Hu by no means always represents official Chinese positions on specific policy issues, but his reasoning seems to be striking a chord with the general public. Hu argues that a bigger arsenal would make the country’s rivals respect China and exercise more self-restraint when dealing with Beijing.
Believing that Western hostility is a result of bigger structural changes in the international system, Beijing feels the only solution is to further consolidate its own power until Western countries acknowledge the new reality-that China’s success and strength are beyond doubt.įearing that any weakness would embolden Western countries to destabilize China and threaten its regime’s security, Chinese thought leaders like Hu Xijin (the editor-in-chief of a major state-owned tabloid) stress that it is critical for China to quickly build a much larger nuclear arsenal. These developments have led Chinese leadership to conclude that China faces a new geopolitical reality in which Western countries are deliberately creating trouble and making up excuses to demonize and contain China, fearing that the country’s rise could challenge the West’s dominance in the international system. Under its current leadership, China’s continued rise is coupled with growing disputes with Western countries over issues like human rights, democratic values, rule of law, and international norms. For decades, it appeared that China was not investing in a massive nuclear buildup because its top political leaders believed that the country had other more important priorities-especially at a time when China perceived no immediate external threat. More >Īs a result, Chinese experts have consistently agreed that Beijing needs to continue gradually modernizing its nuclear forces. Tong Zhao is a senior fellow in Carnegie’s Nuclear Policy Program. capabilities constantly remind Chinese nuclear experts of their nuclear deterrent’s potential vulnerability. military capabilities-like missile defense and conventional precision strike weapons-could undermine the credibility of China’s capacity to retaliate against a nuclear attack. Geopolitics Drives China’s Modernizationįor decades, China has worried about how U.S. The open-ended nature of this expansion, the abrupt departure from China’s long-standing minimalist nuclear policy, and the lack of any official Chinese confirmation or explanation have all contributed to confusion and suspicions about Beijing’s intentions.
The possibility that China could use fissile material produced in civil nuclear facilities to build up its nuclear warhead stockpile has raised further concerns because this would eliminate the biggest constraint on China’s warhead stockpiling capacity. Besides silo-based ICBMs, China also is building more road-mobile ICBMs and strategic nuclear submarines, even as it introduces air-based nuclear capabilities. This expansion is poised to change China’s traditionally small and mostly land-based arsenal across the board.
#China stockpile update#
China’s current program to modernize and update its nuclear weapons is moving at an unprecedented speed and scale. experts shows that the country is likely constructing more than 200 new missile silos. But recent evidence from independent U.S. Over the past few decades, China had maintained only about twenty silo-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). China’s nuclear arsenal appears to be expanding substantially for the first time in years.
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