambiguity to China’s strategic intentions for its nuclear forces.”

The 2010 version of the Pentagon’s China report stated, “However, there is some ambiguity over the conditions under which China’s NFU policy would or would not apply, including for example, whether strikes on what China considers its own territory, demonstration strikes, or high altitude bursts would constitute a first use. Moreover, some PLA officers have written publicly of the need to spell out conditions under which China might need to use nuclear weapons—for example, if an enemy’s conventional attack threatened the survival of China’s nuclear force, or of the regime itself. However, there has been no indication that national leaders are willing to attach such nuances and caveats to China’s ‘no first use’ doctrine.” This was included in many other editions of the report.

In 2011, Japan’s Kyoto New Agency reported that it had obtained classified Chinese documents which indicated that China’s strategic missile forces “will adjust the nuclear threat policy if a nuclear missile-possessing country carries out a series of air strikes against key strategic targets in our country with absolutely superior conventional weapons…” That year, the Pentagon’s China report noted that “there is some ambiguity” over the conditions under which China’s no first use policy would apply, “including whether strikes on what China considers its own territory, demonstration strikes, or high altitude bursts would constitute a first use.”

The 2017 edition of the Pentagon’s China report stated, “Some PLA officers have written publicly of the need to spell out conditions under which China might need to use nuclear weapons first; for example, if an enemy’s conventional attack threatened the survival of China’s nuclear force or of the regime itself.”

In 2021, then-STRATCOM Commander Admiral Charles Richard stated that Chinese capabilities are “…very inconsistent with a no first use policy and the implied minimum deterrent strategy that follows.” Also, in 2021, General John Hyten warned that China could launch a surprise nuclear attack on the U.S. noting that the new Chinese orbital hypersonic weapon and the new silos “look like a first-use weapon[s].”

In 2023, General Cotton observed, “Significantly, the PRC’s investment in lower-yield, precision systems with theater ranges points to investment in asymmetric capabilities that could be employed coercively during an escalation crisis, similar to Russia’s irresponsible nuclear saber-rattling during its war against Ukraine.”

Conclusion

At the end of the Cold War, China was way behind the United States in missile and nuclear weapons technology but this has changed because of decades of massive Chinese investment in these capabilities with the United States going into the opposite direction. China appears to be on the verge of exceeding the United States in nuclear weapons numbers. The report of the Strategic Posture Commission is an important step in recognizing the scope and significance of this problem.

Dr Sari Arho Havrén, Royal United Services Institute Associate Fellow, has observed that, “….China may have learned from Moscow’s capitalisation on European fear regarding Russian nuclear weapons in order to, at a minimum, delay help for Ukraine. Similarly, triggering fear by threatening the use of nuclear weapons could rein in Japan’s and other US allies’ willingness to defend Taiwan, if the People’s Liberation Army tries to take the island by force.”

China’s opposition to Putin’s use of nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war appears to be self- serving. China probably does not want to risk overturning the apple cart when things are clearly moving in China’s direction. According to Admiral Richard, “…it isn't going to be very long before we're going to get tested in ways that we haven't been tested in a long time,” and “As I assess our level of deterrence against China, the ship is slowly sinking.” The Biden Administration’s nuclear deterrence policy clearly minimizes the deterrent to future Chinese nuclear escalation if China needs to do so to win. The Biden Administration’s assertion that the United States can deter nuclear escalation with space capabilities (apparently not weapons) and cyber capabilities borders on the ridiculous.

About the Author

Dr. Mark B. Schneider is a Senior Analyst with the National Institute for Public Policy. Before his retirement from the Department of Defense Senior Executive Service, Dr. Schneider served as Principal Director for Forces Policy, Principal Director for Strategic Defense, Space and Verification Policy, Director for Strategic Arms Control Policy and Representative of the Secretary of Defense to the Nuclear Arms Control Implementation Commission. He also served in the senior Foreign Service as a Member of the State Department Policy Planning Staff.

This article was first published by RealClearDefense.

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