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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31666 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 5, 2022

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Strategic nuclear balance between US and China has apparently changed, and this has been publicly acknowledged by elected US representatives.

Apart from it making a US led escalation of a Taiwan war somewhat less likely, I'm not sure what this means. A ploy to get more money for defense ?

It's a big deal as scholars on twitter whom I follow were reduced from their usual verbosity to posting just .. "what the hell".

I've been seeing rumors from nuclear experts about a Chinese nuclear build-up, but now US house & senate claim it's real.

Would welcome some discussion of this, as I'm sure this is going to have real world implications.

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On first glance, this seemed completely ridiculous even for a China bull like me. As I look into it more, it seems plausible. It depends on how you define 'active' and 'ICBM'.

The numbers for the US are here:

https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/USStratNukeForceNewSTART

the United States deploys 397 Minuteman III ICBMs, with 261 ICBMs in a non-deployed status, all of which have a single warhead. At any given time, an estimated 50 non-deployed silo launchers of ICBMs remain in a warm, operational status.

The Minutemen got unMIRVed due to treaty obligations, while the Chinese have apparently MIRVed up their ancient, crappy, liquid-fuelled DF-5s, along with making modern land-based ICBMs (something the US can't be bothered to do). The rising dragon and the falling eagle in a nutshell.

The United States retains all 14 of its strategic nuclear submarines (SSBNs), although it reduced the number of SLBM launch tubes per SSBN from 24 to 20, for a total of 280 tubes across the entire fleet. Between two and four submarines are in dry dock at any given time. The United States deployed 230 submarine-launched ballistic missiles as of September 2020.

It says later there were about 900 deployed warheads on those Trident missiles in 2018, maybe more. Trident warheads are still MIRVed and that makes things a bit more complicated. There are some missiles with heavy warheads for destroying missile siloes, others with more, lighter warheads for hitting unhardened targets. You can also get more range if you put fewer warheads in the missile, so that's another factor.

Now the Chinese have fewer, crappier missile subs with less missiles and warheads (though this may change when the Type-096 emerges). They couldn't possibly have more SLBMs than the US. They focus a lot more on land-based strategic missiles, which are more traditionally referred to as ICBMs. SLBMs are often considered to be ICBMs too. But maybe this tweet's legalistic definition distinguishes between them. That would mean the Chinese only need to have more than 397 warheads deployed on their land forces, which is more plausible. Of course, the US has thousands of undeployed warheads as well, presumably these aren't counted in the 'active inventory'.

In the last 2 years, China has been building a bunch of new ICBM fields in various deserts capable of holding hundreds of missiles. These would be modern missiles containing ten or so warheads, if all siloes have missiles in them. Maybe the officials think enough of them are finished and now deployed. China already has a fair few ICBMs, some of which are road-mobile (another innovation that the US can't be bothered with). This would mean China has more active ICBMs and warheads than the US, excluding the US's undeployed weapons and its huge submarine arsenal. Even so, this goes against a broad consensus that China only has 350 or so warheads total, including their submarines and bombers. There have also been doubts about how China could build such a large arsenal with its plutonium production.

If the tweet includes SLBMs as ICBMs, the US has taken a massive L. How could they possibly miss the Chinese going from 350 warheads to well over 1400! Are the CIA's eyes just painted on?

That would mean the Chinese only need to have more than 397 warheads deployed on their land forces, which is more plausible. Of course, the US has thousands of undeployed warheads as well, presumably these aren't counted in the 'active inventory'.

Damn, you think this could be legalistic BS that only takes into account non-sea based missiles ?

Gotta keep an eye out for that possibility.

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