Pentagon: China Likely to Have ‘At Least’ 1,000 Nukes by 2030

A new report says China’s nuclear arsenal is likely to be far bigger than the Pentagon predicted last year—the latest sign of what Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley is calling “one of the largest shifts in global geostrategic power that the world has witnessed.”

Released Wednesday, this year’s edition of “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China” says China will likely have 700 operational warheads by 2027 and 1,000—or more—by 2030, “exceeding the pace and size that DOD projected in 2020.”

For China, 2027 is a publicly acknowledged milestone goal and “one where they say that the PLA’s, capabilities should be networked into a system of systems for what they refer to as intelligentized warfare,” said a senior defense official who briefed Pentagon reporters on the new estimates before their release, on the condition of anonymity. “If they realize those goals for 2027, that would provide them with more credible military operations  in a Taiwan contingency.”

“They often talk about ‘to deter’ or ‘to compel Taiwan to abandon moves toward independence’,” the official said of China’s public statements on Taiwan, adding that Beijing appears to be “preparing for a contingency to unify by force also, and wanting to be able to to deter, to delay or otherwise, you know, to counter third-party intervention.”

The report said that China’s rapid expansion of all three legs of its nuclear triad, as well as other improvements to its air, sea and space forces, will by 2027 give it an array of offensive weapons that would give it credible options for attacking or otherwise coercing Taiwan.