China’s nuclear renaissance is now visible from space

Since China detonated its first atomic bomb In the midst of the Cold War, its relationship with nuclear matters has been marked by secrecy, declared prudence and a deep distrust of the great powers. For decades it chose to stay in the background, building capabilities away from the spotlight and speaking little about them. This historical silence is key to understanding why, each time that something moves In that area, the world pays attention.

A silent resurgence in the mountains. The story was brought in a special the new york times this weekend through satellite images. In the humid and rugged valleys of Sichuan, far from prying eyes, China is reactivating and expanding a nuclear infrastructure conceived for another era but adapted to a rivalry between superpowers that is intensifying again after the end of the historic pact between Moscow and Washington that we counted recently.

Images from space show new bunkers, ramps and industrial complexes with ventilation and thermal dissipation systems that aim to high risk activitiesintegrated into a framework that no longer seems defensive or residual, but rather coherent with an accelerated and planned expansion that has been gaining pace since the end of the last decade.

The inheritance of the “Third Line” and its update. These enclaves are not born from nothing, but sink their roots in what was called lto “Third Line”promoted by Mao Zedong to protect the nuclear heart of the country from American or Soviet attacks.

For decades, that internal nuclear empire remained in the backgroundreduced and fragmented when global tensions eased. Today, those same facilities seem regain prominencenot as relics, but as modernized nodes that recover their central function in a China that has left behind the doctrine of minimum containment.

Zitong and Pingtong: key pieces. They explained in the Times that the work detected in Zitong suggests advanced testing of high-precision explosives, essential to perfect the implosion that initiates a nuclear reaction, while the Pingtong complex, with its large ventilation chimney and its characteristic architecture, points to the manufacture of metal cores of the warheads, probably plutonium.

The structural similarity with foreign facilities specialized in this process, like Los Alamos National Laboratory, reinforces the idea that China is closing the full cycle of design, testing and production of modern nuclear weapons.

Intelligence, data and the value of what is not seen. Beyond the visible, the real leap is in the integration of intelligence, geospatial analysis and advanced simulation capabilities. The great laser ignition laboratory in Mianyang allows the behavior of nuclear warheads to be studied without the need for actual detonations, an approach that reduces political and environmental risks while accelerating technical refinement.

In this way, each work detected is only a fragment, but together they form a mosaic that reveals a strategy based on accumulating knowledge, validating designs and gaining operational confidence without openly crossing international red lines.

A direct challenge to gun control. There has been a lot of talk about these in recent weeks with the end of the New Start treaty. This Chinese acceleration would complicate any attempt to revive global nuclear control agreements after the expiration of that last treaty between the United States and Russia.

Washington insists that China must form part of any new framework, but Beijing avoids commitments that limit growth that it considers necessary for its status as a global power. The American accusations of covert tests, rejected by China, add a layer of mistrust that pushes both sides to plan based on worst-case scenarios.

Taiwan and the logic of enhanced deterrence. The backdrop to this effort is China’s perception of vulnerability to nuclear coercion American, especially in a plausible crisis over Taiwan. As? A largest arsenaldiverse and technologically tuned offers Beijing the feeling of sufficient immunity to maneuver more freely in a conventional conflictraising calculation risks for all parties.

In that sense, what is happening under the mountains of Sichuan is not only an industrial modernization, but rather points more to a strategic bet that redefines the balance and forces the rest of the world to interpret, and the “intimate enemies” to react, if They are not doing it anymore.

Image | Planet Labs, Google Earth, Airbus

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