I can recommend you to read the previous thread on the chinese nukes. Everything was discussed in details there
China ICBM/SLBM, nuclear arms thread
- Thread starter Blitzo
- Start date
The current Chinese perspective is that there is no need for so many nuclear weapons to physically destroy the United States.
Just using a portion of nuclear weapons to destroy parts of some American cities would be enough to completely collapse the social order of the United States. The social chaos in an era where everyone has guns is beyond imagination.
With thousands of years of continuous historical records, we Chinese are well aware of the consequences.
Believe me, the evil in human nature under such chaos is more outrageous than anything you've seen in movies or TV shows.
You would find that the United States might be better off physically extinct.
There is a podcast in China hosted by a retired military officer who discussed China's contingency plans in the event of a nuclear attack.
You would realize that China's preparations in this regard far exceed what you might imagine.
Essentially, for China, the focus is on comparing, after a nuclear war with the United States, which country can guarantee the fastest reconstruction and recovery
—maintaining social organization and mobilization capabilities, meaning effective governance.
You would discover that, after a nuclear war, China would still be a nuclear power with genuine social functionality, capable of continuing to fight
—at which point, see who would dare to provoke it—while the United States would most likely have already collapsed and disintegrated.
Proper combination of civil defence and environmental control/modification schema including rapid radiological containment and decontamination would be valuable, as preparedness for handling environmental disasters including the aftermath of a total nuclear exchange would be needed in any event.
Deterrence here isn't necessarily expected to be more than a delaying action against an irrational actor, more for gaining timing for a comprehensive response. The critical factor here is if 80% system effectiveness can be guaranteed against a large enough volume of potential incoming fire (eg 24,000 out of 30,000 incoming missiles), any volume lower than that would be effectively neutralized outright. That's where system scale becomes invaluable.
In any case these are systems that can only come online after 2030 due to the long lead times, but the elements necessary to do so are already present which is the crux of my point.
What you are asserting here is unrealistic. 80% interception rate against 30,000 incoming missiles simultaneously, especially with numerous high end missiles like ICBMs and hypersonics, is far beyond anything that is reasonably feasible any time in the near future. Sure such a system could probably neutralize a few thousand incoming missiles but this is wholly unachievable. This is like Trump's Golden Dome, sure if you could magic up such a system it would be great but that's not reality. This is not a 2030 project or even a 2050 project, maybe a 2100 project or something.
Also I'm not entirely sure how this wouldn't deter but only delay an irrational actor. What causes the delay and how long is it? If they realize their objectives could not be achieved because of your measures and delay indefinitely, isn't that the definition of deterrence? What "comprehensive response" are you looking for here against this irrational adversary if you get your delay, a nuclear first strike? I don't really see where this is going.
Nuclear bursts have much less lasting radiation than people usually believe they do. With the very powerful neutron flux from the fusion stage basically no super-heavy elemental isotopes survive. Since modern, much more powerful nukes still use basically the same amount of fissile material as the first A-bombs (critical mass, duh), the contaminated areas are basically incinerated anyway.
The Chinese are not that foolish. According to American logic, if a war isn’t fought on or near their own soil, it’s considered a victory. Using tactical nuclear weapons in or around China would, at worst, not only cause direct casualties but also turn the land and war zones into scorched earth for a long time. Therefore, from China’s perspective, the logic is this: if you provoke a nuclear war near China while keeping your own homeland far from the conflict and nuclear contamination, China will respond in kind—on its own soil and in its periphery. Falling into such a trap would mean harming ourselves and our neighbors, playing right into America’s poisonous strategy. This is a classic divide-and-rule trick of the Western maritime powers, designed to dominate the world by stoking regional hatred, rendering Chinese territory unusable, and entangling China in millennia-long feuds with neighboring countries. Do you really think the Chinese, with the highest average IQ in the world, would fall for such an obvious trick? Do you think the Chinese are as naive as Westerners? With 5,000 years of civilization, China has seen through such ploys long ago. The only difference is that China has no interest in colonizing the world, because it understands all too well that such ambitions are nothing but a poison that accelerates the collapse of empires. So, here’s China’s logic: if you use tactical nuclear weapons on Chinese soil, but they serve a strategic purpose—like killing with a soft knife—the core intent is to prevent China from thriving, or even to dismember it. No matter how sweet your words may sound, the essence is murder. China is not foolish enough to engage in a tit-for-tat exchange of tactical nuclear strikes with the U.S. For China, proportional retaliation means bringing the battlefield to America—responding with nuclear strikes on U.S. soil or its periphery. For example, if the U.S. nuclear-strikes a Chinese naval base, China will retaliate by nuclear-striking a U.S. naval base on American soil. If the U.S. nuclear-strikes Chinese fleets, China will nuclear-strike U.S. fleets, regardless of their location. This is China’s principle of proportional retaliation. As for why China doesn’t use tactical nuclear weapons—the U.S. is on the other side of the planet. Any Chinese weapon capable of reaching that distance is inherently strategic. Strategic weapons can still be used to solve tactical problems. When you in the West play strategic games, don’t assume others are fools. You can’t set up logical traps and expect others to play by your rules. It’s not that the rest of the world doesn’t understand—it’s that most Global South nations lack the power to break free from your framework. But now, there’s a game-changer: China. In simple terms, it’s like the tech war and shipping war the U.S. has launched against China. If you restrict chip technology and AI, China will restrict rare earth exports and open-source AI—undermining the profitability of U.S. AI investments. If you impose fees on Chinese ports in a shipping war, China will impose fees on U.S. ports in return. If you want to curb China’s economic development without decoupling, China will show you what decoupling really looks like. What is proportional retaliation? Today, China’s nuclear industry capability is actually among the top in the world. The number of nuclear warheads is not the issue. What China is making clear now is this: either accept the new world order and adjust to it—moving beyond the 400-year-old rules of Western superiority and priority—so that we can develop together, or let future history judge the outcome. (China, with its long historical perspective, has already foreseen the fate of Europe and America.)
Yes
IIRC they can carry 250-500kt warheads, which is well beyond the threshold of tactical.