China ICBM/SLBM, nuclear arms thread

[bustead]

Not to mention, missing a few doesn’t even guarantee they’ll be used on your cities. Imagine you’re sitting in Zhongnanhai on the day after such an attack. You’ve lost 98% of your stockpile. You have ten nukes left. The US still has 200 left. So far, your major population centres haven’t been hit. Do you order your last ten nukes be used on cities in the USA, knowing that you’ll have every major city of your own hit in response five times over? Do you use them on US bases, leaving you with absolutely no deterrence against population centre nukes? Or do you surrender, lick your wounds, and make peace with US hegemony?

I disagree. And I have multiple reasons for this.
1. The ratio of warheads is off. There are around 350 ICBM silos in China. According to RAND, spending 2 warheads on 1 silo/hardened target means that there is a 10% chance that the silo will survive. (

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) And current American nuclear doctrine does not call for targeting TELs that have been deployed. Thus, in a surprise first strike, China can realistically expect ~50 ICBMs to survive. And it is very likely that some IRBMs and SRBMs will survive as well, given the large stockpile of them in China. Meanwhile, strikes against other Chinese targets (like command centers) will cost the US even more warheads. Finally, keep in mind that the US has to maintain an effective nuclear deterrent against other adversaries (such as Russia). Thus, it is highly unlikely that the US will want to be placed in a position where they are so low on nukes.
2. Major population centers are likely hit as well. Think about Beijing. If there is a first strike against the Chinese nuclear C&C infrastructure, why would Beijing be spared? The Chinese leadership is there after all, and the civilians are only collateral damage. Same goes for Shanghai, which is close to a major air base and shipyard. A nuclear attack on these "military" targets will likely result in tens of millions of casualties anyways. Heck, even the US is suffering from the same issue. Case in point, San Diego is an important naval base.
3. Conditional madness does exist. Humans are not purely rational creatures. What if you are sitting in the White House and your staff members told you that your family has been nuked? What if your historical sites are destroyed in an attack? Sure, they may not look important in the grand scheme of things, but a leader that is acting irrationally in this case may choose to retaliate disproportionally due to reasons other than pure logic.
4. Imperfect information. Imagine for the moment that you have launched a first strike against China. Your generals report that everything went according to plan. But how do you know if the silos you hit are real? What if there are rail and road mobile launchers that have survived? What if China's submarines are not destroyed because they are hiding in caves? The number of nukes that China has left is a known unknown. Now you got news that NY and LA have been nuked. Do you retaliate based on the idea that China's nuclear arsenal has been depleted? What if you are wrong and China actually has 15 ICBMs? Wouldn't that mean your retaliation has caused more American cities to be nuked?

 

[bustead]

Just had a thought, I wonder if at any point in the future for whatever reason they decide the silos may be too vulnerable, that they could pull all the missiles out of them, move them into the underground great wall and basically convert them all to rollout-to-launch instead. I don't see why not.

Not necessarily. Missiles are relatively easy to build compared to the warheads loaded on them as fissile material production is quite resource intensive. The silos can be loaded with missiles but the warheads can be kept off site (or in another deep underground complex nearby). If there are any surviving silos after a surprise attack, the warheads can be quickly loaded onto surviving missiles and launched.
Moving warheads is easier than 200-ton missiles after all.

 

[TATP]

With early warning satellites + radars, the moment some nukes are launched, all nukes would be in the air already.

Besides if the political situation deteriorates so much that nuclear war is likely, China would start putting its stockpiled separated warheads into as many missiles as they can make, instead of relying on only the 500-1000ish that they have on high alert at all times.

The ideal scenario for China is if US rage nukes an aircraft carrier group or some other irrelevant military installation, letting China defend itself with overwhelming force from a "first strike" and get rid of US once and for all without having to face all US nukes in 1 big wave, which ABM and bunkers can probably not handle.

The early warning launch mode is not considered reliable enough, in particular, air-based strategic cruise missiles dropped by bombers; it is difficult to determine whether an incoming missile is a nuclear warhead or a conventional warhead. After the United States deployed medium-range missile rapid-strike weapons, it is difficult for China to determine whether a US-launched missile (such as the CPS launched by submarines or the LRHW launched on the ground) is a conventional or a nuclear warhead.

As far as the United States is concerned, it is early warning radar to determine whether the DF26 missile warhead launched by China is a nuclear warhead or a conventional warhead. It is difficult to distinguish nuclear warhead from conventional warhead with high resolution and high accuracy X-band radar tracking and identification.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

This makes sense.

If you’re the US, and you think you have superiority, then it makes sense to advocate for a counterforce first strike. China doesn’t have many nukes, comparably speaking. At the moment it has 500 ish, most in silos, with a handful of subs. The US has 1.7k. It could hit every silo three times over, with another couple hundred comfortably in reserve for afterwards.

Maybe you’ll miss a few. Maybe your hunter-killer submarines won’t get all six of the Chinese ones. But if you’re staring down the barrel of a serious peer competitor in a decade or two, maybe you’d rather roll the dice now?

Not to mention, missing a few doesn’t even guarantee they’ll be used on your cities. Imagine you’re sitting in Zhongnanhai on the day after such an attack. You’ve lost 98% of your stockpile. You have ten nukes left. The US still has 200 left. So far, your major population centres haven’t been hit. Do you order your last ten nukes be used on cities in the USA, knowing that you’ll have every major city of your own hit in response five times over? Do you use them on US bases, leaving you with absolutely no deterrence against population centre nukes? Or do you surrender, lick your wounds, and make peace with US hegemony?

At least, that’s the US hawk school of thought, and why China’s current stockpile is insufficient. For effective deterrence, it needs to have enough that even the most optimistic of hawks will realise that MAD is in play. (As they do with Russia.)

You launch 5 nukes against economic/population targets and say that more will be launched if the war isn't ended. And if they don't listen you launch the other 5.

How would they know you don't have another 10-100 in reserve?

It also leaves them open for being wiped by Russia or North Korea.

 

[manqiangrexue]

You launch 5 nukes against economic/population targets and say that more will be launched if the war isn't ended. And if they don't listen you launch the other 5.

How would they know you don't have another 10-100 in reserve?

It also leaves them open for being wiped by Russia or North Korea.

That's definitely NOT how China can fight the US. Launching 5 nukes on American populated centers and waiting for surrender, if I undersand you correctly, is the worst thing that you can do because you will instead get a saturated nuke return. Nobody with the ability to fight would surrender. Politically, you cannot surrender to a country that did this to you when your army is able to fight. Just like that daydream article that said the US should arm Korea and Japan to bow China into nuclear submission, you should also do the reverse check for your suggested method. If the US launched 5 nukes at our cities and asked for surrender, would we, or would we launch all out on them? For America to surrender, all of its military options would have to be depleted; nuclear subs hunted down, nuclear bombers taken out on runways, silo nukes struck by other nukes, aircraft carriers sunk by ASBMs before they consider surrender and that consideration will be the same regardless of whether you dropped 5 nukes on their cities.

If China decided that the US just needs to be ended, we would need to develop some kind of underwater drone, etc... to track and hunt all their nuclear subs and when that is ready, have all of them sting their targets and at the same time do saturation launch on the US, like >1,000 DF-51 launched at the same time with the expectation that some may be intercepted or fail. Even this might leave some deep military installations able to respond, though that would be a very muted response compared to a full force US and our interceptors would be tasked with mitigating any return launches from damaging China. Need another couple hundred saved to deter the rest of NATO though they'll probably be scared stiff and immediately declare neutrality and disband.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

That's definitely NOT how China can fight the US. Launching 5 nukes on American populated centers and waiting for surrender, if I undersand you correctly, is the worst thing that you can do because you will instead get a saturated nuke return. Nobody with the ability to fight would surrender. Politically, you cannot surrender to a country that did this to you when your army is able to fight. Just like that daydream article that said the US should arm Korea and Japan to bow China into nuclear submission, you should also do the reverse check for your suggested method. If the US launched 5 nukes at our cities and asked for surrender, would we, or would we launch all out on them? For America to surrender, all of its military options would have to be depleted; nuclear subs hunted down, nuclear bombers taken out on runways, silo nukes struck by other nukes, aircraft carriers sunk by ASBMs before they consider surrender and that consideration will be the same regardless of whether you dropped 5 nukes on their cities.

If China decided that the US just needs to be ended, we would need to develop some kind of underwater drone, etc... to track and hunt all their nuclear subs and when that is ready, have all of them sting their targets and at the same time do saturation launch on the US, like >1,000 DF-51 launched at the same time with the expectation that some may be intercepted or fail. Even this might leave some deep military installations able to respond, though that would be a very muted response compared to a full force US and our interceptors would be tasked with mitigating any return launches from damaging China. Need another couple hundred saved to deter the rest of NATO though they'll probably be scared stiff and immediately declare neutrality and disband.

The premise was if their first strike worked and you only had 10 nukes left to their 200.

 

[Chevalier]

That's definitely NOT how China can fight the US. Launching 5 nukes on American populated centers and waiting for surrender, if I undersand you correctly, is the worst thing that you can do because you will instead get a saturated nuke return. Nobody with the ability to fight would surrender. Politically, you cannot surrender to a country that did this to you when your army is able to fight. Just like that daydream article that said the US should arm Korea and Japan to bow China into nuclear submission, you should also do the reverse check for your suggested method. If the US launched 5 nukes at our cities and asked for surrender, would we, or would we launch all out on them? For America to surrender, all of its military options would have to be depleted; nuclear subs hunted down, nuclear bombers taken out on runways, silo nukes struck by other nukes, aircraft carriers sunk by ASBMs before they consider surrender and that consideration will be the same regardless of whether you dropped 5 nukes on their cities.

If China decided that the US just needs to be ended, we would need to develop some kind of underwater drone, etc... to track and hunt all their nuclear subs and when that is ready, have all of them sting their targets and at the same time do saturation launch on the US, like >1,000 DF-51 launched at the same time with the expectation that some may be intercepted or fail. Even this might leave some deep military installations able to respond, though that would be a very muted response compared to a full force US and our interceptors would be tasked with mitigating any return launches from damaging China. Need another couple hundred saved to deter the rest of NATO though they'll probably be scared stiff and immediately declare neutrality and disband.

The premise was if their first strike worked and you only had 10 nukes left to their 200.

In terms of game theory, we can look to the U.S. stealing Russians assets of U.S. treasuries as an analogy. Once that rubicon was crossed, it didn’t matter what the USG did afterwards, no autonomous nation will ever place themselves in an over reliant position on U.S. denominated debt and assets.
Similarly, in the world post Hiroshima, in the event of a U.S. first strike, no autonomous nation will consider itself truly independent without a nuclear program. Nuclear proliferation will explode to say nothing of Chinese reprisals against U.S. cities.
In terms of game theory, if your opponent does not believe your 300 nukes will destroy him, then you need to disabuse him of that notion.

secondly, given the nature of the Anglo propaganda, in such an event of an Anglo first strike, they would frame it as “we had no other choice, the Chinese were gonna launch on us!! And besides, we just destroyed new hitler and the chinazis!!” And they and their supporters in India, in Australia, in Denmark, will follow the American propaganda line because the alternative is too horrible to bear: that they explicitly supported another genocide to maintain white supremacy.

 

[Index]

In terms of game theory, we can look to the U.S. stealing Russians assets of U.S. treasuries as an analogy. Once that rubicon was crossed, it didn’t matter what the USG did afterwards, no autonomous nation will ever place themselves in an over reliant position on U.S. denominated debt and assets.
Similarly, in the world post Hiroshima, in the event of a U.S. first strike, no autonomous nation will consider itself truly independent without a nuclear program. Nuclear proliferation will explode to say nothing of Chinese reprisals against U.S. cities.
In terms of game theory, if your opponent does not believe your 300 nukes will destroy him, then you need to disabuse him of that notion.

secondly, given the nature of the Anglo propaganda, in such an event of an Anglo first strike, they would frame it as “we had no other choice, the Chinese were gonna launch on us!! And besides, we just destroyed new hitler and the chinazis!!” And they and their supporters in India, in Australia, in Denmark, will follow the American propaganda line because the alternative is too horrible to bear: that they explicitly supported another genocide to maintain white supremacy.

Would there even be autonomous nations left?

A first strike would be obvious because it needs to be dispersed across many locations. So the moment it is in the air, all the nukes will go up, not just from China but even Russia as well, as Russians have no idea where the massive US ICBM strike is aimed at.

I don't think China only launches on NATO, because why leave fully intact countries when all the top military powers knock eachother out? At the very least, China would also glass India and Israel just to not let them attack the remains of China later. The Russians probably think similar. And I don't see USA letting south America go unscathed so they can become the new superpower.

 

[manqiangrexue]

The premise was if their first strike worked and you only had 10 nukes left to their 200.

Oh, well that's an answer to a question without an answer in terms of military response. You simply cannot let yourself be put in that position because once there, you have already lost. They will know you don't have another 100 left because you haven't launched them. Nobody responds to a massive nuclear strike on all known major military facilities with just 5 nukes on cities and an ultimatum. Also, launching low numbers like 5 risks them getting neutralized; saturation is needed. You will definitely get your response by them blanket nuking your cities. Game over. Just like before, you should check the logic to see if it stands on the other foot. If China launched a first strike on the US and it is believed that the vast majority of thier nukes and military were destroyed, how would you respond to a comparatively very mild 5 nukes back and a clear bluff that they have many more? You would know just from the fact that they haven't sent all the hounds of hell out to fight you in response that they haven't got any fight left in them. You wouldn't surrender; you'd nuke their whole country to a crisp for firing those 5 on your cities even if you managed to take out 4... or hell, maybe even all 5.

We must prevent every possibility of a successful enemy first strike with hidden nukes, nukes protected deep in mountain silos, mobile nukes, improved sub-launched nukes, etc... with the policy to launch when we detect enemy launch rather than when they strike to ensure that we are never left pondering what to do after an enemy first strike destroys the majority of our military with theirs intact. If we let that happen, the only way may be to surrender and live to fight another day, likely in another century.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

Oh, well that's an answer to a question without an answer in terms of military response. You simply cannot let yourself be put in that position because once there, you have already lost. They will know you don't have another 100 left because you haven't launched them. Nobody responds to a massive nuclear strike on all known major military facilities with just 5 nukes on cities and an ultimatum. Also, launching low numbers like 5 risks them getting neutralized; saturation is needed. You will definitely get your response by them blanket nuking your cities. Game over. Just like before, you should check the logic to see if it stands on the other foot. If China launched a first strike on the US and it is believed that the vast majority of thier nukes and military were destroyed, how would you respond to a comparatively very mild 5 nukes back and a clear bluff that they have many more? You would know just from the fact that they haven't sent all the hounds of hell out to fight you in response that they haven't got any fight left in them. You wouldn't surrender; you'd nuke their whole country to a crisp for firing those 5 on your cities even if you managed to take out 4... or hell, maybe even all 5.

We must prevent every possibility of a successful enemy first strike with hidden nukes, nukes protected deep in mountain silos, mobile nukes, improved sub-launched nukes, etc... with the policy to launch when we detect enemy launch rather than when they strike to ensure that we are never left pondering what to do after an enemy first strike destroys the majority of our military with theirs intact. If we let that happen, the only way may be to surrender and live to fight another day, likely in another century.

It's not a 1v1, the signaling to 3rd parties is what is important at that point.