There’s a reason China doesn’t fire nuclear missiles from its most dangerous submarine. You just broke that rule

The greatest strength of a nuclear submarine is not its firepower, but that no one knows where it is. This ability to remain hidden for months has made these ships the most important pillar of nuclear deterrence since the Cold War and explains why each movement related to them is analyzed with a magnifying glass.

It wasn’t just any test. China has insisted that the launch was part of its annual training and that it had previously notified the countries of the region. However, few maneuvers generate as much attention as the ballistic missile shot from a strategic nuclear submarine into the Pacific Ocean.

Not only that, since it was an action practically unpublished in decades. Beijing had been avoiding a public demonstration of this type for years and, precisely for this reason, the test has been interpreted as a message directed far beyond the military exercise itself.

The letter that is never shown. Missile submarines are the most discreet and valuable component of any nuclear power. Its main advantage is in remaining hidden for weeks or months, guaranteeing a retaliatory capacity even if the country suffers a first attack.

This need to maintain secrecy explains why China has barely made public launches from this type of platform and that each demonstration has enormous strategic weight.

The signal was directed to the United States. Although the Chinese authorities they emphasized that the missile carried a training warhead and was not directed against any country, the context tell another story.

Western analysts believe that the test was intended to demonstrate that Chinese submarines can now launch very long-range missiles. from nearby areas on its own coasts and continue hitting targets thousands of kilometers away. In other words, Beijing wanted to remind that its maritime deterrence capacity is entering a new phase of maturity.

A doctrine designed to reduce risks. Everything indicates that the launch took place from protected waters close to China, a strategy known as “bastion.” Instead of sending its submarines to the center of the Pacific, the idea is to keep them under the cover of national aviation, fleet and anti-missile systems while retaining the ability to attack very distant targets.

If the new JL-2 or JL-3 missiles They fulfill the benefits attributed to them by analysts, these submarines no longer need to travel too far from home to reach US territory.

Nuclear expansion continues. Because the test comes in full modernization process of Chinese strategic forces. Beijing is building new silos for intercontinental missiles, deploying more advanced generations of land-based missiles and increasing the number of ballistically capable nuclear submarines.

Pentagon estimates suggest that the Chinese arsenal could exceed a thousand nuclear warheads before 2030a transformation that is changing the military balance in the Indo-Pacific.

The Pacific responds worried. Australia, Japan, New Zealand and Taiwan reacted criticizing a pitch which they consider destabilizing for the region, despite having received prior notification. The criticism was not directed solely at the missile, but in the context of a rapid increase in Chinese military capabilities and an increasingly visible naval presence in the Pacific.

For many governments, the test represents a new step in a show of force strategy that had already included tests of intercontinental missiles and naval maneuvers increasingly distant from Chinese coasts.

The real novelty was not the missile. It is known that China has had ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear weapons for years. What is really new is that he has decided show publicly how one of its strategic submarines can use them, something it had almost completely avoided until now.

In fact, the demonstration increases the credibility of your ability of retaliation, forces its rivals to assume that these submarines are fully operational and confirms that Beijing is willing to use its military tests as another tool of political and strategic deterrence.

Image | PLA

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