China Ballistic Missiles and Nuclear Arms Thread

[gadgetcool5]

It's always weird to me when people talk about a country having *only* a few hundred nukes. As if that isn't already enough to devastate another country.

Well most countries, only a small fraction of the stockpile is even ICBM capable. So if you have 300 warheads, only 50 might be able to reach another continent. Of these 50, maybe 25 are destroyed on the ground or intercepted. That only leaves 25, and if those are going towards military targets, then no, it's not really enough to devastate another country.

Even if the top 25 cities in the US were each hit by one nuke, the vast majority of the population would survive. It's certainly not the same as Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).

 

[Hendrik_2000]

Well most countries, only a small fraction of the stockpile is even ICBM capable. So if you have 300 warheads, only 50 might be able to reach another continent. Of these 50, maybe 25 are destroyed on the ground or intercepted. That only leaves 25, and if those are going towards military targets, then no, it's not really enough to devastate another country.

Even if the top 25 cities in the US were each hit by one nuke, the vast majority of the population would survive. It's certainly not the same as Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).

Wrong calc out of 300, 150 will survive the decapitating strike and launched. Assuming 30% or even 50 % survival rate, 75 will land. And most of Chinese warhead are city wide busting size bomb. Now the question is how many cities in western world has 3 million people. Certainly less than 100. So 75 bomb landed will ensure MAD.

But I never believe China has only 300 warhead that is the fantasy of FAS and their cohort It was never been proven and regurgitated thousand time including DOD report. Chinese reprocessing capacities can produce 1500 bomb per year if they want it . And these days you don't have to test the bomb by exploding it China has enough test to be able to correlated with computer model. So there is not constraint unless the CCP is dumb

 

[gadgetcool5]

The DOD report actually puts China's arsenal as only the "low 200's", not even 300. They may be lowballing it to make China look weak, but China never contests it.

 

[Hendrik_2000]

The DOD report actually puts China's arsenal as only the "low 200's", not even 300. They may be lowballing it to make China look weak, but China never contests it.

China never publish their warhead count. DOD report is compilation of open source, public material Not from US intelligence. They have restricted version but not open to public. So whatever they say is regurgitation of FAS paper etc Nothing to take is seriously. You can say whatever you want it does not mean anything other than BS!

 

[Ndla2]

Wrong calc out of 300, 150 will survive the decapitating strike and launched. Assuming 30% or even 50 % survival rate, 75 will land. And most of Chinese warhead are city wide busting size bomb. Now the question is how many cities in western world has 3 million people. Certainly less than 100. So 75 bomb landed will ensure MAD.

But I never believe China has only 300 warhead that is the fantasy of FAS and their cohort It was never been proven and regurgitated thousand time including DOD report. Chinese reprocessing capacities can produce 1500 bomb per year if they want it . And these days you don't have to test the bomb by exploding it China has enough test to be able to correlated with computer model. So there is not constraint unless the CCP is dumb

There's a difference between total warheads count and deployed warheads. That's why quite a few people suggested that China would need no less than 1000 deployed warheads just to give the US a serious pause.

 

[Ndla2]

It's always weird to me when people talk about a country having *only* a few hundred nukes. As if that isn't already enough to devastate another country.

There's more to it than just the number to total warheads.

 

[Team Blue]

I find the notion that the American government would decide a dozen or so of the largest cities as expendable a laughable notion. I expect it would give us quite a bit of pause.

 

[sinophilia]

China has about 100 ICBMs, the US about 400. That's the only thing I'm confident of.

If China wanted to it could build 2000 warheads by 2030 quite easily. The only reason it might not is because it thinks it's a waste of money and it would rather spend money on conventional arms which have an infinitely higher chance of being used.

 

[SpicySichuan]

And these days you don't have to test the bomb by exploding it China has enough test to be able to correlated with computer model. So there is not constraint unless the CCP is dumb

I heard China conducts nuclear tests using Tianhe series supercomputers on a regular basis. Do you happen to know exactly how governments model and conduct nuclear tests through this kind of software simulations?

 

[Dante80]

Even if the top 25 cities in the US were each hit by one nuke, the vast majority of the population would survive. It's certainly not the same as Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).

But China does not carry a MAD nuclear posture/doctrine. No-one does really in the modern age, and the history of false positives explains pretty well why.