The United States has updated a highly classified nuclear strategy to address China’s growing arsenal and potential cooperation with Russia and other countries, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.
The Nuclear Posture Guidance, which is normally revised every four years, is only available to a select group of administration officials because of its sensitive nature. Even members of Congress do not have full access to the manual, which details the US response in the event of a nuclear attack.
According to the New York Times, US President Joe Biden approved the revised plan in March.
According to the NYT, the revised manual for the first time explicitly mentions deterrence strategies against ‘China’s rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal’. The document also mentions the possibility of coordinated attacks involving China, Russia, North Korea and Iran.
Senior officials in the Biden administration had previously hinted at this shift. In June, Pranay Vaddi, a senior director at the National Security Council, told an arms control conference that Biden was expanding the policy to address the threats posed by these countries in light of ‘the realities of a new nuclear age’.
“The revised policy] emphasises the need to account for the growth and diversity of the DPRK’s nuclear arsenal and to deter Russia, the DPRK and North Korea simultaneously,” Vaddi said.
Vaddi also explained that Washington is considering expanding its arsenal to counter the strike capabilities of its adversaries. Experts say this marks a significant shift from the post-Cold War era, when the United States began diplomatic efforts to reduce global nuclear stockpiles.
In a brief statement following the New York Times report, the White House said the review of the nuclear employment guidelines “is in no way secret … [and] is not in response to any one entity, country or threat”.
In June, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute reported that China had added 90 nuclear warheads to its arsenal, bringing its total to 500 as of January.
The report also predicted that China’s total number of intercontinental ballistic missiles, currently around 238, could surpass the US’s 800 or Russia’s 1,244 within the next decade.
The US and China resumed informal nuclear arms talks in March for the first time in five years. However, all negotiations were suspended in July in response to US arms sales to Taiwan.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian said the sales ‘seriously jeopardise the political atmosphere necessary for the resumption of arms control consultations’.
The issue was also raised by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump during a conversation with Elon Musk on X, formerly Twitter. Trump expressed concern that China was catching up with the US in nuclear capacity.
That’s where you need a strong American president because you don’t want that kind of proliferation,’ Trump said.
In May, US Air Force Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse, director of defence intelligence at the Pentagon, told the US Senate Armed Services Committee that ‘even if Russia and China cannot work together as military powers, they will certainly work together’, stressing that the armed forces should review their strategies.
In the same session, US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines said that Sino-Russian operations ‘in many ways have led to new government-wide planning’.
