Next month, Keir Starmer’s government will publish its National Security Strategy, and alongside it, a long-planned “audit” on the UK’s relations with China.
The Labour administration, under Starmer and Foreign Secretary David Lammy, tries to differentiate between Russia – branded as an “immediate and pressing threat” in the recent Strategic Defence Review – and China, which it sees as “a sophisticated and persistent challenge”.
By 2030, Beijing – a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) – is predicted to double its number of nuclear warheads by 2030.
China has “more types and greater numbers of nuclear weapons than ever before, with its arsenal expected to double to 1,000 nuclear warheads by 2030”.
This also includes a “vast increase in advanced platforms and weapons systems, such as space warfare capabilities”.
It added: “The coming decades will be defined by multiple and concurrent dilemmas, proliferating and disruptive technologies, and the erosion of international agreements and organisations that have previously helped to prevent conflict between nuclear powers.
Bob Seely, an ex-military officer, former Conservative MP and author of The New Total War, said: “What’s clear is that China has been upgrading and updating its new nuclear arsenal across the board.
And Luke de Pulford of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China said: “Beijing is engaged in what the former foreign secretary called the ‘biggest military build up in history’.
Is Beijing’s ‘no first use’ of nukes policy in doubt?
Lukasz Kulesa, director of proliferation and nuclear policy at RUSI, said the advance of the Chinese nuclear programme since the end of the last decade was “quite unprecedented”.
Kulesa said China had been constructing three new big missile fields with silos for intercontinental and ballistic missiles, as well as a new generation of nuclear submarines, armed with nuclear ballistic missiles.
He said this military build-up appeared to be expanding Beijing’s options beyond a so-called second or retaliatory strike.
Beijing may want to expand its arsenal to allow it to have prestige as a global world power: “So the nuclear weapons might be seen as one of these attributes of a great power that China needs to step up to in order to be able to shape or to change the international system.”
This does not mean the UK is ignoring the potential for a new conflict in a new theatre in the Indo-Pacific.
It will carry out exercises in the region as a show of strength and support for allies like Japan and Australia.
Last month, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth warned invasion of Taiwan by China could in fact be imminent.
The Defence Secretary said: “He was stating what everyone has recognised, which is that President Xi has put his own forces on a footing to be able to have the military strength if required.
“We can play a part in reinforcing that regional stability, for instance with the carrier that the UK is sending into the Indo-Pacific at this moment, or our alliance with Australia and with the US over new submarines for the future. We can play a part in reinforcing that regional security and stability and saying to China, pursue this, resolve this, by political and not by military means.”
“We waited years before we saw Russia as the threat that it became. Yet again, we’re being too slow to respond and not thinking through strategy with our closest allies in Europe, America and the Pacific.
What can the UK do?
Even though China has missiles that can reach the UK, experts believe that Beijing’s sights would not extend beyond the Indo-Pacific region.
According to the SDR, this could include “leveraging the UK’s niche capabilities and overseas bases” – including the one at Diego Garcia – as well as “building collective defence industrial capacity” and “strengthening regional partners and protecting freedom of navigation”.
The SDR said the British government should “maintain military-to-military channels of communication with China to deepen mutual understanding and avoid miscalculation and inadvertent escalation in the event of a crisis”.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( China is growing its nuclear arsenal – how worried should we be? )
Also on site :