manqiangrexue
Brigadier
I don't know what this means. If you launch 5 nukes on the cities of an adversary who has hundreds of nukes and a fully intact military, you're getting the rest of your country killed, no doubt. What would you be signalling?
China ICBM/SLBM, nuclear arms thread
- Thread starter Blitzo
- Start date
There's other adversaries that are willing to jump in with their own intact nuke stockpiles and militaries if they spend the rest of their reserve on a countervalue strike.
If US uses their last 200 nukes on counter value it would only kill an additional 20% of China's population even assuming 1 million casualties per nuke which wouldn't be the case due to evacuation and dispersal.
Now they're a sitting duck for an intact Russian strike or even a 50 warhead North Korean strike. US warhead counts are known due to START, China's is not, so their adversaries know what they have.
So those 5 nukes are free. If they respond with a full launch to call the bluff, they could be wiped completely by counter value.
manqiangrexue
Brigadier
Never EVER EVER count on another nation to save your ass, not even in a conventional war let alone a nuclear trade. Don't even think about it. You will be unpleasantly surprised every time. You count Russia and NK; the US counts the rest of NATO. All these countries have nuclear stocks saved up to deter each other. They don't want that trouble to avenge China's losses.
And I want to emphasize how stupid the part in bold is. You have, once again, failed to check your logic on the other foot. If those 5 nukes are "free" for us to launch on the US, then assuming the US has 200 left, they can launch 195 on us for "free."
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They could but the marginal value is low. Destroying China's counterforce capabilities will also kill millions and a significant % of infrastructure. It will also take thousands of warheads. What's another 5?
I'm just telling you how modern Chinese think about deterrence. It is worth it to die to cripple the enemy, even if its from a 3rd party. Read Three Body Problem where this exact scenario comes up. It is as much of a reflection of modern Chinese culture as the smug arrogance of Star Trek is of US 1960s to 1980s culture.
You don't need to convince me, I don't have any power here. I'm telling you, this is how the thinking goes. There's not going to be a surrender. It's either fight and win, both get crippled, or die to cripple the enemy. That's the public opinion.
Japanese didn't invent "rather be broken jade than whole brick" (宁为玉碎，不为瓦全), Chinese did.
manqiangrexue
Brigadier
The original premise you were responding to was what if the vast majority of China's military and nuclear stocks were destroyed with our civilian centers mostly untouched. And that other "5," is actually 195 assuming you were talking about leaving just 5 with the rest "free" to launch. 195 undefended nukes on China's densest civilian/econ centers would be absolutely hell; it would make the difference between us becoming a post-war Japan/Korea (neutered and chained but in fine economic shape) vs us becoming a post war... Philippines. Totally destroyed, slave mentality ingrained, people eating pagpag to survive... ok maybe better than that because we're not stupid like Filipinos but you get the point. The destruction of such a strike would take decades to recover from, quite possibly over a century if under continuous Western sabotage on a China that cannot defend ourselves.
I would agree that we can make that sacrifice if it can actually cripple the enemy, but the problem is that in the initial scenario you were responding to, you could not choose to die to cripple the enemy; you could easily die, but at best, you would inflict small injury on the enemy with your 2 waves of 5 nukes launched against all their interceptors. The scenario presented was an unwinnable situation to avoid at all costs, most obviously by building a huge nuclear stock. It was not a wargame scenario for you to try to salvage.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
It’s funny so many people have wasted so much time on silly scenarios when the reality is no one wins in a nuclear war. Not with existing tech anyways.
As soon as any of the top 3 nuclear powers use nukes against each other, the reset button is pressed on all of humanity.
The only way the odds could be shifted enough to make full scale nuclear war winnable at remotely acceptable cost is if one power dominates near space and builds an orbital missile defence shield over both itself and the main adversary where you can shoot their silo based missiles from orbit during the assent stage and then hit what’s left in space.
But as soon as any power tries that, it will kick off an arms race in space with the other side mass deploying anti-satellite weapons and maybe even pre-deploy nukes in space and you are again back at MAD.
There is no sane winning strategy for mass nuclear war. The best any nation and humanity can hope for is that MAD is so guaranteed that no one is stupid and suicidal enough to press the proverbial big red button.
As soon as any of the top 3 nuclear powers use nukes against each other, the reset button is pressed on all of humanity.
The only way the odds could be shifted enough to make full scale nuclear war winnable at remotely acceptable cost is if one power dominates near space and builds an orbital missile defence shield over both itself and the main adversary where you can shoot their silo based missiles from orbit during the assent stage and then hit what’s left in space.
But as soon as any power tries that, it will kick off an arms race in space with the other side mass deploying anti-satellite weapons and maybe even pre-deploy nukes in space and you are again back at MAD.
There is no sane winning strategy for mass nuclear war. The best any nation and humanity can hope for is that MAD is so guaranteed that no one is stupid and suicidal enough to press the proverbial big red button.
It's why I say when dealing with irrationally aggressive ideologues that ensuring that any direct hostile action by them guarantees their total destruction is even more critical than simply achieving a victory, because those types only really stop when they are hard stopped and not before.
Based on what I've encountered wrt nuclear war planning from the Cold War days, it always boils down to being the last one standing still packing nukes, no matter the cost (eg, Milstar, Dead-Hand). This requires assymmetries in methodological advantages to achieve, but ironically, developments in AI may very well create an assymmetric Tic-Tac-Toe outcome in contrast to the scenario shown in the movie Wargames.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
The very definition of a pyrrhic victory which is utterly meaningless and worthless. The Chinese are not interested in such empty symbolic victory at the cost of literally everything.
As such, I think the extent of Chinese nuclear expansion is aimed to achieve nuclear parity or even a slight advantage, to firmly erase all possible delusions the Americans might hold about somehow being able ‘win’ a nuclear war against China to prevent one from ever happening.
But there is no real value in seeking to have a dominating nuclear advantage because once a certain minimum threshold is passed, more nukes is just meaningless overkill and a waste of resources.
This is also why I think China will continue to build big megaton yield city busters instead of going heavily into low yield tactical stuff, expect where miniaturisation demands it for MIRV purposes and/or for mounting on hypersonics.
The Americans wants arms control to prevent China from achieving nuclear parity because they desperately want to cling onto their delusional wet dream of ‘winning’ nuclear war against China and will bankrupt themselves trying to maintain their current nuclear ratio against Chinese nuclear expansion. But that’s very much America’s problem that China should give zero fucks about.
I agree, if we are talking about sane and reasonable people, but often we forget about people like the rapture groupies who are awaiting salvation. If those in control of power or the buttons are true believers and think that they already have a guaranteed seat in heaven then all bets are off.