The Nuclear Balance Of Power Has Changed

Before We End Up In Wars With Russia And China Simultaneously, Let's Review The Nuclear Balance Of Power...

 Michael Snyder

It has been said that there are no winners in a nuclear war, but the Russians and the Chinese have been feverishly preparing to fight one anyway.  When I was growing up, I was taught that nobody would ever dare start a nuclear war because both sides would fire their missiles and everyone would die.  In those days the doctrine of “mutual assured destruction” was universally accepted in the United States, and once the Cold War ended our politicians saw no more need to upgrade our missiles or to develop cutting edge anti-missile technologies.  Unfortunately, the balance of power has changed dramatically over the past decade.  Russia and China have both made enormous leaps forward, and that puts us in a very precarious position.

In recent days, Republicans in Congress have been buzzing about a new report “from the top commander of U.S. nuclear forces” that says that China now has more launchers for land-based nuclear missiles than the U.S. does…

Top Republicans on Capitol Hill are raising alarms over news that China has surpassed the U.S. in its number of launchers for land-based nuclear missiles — and arguing for the U.S. to expand its own arsenal to keep pace.

Four GOP leaders on the House and Senate Armed Services committees said the revelation about China’s nuclear capability, made in a Jan. 26 letter from the top commander of U.S. nuclear forces, is a warning that Beijing’s arsenal is expanding faster than anticipated, though the U.S. still has more warheads and intercontinental ballistic missiles.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

We all knew that the Chinese were upgrading their arsenal, but it turns out that they were even busier than we had anticipated.

In fact, they “have doubled their number of warheads in just 2 years”…

“The [Chinese Communist Party] is rapidly expanding its nuclear capability. They have doubled their number of warheads in just 2 years,” Rogers said at the outset of Tuesday’s hearing. “We estimated it would take them a decade to do that.”

The Chinese were not supposed to catch up with us that quickly.

Meanwhile, the Russians have developed a new intercontinental ballistic missile that is the most advanced in the world by a wide margin.  It is called “the Sarmat”, and it is absolutely frightening…

The Sarmat is a three-stage, silo-based, liquid-fuel, heavy ICBM with a reported range of 18,000 kilometers. Dubbed “Satan II” by NATO, the missile is a Russian-built replacement of the Soviet-era SS-18 “Satan” ICBM, which is reaching the end of its life cycle. The Sarmat reportedly can carry a 10-ton payload consisting of 10-plus multiple independent reentry vehicles along with penetration aids used to evade missile defenses. Moscow says the new missile can also carry several Avangard hypersonic glide vehicles.

A single Sarmat can carry enough firepower to destroy an area the size of Texas.

If the Russians or the Chinese fire their missiles at us, can we shoot them down?

The answer is no.

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