Joseph Wang
Studied at Ph.D Astronomy UT Austin, Physics MIT2y
If the United States destroyed the Chinese nuclear launching points, would China have any second strike ability to target the United States?
Chinese nuclear doctrine involves minimal deterrence. What that if China has 30 missiles, and the US manages to knock out 29 missiles, it will launch that one missile and nuke an American city, and at that point the possibility that one missile will survive and that Los Angeles will go poof is enough for the US not to push things.

In the words of Clint Eastwood.

The thing that China is trying to prevent is nuclear blackmail. The thing that China isn’t worried about is that the US will launch a massive attack, but rather that the US will threaten to nuke Shanghai if China doesn’t do X. The fact that the US did this in the 1950’s is why China has nukes in the first place.

I suspect that Chinese nuclear doctrine doesn’t involve defending against a mass attack, because you have to ask the question, suppose the US carries out a massive nuclear strike against China. 3000 nuclear weapons. You destroy every major Chinese city, and end up killing 400 million people.

Now what?

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Jackson Lee
· November 11, 2019
The thing is, China does have mid term and terminal ICBM interception capability, that means whoever wants to strike China with nukes would be prepared to launch multiple missiles against one target to ensure hit. How many nukes do you think US would fire against China and how many in reserve against Russia?
How likely people believe that US and China ensured mutual destruction of their own countries, while leaving all the other countries with nukes smiling as bystanders, possibly rise happily in the aftermath of the ashes?

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Nicholas Yoong
· August 15, 2020
That’s why the Russian type MIRV missiles exist.

And it isn’t just Russia/China with them. The most destructive weapon in the world is actually the Trident II.

It has 8 warheads. There are 24 of them on each nuclear sub.

You would need 20 antimissiles (or a few MIRV antimissiles, which doesn’t exist yet) to hit one of those. They don’t come alone. Hitting satellites does not equal hitting missiles. China can shoot down missiles too, but not a nuclear strike.

Not even the US can do that. The incapability of USA to defend itself from nuclear strike is what keeps world peace going.

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Jon Lee
· April 13, 2020
Fastest flight path from Continental US/Alaska to Asia is probably through the Arctic region, which traverses multiple countries, and means those countries in the path may NOT know if they are the intended targets. With less than 30 minutes to react they may not even hesitate and wait to find out if they weren’t the intended targets.

Due to this I don’t think any ICBM capable nation in the Eurasian/Asian region would be sitting on their hands. Considering the proximity of ICBM capable Russia (+India+Pakistan+DPRK?), their fingers would be on the trigger as well.

Add on to this the uncertainty of the available weapons such as MIRV type warheads, “hypersonics”, and those SLBMs always lurking along the coast of some country. Basically, from what I infer, nobody is safe from a supposed “precision” targeting of an ICBM.

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John Murphy
· January 28, 2021
Of course they would know. They are BALLISTIC missiles. Their flight path is entirely predictable once propulsion ceases.

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Lau William
· May 13, 2020
It is very naive to even imagine either the US or China had exposed all its launching sites that any country striking first could knock out completely the other’s nuclear launch pads. Nuclear missiles could be mobile and could be launched from submarines, carriers and so on.

But it should be plain stupidity for any nuclear country to even consider launching any unless it is a do or die situation because the earth will be doom and for a long period aftermath.

There will be no winners and it is almost certain other allied countries will join in causing massive destruction and may make this earth unlivable.

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Maxine Hatton
· December 7
I would hope that the Allys would not support such nonsense.

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Trent McLeod
· January 10
Maxine I like to believe they are smarter than what we have seen leading the USA for 50 plus years now.