(Mark Pellin, Headline USA) As the Biden administration’s Defense Department focuses on appeasing Generation Woke with transgender mandates and myriad multicultural DEI — diversity, equity and inclusion — policies, China has outpaced America on a key military arms measure.
“The number of land-based fixed and mobile ICBM launchers in China exceeds the number of ICBM launchers in the United States,” the commander of the U.S. Strategic Command wrote last month to the Senate and House Armed Services Committees.
House committee chairman Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., called the admission a stark and brutal “wake-up call for the United States.”
“It is not an understatement to say that the Chinese nuclear modernization program is advancing faster than most believed possible,” Rogers wrote in a joint statement issued with Senate Armed Services ranking member Roger Wicker, R-Miss.. Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colo., and Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., the top Republicans on subcommittees that oversee nuclear weapons programs, also signed on to the statement.
“We have no time to waste in adjusting our nuclear force posture to deter both Russia and China,” the lawmakers wrote. “This will have to mean higher numbers and new capabilities.”
The DOD’s StratComm noted that the U.S. still has more intercontinental-range missiles and nuclear warheads, and many of China’s land-based launchers currently house empty silos, but the extensive count of launchers have led military analyst to believe China has more nuclear weapons in the pipeline, ready to fill those silos.
The revelation that shocked GOP lawmakers came days before the U.S. belatedly shot down a Chinese spy balloon that had flown across the country, including over Montana’s three nuclear missile silo fields.
“Make no mistake, that balloon was intentionally launched as a calculated show of force,” Rogers said Tuesday at a House hearing on the threat of the Chinese Communist Party to U.S. national defense.
“We have to stop being naïve about the threat we face from China,” Rogers said. “We no longer have the luxury of time. We need to act now to get ahead of this threat.”
Last month’s update on Chinese missile launchers was the latest indication that the threat must be taken seriously, Rogers said, noting that, “Under President Xi, the Chinese Communist Party has nearly tripled its defense spending in the past decade.”
In just two years the CCP has doubled their number of nuclear warheads, a goal that military officials had estimated would take at least a decade,” Rogers said.
“The CCP is rapidly expanding its nuclear capability. They have doubled their number of warheads in just two years,” Rogers said at the outset of Tuesday’s hearing. “We estimated it would take them a decade to do that.”
The weapons acceleration is not being designed for China’s self-defense, he warned, pointing to the communist actor’s consistent “violation of international law” in deploying “stealth fighters, bombers and missiles” in the South China Sea and its continued intimidation of Taiwan.
“In recent years, the CCP has used its military to push out its borders, threaten our allies in the region, and gain footholds on new continents,” Rogers said.
“China is the most challenging national security threat America has faced in 30 years. If we fail to acknowledge that, and take immediate action to deter it, the next 30 years could be devastating for our nation.”
