The Forth Level of Deterrence :


Should China be first attacked by nuclear weapons, under the doctrine of "resolute nuclear retaliation", China will have to use DF21 or other medium-rage ballistic missiles armed with tactical nuclear warheads to strike Hawaii and Guam. Pending on the nature of the attacks that China would have received, China's deterrence actions at this level may be accompanied with direct nuclear strikes upon the the US homeland targets with ICBMs.

The Fifth Level of Deterrence :


With its most powerful nuclear arsenal and its nuclear deterrence superiority against China, should China strikes the US homeland with nuclear weapons, the US will launch nuclear strikes against a large number of China's homeland targets with ICBMs or SLBMs.

The above five levels of deterrence can at minimum prevent the breakout of a conventional war at Taiwan Strait. Meanwhile, this may also help avoiding a nuclear war between China and the US. In the future, such deterrent games are expected to go side by side with the military redeployment of the two countries.

China readjusts deployment of nuclear weapons



What is "effective nuclear counterattack capability"

For China, this nuclear counterattack capability can be characterized in the following aspects of force deployment.

First, the immediacy of nuclear counterattack. Traditional Chinese phylosophy emphasizes "it is not too late for a real man to take revenge 10 years after being wronged" and "gaining mastery by striking only after the enemy has struck". As a result, DF5 was initially deployed inside tunnels, meaning that if DF5 can survive a large-scale nuclear attack , it will be pulled out of the tunnel and the launch attacks against the enemy.

At present, the upgraded DF5A has been developed into a silo-deployed variant and can be fired at any required time. This mean that should China learn in advance that the US is going to strike China with nuclear weapons, DF5 has the capability to perform immediate firing before it gets struck by the US strategic nuclear missiles.

The DF5 launch silo images released by the Chinese military indicate that these silos are steel-structured with much enhanced capability to resist strikes. A large number of Chinese ballistic missile experts visited Ukraine to study the design of SS-24 railroad mobile ICBM and the silos.

Secondly, the survivability of China's strategic missiles has been greatly enhanced. DF31 serial ICBMs can be mobile launched and one 09-IV SSBN is already under sea tests. In addition, China has built a large number of decoy launch silos for DF5. These measures have helped to uplift the survivability of ICBMs to the level of limited secondary nuclear counterattack capability.


Lastly, the core of "effective nuclear counterattack capability" lies in the increase of the number of ICBMs and nuclear warheads. With the US accelerating the pace of NMD development, the China - US nuclear race will force China to steadily increase the number of nuclear warheads in the inventory, while the US will continue to reinforce its number of "nuclear warhead intercepts".

Tầu ngầm nguyên tử Type 094 (09-IV) có trọng tải rẽ nước khoảng 8-9.000 tấn là một dự án tầu ngầm nguyên tử thế hệ mới của TQ nhằm thay thế tầu ngầm thế hệ cũ Type 092 và dự tính đến năm 2010 TQ sẽ có khoảng 3-4 tầu ngầm loại này được đưa vào sử dụng.

Tầu ngầm Type 094 mang nhiều đầu đạn hạt nhân có sức mạnh 90 kilotons và với tầm bắn 8.000km nó có thể tấn công trực tiếp phần bờ biển phía Tây của nước Mỹ khi vẫn đang ở trong lãnh hải của TQ.

Hiện dự án này của TQ được xếp vào loại tuyệt mật và có rất ít thông tin về nó được để lọt ra ngoài.

China's effort to increase its inventory of ICBMs became stepped up dramatically in the later half of 1990s, which seems to have been confirmed by both the Russian and US intelligence establishments. This trend can also be observed from China's action of establishing more ICBM brigades under the PLA Second Artillery Force.

The US National Air Intelligence Center believes that in 1998, China deployed approximately 25 DF5 and DF5A ICBMs. The US FAS source also revealed that China deployed at least two DF5 ICBM brigades at Tongdao in the latter half of 1990s. Each ICBM such ICBM brigade consists of three launch battalion. Other sourc speculates that one ICBM brigade of the PLA Second Artillery Force is equipped with 10 sets of ICBMs.

If China indeed has an inventory of 25 DF5, the PLA SAF now has at least 2-3 DF5 ICBM brigades. They are No. 804, 805 and 818 brigades according to the Taiwanese intelligence source. Over the next few years, DF5A is not going to retire from service mainly because more MIRVs will be fitted on this type of ballistic missiles. Besides, the quantity of DF31 ICBMs is obviously not sufficient.

Russian and the US intelligence reports on the actual number of DF31 and DF31A ICBMs that China has in the inventory are very confusing. Some intelligence sources say that the PLA SAF has added 2-3 DF31 brigades, while others say that there are 4 DF31 ICBM brigades including one railroad mobile DF31 ICBM brigade currently under formation.

A Taiwanese military source say that the brigades armed with DF31 ICBMs include Brigade No. 806, 813 and 820. At any rate, there are very limited channels to confirm the above speculations.

Suppose the PLA SAF has indeed added 2-3 DF31 ICBM brigades, at least 20-30 DF31 ICBMs have been deployed in the combat force since 1999, an increased of 3-5 DF31 ballistic missiles annually in the last 6 years. In respect to China's comprehensive national power and its doctrine of "effective nuclear deterrence", such a pace of growth is not surprising.

If calculated on the basis of 25 DF5, 20-30 DF31 ICBMs and 16 JL2 SLBMs in the Chinese inventory, the total number of ICBM and SLBM nuclear warheads is proximately 66-288. The reason for such a big gap is that it is not known whether DF5A will be fitted with 6 MIRVs in the furure, as it was claimed by some US intelligence.

The US intelligence sources also believe that DF31 may be fitted with at least 3 MIRVs in the future.

Suppose DF5A, DF31 and JL2 are each fitted with a single warhead, the total number of ICBM nuclear warheads that can reach the US homeland will be no more than 66. Such a number of nuclear warheads is far below the standard of "effective nuclear deterrence" theory.

Nuclear Capability Gap Between China and US In Actual Combat Operations



Let's look at the consequences of a China-US nuclear war from the perspective of actual combat operations.

Our conclusion is that, with China's existing nuclear capability, it is rather doubtful whether the "effective nuclear deterrence" strategy can be implemented in actual combat operations. "Whether in quantity, quality or comprehensive capacity", China's nuclear strength is far behind major Western powers. China's nuclear capability still falls short of the requirements of minimum nuclear retaliation sufficient to deter the Western power from using nuclear weapons on us. "This comment appeared in the PLA internal document does bear some realistic significance. Major General Zhu Chenghu's threat of "destroying hundreds of US cities" with nuclear weapons is indeed an exaggeration of China's current nuclear capability.