SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
posted by
martyb
on Wednesday September 02 2020, @08:30PM
from the working-so-well-for-North-Korea? dept.
from the working-so-well-for-North-Korea? dept.
China working to double nuclear warheads:
China is expected to at least double the number of its nuclear warheads over the next 10 years - from an estimated figure in the low 200s it has now - and is nearing the ability to launch nuclear attacks by land, air and sea, a capacity known as a triad, the Pentagon has revealed.
The annual report to Congress on China's military marks the first time it has put a number to China's nuclear warheads. The Federation of American Scientists has estimated that China has about 320.
The Pentagon said the growth projection was based on factors including Beijing having enough material to double its nuclear weapons stockpile without new fissile material production.
Begun, the Second Nuclear Arms Race has?
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
China is Working to Double Nuclear Warheads in the Next Decade
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 40 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
I'm mentally OVERDRAWN! What's that SIGNPOST up ahead? Where's ROD
STERLING when you really need him?
(Score: 4, Informative) by Thexalon on Wednesday September 02 2020, @09:36PM (3 children)
I think it's more like "ensure" the M of "MAD".
Right now, there are 2 nations with the nukes sufficient to kill everybody several times over: The USA, and the Russians. If the Chinese get it, then they're basically secure from direct attack, just like the USA and Russians are. And, like the USA and Russians can and do, they can offer that level of protection to their allies in exchange for loyal diplomatic and economic support. The effect of having enough nukes to do that is that your only real military threats are covert ops and insanely self-destructive opposition.
I could especially imagine the Chinese getting nervous if there's a serious prospect of an official US-Russian alliance against them, which given the current US president is more possible than the Chinese would like.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by PiMuNu on Thursday September 03 2020, @12:36PM
A US - India alliance would make more sense, politically and economically. I realise Trump is special.
(Score: 2) by pdfernhout on Friday September 04 2020, @12:15PM (1 child)
... are both rational and perfect. If they can do crazy things (NK?) or can accidentally launch a first strike (Russia?) then it does not work. For example, the lives of US Americans currently still depend on the correct functioning of 1970s-era Soviet technology -- tech the USA tried to sabotage -- to prevent the launch of the "Dead Hand" system for nuclear "retaliation". One misunderstood Russian earthquake by that aging Soviet tech and it is all over for the USA. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand [wikipedia.org]
The deeper issue is the one I discuss in this essay and elsewhere where we are using the technology of abundance (e.g. nuclear energy, automation, material science, space craft, solar panels to keep the lights on in missile silos, education, a command-and-control-inspired internet, etc.) from a scarcity mindset (e.g. to fight over oil fields on Earth) -- instead of using that tech to create abundance for all (like billions of self-replicating space habitats, arkologies in the oceans, a universal basic income to schedule industrial 3D printing until everyone has a matter replicator of their own, and so on):
"Recognizing irony is key to transcending militarism"
https://pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html [pdfernhout.net]
From an essay I wrote circa 2004, here is how to pay for it all until we move past using fiat dollar ration units as our main means of scheduling industrial production (given "money is a sign of poverty" as Iain Banks wrote about in the "Culture" series or James P. Hogan implied in "Voyage from Yesteryear" and other novels):
https://www.kurtz-fernhout.com/oscomak/AchievingAStarTrekSociety.html [kurtz-fernhout.com]
"Let us consider ways to free up money for the non-profit sector (or reducing working hours) by cutting wasteful government and consumer spending in these areas with (annual estimate of easy savings):
* Healthcare ($800 billion),
* Military ($200 billion),
* Prisons ($125 billion),
* Agriculture ($40 billion),
* Transportation ($250+ billion),
* Housing ($350+ billion),
* Manufacturing (very variable),
* Media (very variable),
* Banking ($14000 billion up front, $320 billion annually), and
* Education (very variable).
This is a total of $14000 billion up front and at least another $2085 billion per year. And this is even without considering any lifestyle changes such as from widespread adoption of Voluntary Simplicity ... which will ultimately result in the largest savings in the US and worldwide (but I discuss no further here). ..."
Although a more recent related idea is "quantitative easing" and similar programs which just sent trillions of dollars to the investor class to drive up stock prices instead of sending, say, $20K to every US American:
https://prospect.org/coronavirus/unsanitized-bailouts-tradition-unlike-any-other/ [prospect.org]
"The enormity of this bailout is being under-reported. The number you’re hearing is $500 billion. Of that, $75 billion goes to the airline industry and the mysteriously named “businesses critical to national security.” The other $425 helps capitalize a $4.25 trillion, with a T, leveraged lending facility at the Federal Reserve. The taxpayer dollars would soak up any losses from that lending program. The loans won’t be secret anymore, but the oversight is largely after the fact, without subpoena power, and mainly reduced to writing reports. How exactly do you expect a small, underfunded panel to find fraud in a $4.25 trillion lending facility! Especially when the current administration explicitly believes they are not required to turn over anything to Congress. So it’s not a $2 trillion bill, it’s closer to $6 trillion, and $4.3 trillion of it comes in the form of a bazooka aimed at CEOs and shareholders, with almost no conditions attached."
Imagine how much $6 trillion dollars (about $20K per US citizen) could have done to rebuild US infrastructure, or end US poverty, or finally get hot or cold fusion energy to work, or deploy cheap solar panels, or make medical breakthroughs centered around improved nutrition and breaking out of "The Pleasure Trap" caused by supernormal stimuli warping our adapted drives, or improving household 3D printing, or creating home gardening robots, or creating the first seed for the first self-replicating space habitat that could duplicate itself from sunlight and asteroidal ore, or creating a first self-replicating SeaLab 2020 to support human life undersea on the continental shelf, and so on...
The money was there -- six trillion US dollars magicked into existence on demand -- but we (i.e. the US government) just chose to spend it poorly again (like the six trillion US dollars or so wasted on the Iraq war when everything is accounted for).
As I wrote here around 2008: https://www.oscomak.net/wiki/Main_Page [oscomak.net]
"A flow into foundations of $55 trillion is expected over the next 25 years: [see:] "Is Open Source the Answer To Giving?" And TV watching is consuming 2,000 Wikipedias per year: [see Clay Shirky's] "Mining the Cognitive Surplus". So no one should seriously suggest the absence of money or time for R&D and deployment is the problem for making either Spaceship Earth or Spaceship Mars (OpenVirgle) work for everyone, even at the same time. It comes down to issues like ideology and imagination, not "resources". "
The biggest challenge of the 21st century: the irony of technologies of abundance used by scarcity-minded people.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday September 04 2020, @04:38PM
There's a reason I specifically acknowledged the possibility of what I referred to as "insanely self-destructive opposition".
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.