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The Chinese military’s new DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missiles are seen during a parade to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949 at Tiananmen Square on October 1, 2019 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Kevin Fryer/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — Beijing could produce about 1,500 nuclear weapons by 2035, the Pentagon said in its recently released annual report on China, predicting a “dramatically accelerated pace” of nuclear development.
The latest estimate, released today, underscores China’s plans to more than triple its nuclear stockpile from its current total of about 400 warheads in just over a decade, a senior defense official told reporters ahead of the report’s release.
Although China has not publicly changed its “no first use” policy on nuclear weapons and maintains that what it calls a “lean and efficient” nuclear arsenal is for defensive purposes only, the Pentagon is increasingly concerned that China’s growing stockpile of nuclear weapons could signal a future change in China’s nuclear policy, the official said.
“What we’re looking at here raises some questions, I think, about their intent,” the defense official said. “They haven’t formally changed their policy or strategy, but they have an ongoing program that will give them a set of options that would potentially allow them to consider different policies or strategies, other than those that have been open.” them in the past.”
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In a report last year, the Pentagon estimated that China would have 700 deliverable nuclear warheads by 2027 and 1,000 warheads by 2030. Those numbers remain the department’s projections, and the latest figures appear to be an extension of the previous forecast, the official said.
Even in 2035, China’s nuclear stockpile is likely to be significantly smaller than that of Russia and the United States. In 2022, the US had about 3,700 warheads in its deployed or reserve stockpile, while Russia had about 4,500, according to the Federation of American Scientists.
In addition to plans to sharply increase the number of warheads, Beijing has taken other steps to increase the capability of its nuclear arsenal, the Pentagon said in a summary of the report. In 2019, China revealed that it had fielded a nuclear triad with the H-6N, its first air-to-air refueling nuclear bomber.
The past year has been particularly busy for China’s intercontinental ballistic missile corps, the People’s Liberation Army Missile Force. The PLARF launched about 135 ballistic missiles during tests and training exercises in 2021 — more than the rest of the world combined, excluding conflict zones, the report said. Construction also continued on three new ICBM fields, which will eventually house 300 new ICBM silos.
And while China has said it intends to strengthen its nuclear deterrent, it has been less willing to discuss its intentions to do so, which the Pentagon believes could contribute to instability around the world.
“They’re doing things now that really exceed their previous attempts, both in terms of scale and number and complexity and technological sophistication of capabilities,” the official said, calling China’s nuclear modernization plan “a rapid development that is somehow too significant to kept secret.”
Apart from nuclear weapons, the Chinese report highlights other new developments:
No ‘imminent’ invasion of Taiwan, but a ‘new normal’ is coming
In 2021, China escalated tensions with Taiwan, sharply increasing the number of flights into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone and conducting demonstrations — such as island-grabbing exercises — aimed at sharpening the skills the Chinese military might need to invade the Taiwan, according to the summary of the report.
And while the Defense Department still sees no immediate signs that China is preparing to launch an invasion, China has established a “new normal” for military activity around the self-governing island in 2022 following a visit by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in August, a defense official said.
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“They stepped it up quite a bit with the missile launches and other demonstrations they undertook after her visit.” But what we have seen since then is that it has not come down to the level we were used to before her visit,” the official said.
For example, China would previously conduct “central line crossings” — flying planes or sailing ships halfway between China and Taiwan — only when Beijing was trying to send a political message to Taiwan or the United States. However, those crossings became “kind of routine” after Pelosi’s visit, the official said.
“While we don’t see an imminent invasion, it’s clearly some kind of heightened level of intimidation and coercive activity around Taiwan,” the official said, adding that the Pentagon will be watching closely to see if China steps up such activities. the 2024 Taiwan presidential election, as it has been in the past.
A new operational concept
In 2021, China unveiled a new operational concept known as Multidomain Precision Warfare, which appeared to be Beijing’s response to America’s Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2).
Like JADC2, China’s Multidomain Precision Warfare is a “system of systems” focused on improving command and control infrastructure and injecting artificial intelligence and data analysis. But while JADC2 is focused on networking different platforms to speed up the decision-making process, Multidomain Precision Warfare revolves around using artificial intelligence to discover the enemy’s weak points.
“This new concept aims to help identify key vulnerabilities in an adversary’s operating system and then launch precision strikes against those vulnerabilities that can be, you know, kinetic or non-kinetic,” the official said. “Essentially, it’s how they think about scanning a domain to identify vulnerabilities in an adversary’s operating system and then exploiting them to cause it to collapse.”
A more resilient defense industrial base
As China pursues its military modernization plans, it is also taking steps to make its defense industrial base more capable. The report cited the strength of China’s missile manufacturing capabilities, which the Pentagon believes are “comparable in quality” to other top international manufacturers, as well as its increased shipbuilding capacity.
Another key theme is industrial resilience. In particular, China — like the US — is focused on reducing its reliance on foreign suppliers, a policy it calls “dual circulation,” which can be seen by switching from buying aircraft engines from Russia to producing them domestically. China began equipping its J-10 and J-20 fighters with domestically produced engines in 2021, and is expected to install a new Chinese engine for the I-20 heavy transport aircraft by the end of 2022, the report said.
“The [People’s Republic of China’s] the long-term goal is to create a fully self-contained defense industrial sector — coupled with a strong civilian industrial and technological sector — that can satisfy [People’s Liberation Army’s] the need for modern military capabilities,” the summary of the report states.
“They are concerned about any vulnerability they face from relying on external sources and are trying, as a result, to make sure they are able to do as much as they can domestically, through acquiring foreign technology and the like, but also developing their own capabilities.” at home,” said the defense attorney.
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