CCP loves Team Biden’s nuclear security policy

FPI / November 16, 2021

The communist regime in China is "sprinting to build" an estimated 350 new silos for its intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), analyst Rick Fisher noted.

On Sept. 13, U.S. Vice Chief of Staff General John Hyten told a Brookings Institution online forum that the PLA missile that will go into its new silos can carry 10 warheads. “There’re no limits on what they can put in those silos,” he added.

China’s intercontinental nuclear warhead count "could exceed 3,000 intercontinental-range warheads before the end of the 2020s," Fisher, a contributing editor for Geostrategy-Direct.com, wrote in a Nov. 9 analysis for The Epoch Times.

With that in mind, observers say Team Biden is doing the communists a huge favor by proposing a change in U.S. unclear doctrine to No First Use (NFU).

Related: First China Military Power report under Biden may underplay nuclear threat, November 9, 2021

On Oct. 30, the Financial Review reported that NATO allies Britain, France, and Germany, and Pacific allies Japan and Australia were “lobbying” the Biden administration “not to change American policy on the use of nuclear weapons amid concern the president is considering a ‘no first use’ declaration that could undermine long-established deterrence strategies aimed at Russia and China.”

Fisher noted: "What is crucial is that U.S. allies in Europe and Asia face both overwhelming nuclear and non-nuclear threats, and they rely on the counterthreat of an American nuclear first strike to deter both."

Russia is amassing troops, likely to practice mobilizing for an invasion of Ukraine, and its military buildup in Kaliningrad poses a daily threat to the Baltic States and to Poland. Russia is also officially estimated to have 2,000 theater nuclear weapons as it develops, or may already possess, a new class of very-low-yield nuclear weapons for direct battlefield use.

North Korea may have more than 60 nuclear weapons, and now maneuverable hypersonic warheads, submarine-launched medium-range missiles, and new land-attack cruise missiles to deliver them to South Korea or Japan, in addition to an army of 1.1 million troops, versus South Korea’s army of 464,000 and no nuclear weapons.

Then there’s China’s rapidly increasing threat. On Nov. 3, the Pentagon released the first congressionally mandated annual China Military Power Report (CMPR) under the Biden administration leadership, and it states that China could have 700 nuclear warheads by 2027 and 1,000 warheads by 2030.

"But the CMPR assessment is much lower than what can be estimated from open sources," Fisher noted.

Russia could add its 1,400 or more nuclear warheads to support joint nuclear missile “offense” and blackmail exercises against the United States, Fisher added.

And, soon after being installed into office, Joe Biden extended the New START treaty, committing the United States to 1,550 deployed warheads until 2026.

"China may be betting that joint nuclear blackmail can prevent U.S. military opposition to a Chinese attack against the island democracy of Taiwan," Fisher wrote. "China’s buildup of missile and air strike forces, modern mechanized army and marine units, and formal and informal naval amphibious lift, points to the conclusion that China will soon, if not already, be able to launch a D-Day-scale invasion against Taiwan."

Fisher continued: "So in Europe, on the Korean Peninsula, in the Sea of Japan, and in the Taiwan Strait, any U.S. change in declared nuclear policies that would diminish or remove the possibility of a United States first use of nuclear weapons in a conflict would only serve to increase the temptation for Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong-Un to start wars against America’s key allies and partners."

That’s why the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) enthusiastically supports an American adoption of a Team Biden nuclear NFU policy.

In an Oct. 31 article, the Global Times, the “inner voice” of the CCP, gushed:

“The U.S. was about to nail the [NFU] adjustment during former president Barack Obama’s tenure. … If Biden can really take the step to announce ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapons or take pragmatic measures to restrain U.S. nuclear policies, the move will be widely welcomed across the globe.”

China is all too happy to sit back as Team Biden adds to its already long list of strategic blunders. As Napoleon Bonaparte said: “Never interfere with your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

Free Press International