China Ballistic Missiles and Nuclear Arms Thread

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Kalec

Junior Member
Registered Member
I think this is my final piece on Chinese nuclear warhead.

The PRC probably intends to develop new nuclear warheads and delivery platforms that at least equal the effectiveness, reliability, and/or survivability of some of the warheads and delivery platforms currently under development by the United States and/or Russia.
US admitted in 2020 report for the first time that US, Russia and China are generally on the same page of nuclear warhead design, after all warhead design has been in freeze for decades still no sign of any huge upgrade.

From Chinese side, many nuclear experts, who designed warhead themselves, have long being saying that China is at least on par with "advanced international level." Although being opaque on warhead design for decades, I think there are at least 5 active warhead designs.

Rumored CodenameLauncherYieldNuclear test
506 warheadExclusively DF-5A4Mt - 5MtThe 21st nuclear test on 11/17/1976
515 warheadDF-21/JL-1 and possibly by DF-261MtThe 16th test on 06/17/1974 or the 27th test on 10/16/1980
535 warheadDF-5B/DF-31/DF-41650ktThe 37th test on 05/21/1992
575 warheadUnknown200kt - 250ktThe 33rd test on 06/05/1987 or
the 36th test on 05/25/1990
"Shadow warhead"UnknownUnknownA series of nuclear tests in 90s

The first nuclear bomb is named after Project 596 and the DF-2 warhead was called 548 warhead, DF-3 & DF-4 warhead was likely to be 524 warhead or 512 warhead.

It is a very clear pattern here. The first digit starts with a "5" and the last two digits got halved between generation. I would like to take a wild guess here, there is warhead named as "503" between 506 and 515, but it doesn't matter anyway.

The quality of 535 and 575 is likely to be on par with US/Soviet design in late 70s and 80s because they were developed after China acquired very accurate information on Russian and American design in 80s.

From the book "Tiger Trap: America's Secret Spy War with China,"
Alarmingly, the Chinese secret document, which bore a 1988 date, gave the exact diameter of the W-88's primary, 115mm. Even more significantly, the document disclosed that the W-88's primary was "two-point aspherical"—a highly sensitive and, it was thought, carefully guarded US secret—which meant that it was shaped more like a football or a pear than a grapefruit, with implosion points at each end.
It got worse. The Chinese document accurately gave the radius of the round secondary as 172mm, or just under 7 inches, and it disclosed that, unlike other nukes, the primary of the W-88 was at the tapered tip of the warhead, forward of the secondary, another secret that was supposed to be closely held.
Finally, the document accurately reported the overall length of the warhead as 1522mm, or 5 feet. There were other documents in the walk-in's cache,
hundreds that dealt with other foreign missile and defense systems, including those of Russia and France.
It is not only amusing but scary that "The Chinese data was said to be one millimeter off." And it was caused by unit conversion.
"The US document had measurements in inches. The Chinese document had dimensions in millimeters. If you translated the US document into millimeters and rounded off the number and then translated it back to inches there could be a slight discrepancy."

While US insisted that China couldn't have tested its first miniaturized bomb in 1992 if not stealing from US. It is complete bs as everyone knows it. Because neutron bomb also required a miniaturized design and China successfully tested it in 1984. It also doesn't make sense since China just tested a new bomb, rumored to be 575 warhead, in 1990 and why should China still use inferior design after claimed "espionage" happened in late 70s.

The unclear part of Chinese warhead arsenal is mainly due to numerous fractional test in 90s, making it very hard to estimate the yield. They was said to "provide reference for future warhead design." US is also developing new W93 warhead by using past test data, so it is still possible for China though unlikely to develop new warhead from one way or another. At least US is claiming that China is modernizing warhead design without providing any details.
 

BoraTas

Captain
Registered Member
Interesting development. I think it is the launchers part. US STRATCOM shouted a lot about silos last year. I guess they added a few hundred silos to their ICBM launchers of China list.

What I found more interesting is the US has a law that requires the STRATCOM to notify the Congress when China surpasses the USA in launchers, warheads on ICBMs or ICBMs. The law requires an unclassified notification too. I look forward to what they will declassify.
1670299987201.png

1670300023966.png
 

Kalec

Junior Member
Registered Member
Interesting development. I think it is the launchers part. US STRATCOM shouted a lot about silos last year. I guess they added a few hundred silos to their ICBM launchers of China list.

What I found more interesting is the US has a law that requires the STRATCOM to notify the Congress when China surpasses the USA in launchers, warheads on ICBMs or ICBMs. The law requires an unclassified notification too. I look forward to what they will declassify.
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If it is true (I think it is very likely to be true) then China is currently deploying about 500 warheads.
 

ACuriousPLAFan

Brigadier
Registered Member
If it is true (I think it is very likely to be true) then China is currently deploying about 500 warheads.
From 200 to 400/500 warheads in just one year from 2021-2022... Imagine how many more warheads can China produce as long as China keep expanding her warhead production capacity.

If China is producing 200 warheads per year (taking from the 2022 Pentagon report), then China would have 2000 warheads by 2030, assuming China has 400 warheads by the end of this year. That means China wouldn't even need to wait until 2035 to get 1500 warheads.
 

clockwork

Junior Member
Registered Member
Interesting development. I think it is the launchers part. US STRATCOM shouted a lot about silos last year. I guess they added a few hundred silos to their ICBM launchers of China list.

What I found more interesting is the US has a law that requires the STRATCOM to notify the Congress when China surpasses the USA in launchers, warheads on ICBMs or ICBMs. The law requires an unclassified notification too. I look forward to what they will declassify.
View attachment 103025

View attachment 103026
Anyone have any sources/further discussion of this? I thought it was fake, but apparently real:
 

Kalec

Junior Member
Registered Member
From 200 to 400/500 warheads in just one year from 2021-2022...

If China is producing 200 warheads per year (taking from the 2022 Pentagon report), then China would have 2000 warheads by 2030, assuming China has 400 warheads by the end of this year. That means China wouldn't even need to wait until 2035 to get 1500 warheads.
I think it is an over-reaction from Pentagon on correcting past wrong estimation, not necessarily means that 200 warheads per year.

But I heard some rumors four years ago, claiming that China spent two weeks producing one warhead and moving to one warhead per week and ultimately one warhead per day, though don't know how this rumor holds up after 4 years.
 

bustead

Junior Member
Registered Member
Found this interesting essay when searching for more WgPu production rate assessment.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Basically the mainstream frequently quoted assumption is based on Zhang Hui's 2017 assessment, it concluded that China may have a current 2.9kg WgPu reverse.

This essay discussed Zhang's and two other assessments, arguing the plutonium rate could be higher than originally thought. Because Zhang's assumption is that China decided to half the prodution rate and shift plutonium production from purely military plutonium use to dual-use purpose in 1980. Well .... for no particular reason.

The first civilian reactor was completed and connected to the grid in 1991, almost one decade after the claimed halvation. And the shutdown of plutonium production was in 1987, five year earlier than the reactor is completed. And China also got hold of American warheads design by early 1980 and then begin true modern warhead design work. China made several attempts on build neutron bombs in 80s and two advanced primary designs and several warhead designs in 90s.

AFAIK China didn't export fuel rod to other countries and they didn't need them anyway, so the claim of halvation in my view is very suspicious without concrete proof. He was practically suggesting that China realized its huge design gap with US in 1980s and decided to go with intensive nuclear test after the chief designers wrote a joint letter directly to Deng Xiaoping for approval meanwhile ...... halving the WgPu production rate.

Here's the source he quoted for this claim, basically "I made it up" vibe.


The reassessment conclude that the actual WpGu stockpile is around 5,200 kg with no assumed reduction in production.

AFAIK Zhang Hui is completely wrong on plutonium usage on each primary, which he claimed that 4 kg WgPu is needed for such primary.

China has two primary stage design, respectively with 5-7kt and 8kt energy, both deduced from past nuclear test and the minimum energy needed to ignite one thermonuclear warhead.

As shown in this chart, it is absolutely no way China need 4 kg WpGu to produce a 8kt primary as almost North Korea did a better job on that. For reference the low category was what US did with Fat Man bomb, 6.1 kg WgPu for 20kt explosion.

The actual plutonium usage for each Chinese primary is likely to be around 1.5 - 1.8 kg WgPu, a.k.a 1,600 - 2000 warheads with no new production or 2900 - 3500 warheads on new reassessment.
View attachment 102819

View attachment 102820
Th
may I ask where did the charts come from?
 

bustead

Junior Member
Registered Member
I think this is my final piece on Chinese nuclear warhead.


US admitted in 2020 report for the first time that US, Russia and China are generally on the same page of nuclear warhead design, after all warhead design has been in freeze for decades still no sign of any huge upgrade.

From Chinese side, many nuclear experts, who designed warhead themselves, have long being saying that China is at least on par with "advanced international level." Although being opaque on warhead design for decades, I think there are at least 5 active warhead designs.

Rumored CodenameLauncherYieldNuclear test
506 warheadExclusively DF-5A4Mt - 5MtThe 21st nuclear test on 11/17/1976
515 warheadDF-21/JL-1 and possibly by DF-261MtThe 16th test on 06/17/1974 or the 27th test on 10/16/1980
535 warheadDF-5B/DF-31/DF-41650ktThe 37th test on 05/21/1992
575 warheadUnknown200kt - 250ktThe 33rd test on 06/05/1987 or
the 36th test on 05/25/1990
"Shadow warhead"UnknownUnknownA series of nuclear tests in 90s

The first nuclear bomb is named after Project 596 and the DF-2 warhead was called 548 warhead, DF-3 & DF-4 warhead was likely to be 524 warhead or 512 warhead.

It is a very clear pattern here. The first digit starts with a "5" and the last two digits got halved between generation. I would like to take a wild guess here, there is warhead named as "503" between 506 and 515, but it doesn't matter anyway.

The quality of 535 and 575 is likely to be on par with US/Soviet design in late 70s and 80s because they were developed after China acquired very accurate information on Russian and American design in 80s.

From the book "Tiger Trap: America's Secret Spy War with China,"



It is not only amusing but scary that "The Chinese data was said to be one millimeter off." And it was caused by unit conversion.
"The US document had measurements in inches. The Chinese document had dimensions in millimeters. If you translated the US document into millimeters and rounded off the number and then translated it back to inches there could be a slight discrepancy."

While US insisted that China couldn't have tested its first miniaturized bomb in 1992 if not stealing from US. It is complete bs as everyone knows it. Because neutron bomb also required a miniaturized design and China successfully tested it in 1984. It also doesn't make sense since China just tested a new bomb, rumored to be 575 warhead, in 1990 and why should China still use inferior design after claimed "espionage" happened in late 70s.

The unclear part of Chinese warhead arsenal is mainly due to numerous fractional test in 90s, making it very hard to estimate the yield. They was said to "provide reference for future warhead design." US is also developing new W93 warhead by using past test data, so it is still possible for China though unlikely to develop new warhead from one way or another. At least US is claiming that China is modernizing warhead design without providing any details.
I would like to argue that the final nuclear tests conducted in 1996 are related to IHE use in nuclear primaries. Thus, the warhead is likely 575 but the tamper maybe replaced with DU as a cost and HEU saving measure. As long as the warhead detonates, the IHE worked as intended.

Also, some speculation. I think it is likely that China has some sort of small/tactical nuclear weapon developped in the 90s, whether or not it is actually fielded is another story.
 

Kalec

Junior Member
Registered Member
may I ask where did the charts come from?
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
I would like to argue that the final nuclear tests conducted in 1996 are related to IHE use in nuclear primaries. Thus, the warhead is likely 575 but the tamper maybe replaced with DU as a cost and HEU saving measure. As long as the warhead detonates, the IHE worked as intended.

Also, some speculation. I think it is likely that China has some sort of small/tactical nuclear weapon developped in the 90s, whether or not it is actually fielded is another story.
Technically the 1996 primary is widely supposed to be a new primary design with IHE design for a claimed "Shadow Warhead," which I don't even know whether it exists. Because I can't find any place to fit it in among Chinese missiles.

And no I don't think China has any tactical warhead deployed yet, it is a simple play with tritium in the primary to control the yield. But it doesn't make sense for Chinese nuclear doctrine and no stockpile to waste as well.
 
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