Inside the Ring

China nuclear arms

China’s strategic nuclear forces remain shrouded in secrecy, but a new report this week identified the key location of Beijing’s tightly guarded underground nuclear-weapons storage base.

The report by the Project 2049 Institute, a private China affairs research group, also suggests the Chinese military is working on a long-range conventional warhead missile capability. The conclusion is based on indicators that China is not building nuclear warheads as fast as it is deploying large numbers of long-range missiles.

The increase in long-range missiles without a corresponding growth in nuclear warheads is a sign that China may be following the U.S. Strategic Command in building a non-nuclear long-range strike capability, said Mark A. Stokes, a former Air Force officer and China specialist who authored the report.

“The implication is that there could be a significant expansion in the Second Artillery’s conventional strike mission, beyond just short-range ballistic missiles,” Mr. Stokes said.

Some military specialists may misread the relatively low numbers of nuclear warheads as indicating China’s new DF-21 and DF-31 missiles will have limited use.

“The 10,000-plus-kilometer range DF-31A — yes, this is probably a dedicated nuke,” he said. “But new 1,700- to 1,800- kilometer-range DF-21 and possibly 8,000-kilometer DF-31 brigades … watch them for an expanded-range conventional strike capability.”

Both the DF-21 and DF-31 can carry either nuclear or conventional warheads, he said.

The report stated that the main nuclear storage facility at Taibai is located deep inside tunnels running through the Qinling mountain range about 87 miles west of the far-western city of Xian. A military unit known as the “22 Base” stores and manages most of the Second Artillery’s nuclear-warhead stockpile.

The report, “China’s Nuclear Warhead Storage and Handling System,” is based on details gleaned recently from Chinese press reports and experts.

Disclosure of the Chinese nuclear system comes as the Pentagon is continuing efforts — unsuccessful so far — to hold in-depth talks with military leaders from the Second Artillery Corps, as the strategic arms service is called.

Defense officials have said China fears that engaging in nuclear talks will result in giving up secrets that would assist U.S. missile targeting and cyberwarfare efforts against the nuclear forces.

Chinese military officials on two occasions threatened to use nuclear weapons against the United States in the last 14 years. Gen. Xiong Guankai in 1996 told a former Pentagon official that China would attack Los Angeles during any conflict with Taiwan. Then in 2005, Maj. Gen. Zhu Chenghu stated that China would use nuclear weapons to retaliate against any U.S. conventional long-range cruise missile strikes on Chinese cities.

The report said China’s nuclear forces are the least understood among all the world’s nuclear arsenals. “The dearth of information is in part purposeful — its nuclear warhead stockpile naturally is among China’s most closely guarded secrets,” it stated.

China’s nuclear warheads are under the authority of Chinese Communist Party’s Central Military Commission, the party organ that controls the military and is led by Chinese President Hu Jintao. The commission owns the centralized control system run by the Second Artillery.

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