By South China Morning Post | Created at 2024-12-18 23:16:34 | Updated at 2024-12-19 03:16:27
4 hours ago
China has not only expanded its number of operational nuclear warheads to 600 but improved the diversity and sophistication of its arsenal, the Pentagon said in a report released on Wednesday.
“China had a very, very small, relatively outdated nuclear arsenal” two decades ago, said Michael Chase, US deputy assistant secretary of defence for China, Taiwan and Mongolia, at the report’s launch at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank.
“What we’ve seen over time is that they’ve expanded to a nuclear triad, with the [People’s Liberation Army] Navy having ballistic missile submarines conducting deterrence patrols,” Chase continued.
In addition, in recent years, there has been “increasing diversity in capabilities like precision-strike capable missiles with lower-yield nuclear warheads”, he added.
The China Military Power Report, mandated by the US Congress and issued annually for the past two decades, is the Pentagon’s most comprehensive unclassified report detailing China’s defence capability.
Wednesday’s report largely captured developments in China through December 2023, with some significant developments in 2024.
