If tomorrow the war starts: whose army is stronger today - the United States or China?

Victor Kuzovkov

American Major General Ross Coffman recently responded in absentia to the words of the chairman of the PRC's Central Military Commission, who said that war between the PRC and the United States was inevitable. According to the American military, if war is inevitable, then the United States should strike first. "If it's inevitable, why wait for the enemy to strike first?", - said the American.

Perhaps this will seem to many just bravado and some kind of ritual phrase, because China is a member of the "nuclear club", has a whole arsenal of nuclear weapons delivery vehicles in its arsenal, and it will hardly be doomed to wait for the United States to whip it. And at first glance, such skepticism is entirely justified. And yet, the logic of the development of the confrontation between the United States and China suggests that their fight for global domination may well lead to a military clash between the two superpowers. And if so, it is not a sin to try to analyze the situation, to understand what is really bravado here, and what is a harsh reality that has not yet come into use simply because of its unpredictability...

It is worth paying attention to the fact that tensions on the brink of an open military clash between the United States and China do not happen so rarely. This is usually due to a certain activity of Beijing near the coast of Taiwan - a Chinese region that has not formally declared its independence and claims to have full power in the PRC. Communist China, in turn, does not recognize the current government in Taipei, openly proclaims the annexation of Taiwan as its priority goal and periodically reminds that it may accidentally transfer several armies to the island.

As a rule, such reminders take the form of the exercises of the People's Liberation Army of China, taking place in the territories and waters adjacent to Taiwan. And the United States, striving to prevent the reunification of the PRC with Taiwan, each time demonstrates its solidarity with Taipei. This is usually expressed in the sending of one or two aircraft carrier strike groups (AUG) of the US Navy to the region of a possible conflict. And it is very likely that the matter is not limited only to the readiness to "show the flag", because there are good analysts in Beijing and they would have figured out the pure bluff of the Americans long ago.

Americans "eat" with the Chinese and on other occasions. So, today, the PRC disputes several disputed territories at once in the South China and East China Seas. These are the Paracel Islands, the Spratly Archipelago, Scarborough Reef, and the Senkaku Islands. The opponents of Beijing are Japan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and even Brunei, claiming some of the above-mentioned territories. Frankly speaking, none of the states mentioned, with the possible exception of Japan and Vietnam, is unable to resist China on its own while defending its sovereignty. And the possibilities of these two states against China, which is actively strengthening every year, more and more obviously tend to zero. This means that all these states, to one degree or another, are counting on Washington.

And here America again demonstrates decisiveness, while keeping Beijing from taking too abrupt steps. Does this mean that the United States still has a chance of a direct victory in the conflict with China, despite its nuclear weapons? Well, this is the first and most fundamental question that we have to answer ...

First of all, we need to remember that China adheres to the doctrine of "minimum deterrence" and its nuclear forces, in comparison with the American or Russian, are very small. True, Beijing does not indulge foreign observers with open data on its nuclear forces, but we do have some information about them. For example, it is known that today the basis of the PRC's ground strategic nuclear deterrent forces are various modifications of the Dong Feng-5 (East Wind-5) missiles. The first modification of this missile was put into service in the early eighties of the last century. Its range, up to 12,000 kilometers, allows strikes throughout the United States, and a power of 2-3 megatons seems to remove questions about accuracy - for strikes against large cities, a circular probable deviation (CEP) of 3-3.5 km at this power is not critical.

More modern modifications of the DF-5 missile, for example, the DF-5A, can have multiple warheads with a yield of up to 350 kilotons. Their accuracy is slightly higher than that of its predecessor, and this is also a very formidable weapon. True, it has some vulnerabilities, which we will talk about below.

Of course, since the eighties of the last century, Chinese rocketry has not stood still. More modern ground-based ICBMs were also created, in particular, the DF-31 and DF-41. The main difference between these missiles and their predecessors is the use of a solid-propellant engine, which made it possible to make the missiles mobile and reduce the prelaunch preparation time to 15-20 minutes.

It is also assumed that the modern DF-41 missile can carry up to ten MIRVs, decoys and other means of breaking through an on-site missile defense system. The range of this missile, again, presumably, can reach 15 thousand kilometers, which makes it possible to attack the entire depth of the territory of a potential enemy.

Add to this the fact that the Chinese have strategic nuclear submarines, also armed with ballistic intercontinental missiles, and it may seem that the PRC is absolutely fine with nuclear security. However, let's not jump to conclusions, because in this "barrel of honey" there is much more fly in the ointment ...

First of all, let's note that China has never chased the number of missiles and nuclear warheads. Assessments of the PRC's nuclear potential vary, especially since it is the only country from the official nuclear club that has never provided official information about its nuclear potential to anyone. Nevertheless, with a fairly high degree of probability, it can be argued that at the moment the PRC is armed with hardly more than a hundred strategic ICBMs. Moreover, up to a third of this number falls on very old, despite all the modernization, DF-5 missiles.

Of course, in the absence of opposition, this amount is sufficient to inflict unacceptable damage on any enemy. But the fact of the matter is that the Americans have long and persistently created systems of counteraction, capable of, if not completely destroying, then at least greatly weakening any nuclear strike.

In particular, we all know about the strategic American missile defense system. True, in Russia, the European echelon of the American missile defense system is more popular, while in the east they have succeeded no less, if not more. The advanced missile defense areas are deployed by the Americans in Japan and South Korea, and this is very critical for Chinese ballistic missiles taking off. Yes, it is so inscribed by the very geography of the Earth that their trajectories, when moving towards the United States, will pass within the range of interceptor missiles.

It is difficult to say with certainty how this circumstance will affect the new missiles of the DF-41 type. But it is obvious that the "old ladies" DF-5, developed at a time when they did not even think about the need to break through the missile defense system, will be destroyed at the start. More modern systems are also questionable - the fact is that the very fact of creating an ICBM on solid fuel was a huge success for the PRC. Whether the Chinese designers set themselves the task of ensuring a more energetic launch of taking off missiles and reducing the time they spent in the danger zone is an open question. It is very likely that not - even Russian designers were able to partially solve this problem only in their latest developments, and, alas, no one has yet been able to guarantee the complete solution of this problem.

That is, the massive launch of Chinese ICBMs through missile defense positions in Japan and South Korea, reinforced by the Aegis missile defense destroyers deployed in the ocean, does not guarantee China the total destruction of the United States. Rather, it guarantees a nuclear response incompatible with the existence of China itself.

So far, it is difficult to count on Beijing and its strategic nuclear submarines. Although they have serious striking power, they have a number of serious vulnerabilities. And the main one is rather poor stealth, due to the high noise of the submarine missile carriers. According to American intelligence, the Chinese nuclear submarines of the 094 Jin type, which now form the basis of China's submarine strategic nuclear forces, "fade" almost at the level of Soviet nuclear submarines of the eighties. This means that any of their access to the sea does not go unnoticed, behind them there is always a "tail" of at least one multipurpose American nuclear submarine, and if necessary, all of them can be destroyed by a preemptive strike.

Of course, all of the above is an assumption, reliable only to a certain extent. And yet, we can assert that in the event of even a very significant aggravation of the situation around China, the PRC is unlikely to risk turning the conflict that has begun into a nuclear one.

For both sides, it will be a game with fire. For all their technological power, the Americans find it difficult to guarantee the complete destruction of all ICBMs in service with the PLA. More precisely, it is simply impossible to guarantee it. This means that in the event of a full-scale conflict, their victory may turn out to be Pyrrhic - the Chinese can still provide several nuclear bald spots on the US map.

China risks everything in general - if it is the first to use nuclear weapons, the consequences for it are almost guaranteed to be catastrophic, and the very existence of the PRC will be called into question. And if this is so, we may well admit that the Americans may embark on a military escalation along the perimeter of the PRC, with the aim of critically weakening China's geopolitical ambitions for many decades to come. This is very risky, but just as risky for the United States and inaction - if Washington does nothing against China, the very fact of its existence will gradually push the United States away from geopolitical primacy. And for the United States, whose main export product has long been the dollar, this is tantamount to death ...

Now let's see how the conflict can unfold. In part, General Coffman, mentioned in this article, himself answered this. According to him, this conflict will affect the entire vast territory of the Indo-Pacific region. We did not hear any other details, but we will try to decipher.

In the event that the United States unleashes a war against the PRC, its main task may be to deprive Beijing of its strongholds in this region. The first contenders are likely to be Chinese military bases in Djibouti and Pakistan. These are important elements of ensuring the security of Chinese maritime trade, and, moreover, located in very sensitive places.

The likelihood that China will be able to withstand such aggression for a long time now tends to zero. But there is one nuance - it will not be a complete defeat for the PRC, nor will it become a final victory for the United States. At the moment, the PRC has no other facilities of comparable importance abroad. Yes, there is a significant economic presence in the countries of the region and Africa, but under the gunpoint of American automatic weapons the governments of the states "guilty" before the Americans will be glad to curtail it.

So isn't the game worth the candle yet?

Let's assume for a moment that the Americans are not as stupid as the satirist Zadornov said about them, and take a closer look at the conflict zone. On closer inspection, we see that China has one very vulnerable point - Tibet. On the one hand, it is like China, according to the official Beijing. But from the point of view of many other states, including the United States, it is a sovereign state illegally seized by China. And this ambiguity gives the Americans the chance to foment a large-scale conflict that will really shake all of China.

Taking into account the complex geography of the region, the defense of Tibet is only possible with the qualitative superiority of the Chinese air defense and aviation. Otherwise, the weak communications of the region will be instantly cut off by air strikes, and then the military units defending Tibet will simply be methodically bombed. Given the current state of the Chinese aviation, one can only talk about very limited opposition to American plans in the region, which means that in the event of a conflict, one can assume a fairly quick triumph of the Americans.

The reason for the start of the conflict may be the confrontation between the PRC and India, which periodically takes very hot forms, or some other event, for example, the declaration of sovereignty by Taiwan, to which Beijing promises to respond with immediate military intervention. In any case, Washington will succeed in making Beijing an "aggressor" in the eyes of the world community and again "on the side of the weak and oppressed".

Unfortunately for Beijing, the only real way to counter this development of events is the use of nuclear weapons. However, due to the above circumstances, at the moment it is extremely risky for him. And it is difficult to predict whether Beijing will agree to this, or hope to keep the situation under control even after the loss of Tibet and Taiwan...