Sec. 3501. Findings on strategic security and arms control
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Congress makes the following findings: The United States and the PRC have both made commitments to advancing strategic security through enforceable arms control and non-proliferation agreements as states parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, done at Washington, London, and Moscow July 1, 1968. The United States has long taken tangible steps to seek effective, verifiable, and enforceable arms control and non-proliferation agreements that support United States and allied security by— controlling the spread of nuclear materials and technology; placing limits on the production, stockpiling, and deployment of nuclear weapons; decreasing misperception and miscalculation; and avoiding destabilizing nuclear arms competition.
In May 2019, Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency Lieutenant General Robert Ashley stated, China is likely to at least double the size of its nuclear stockpile in the course of implementing the most rapid expansion and diversification of its nuclear arsenal in China’s history. . The PLA is building a full triad of modernized fixed and mobile ground-based launchers and new capabilities for nuclear-armed bombers and submarine-launched ballistic missiles. In June 2020, the Department of State raised concerns in its annual Adherence to and Compliance with Arms Control, Nonproliferation, and Disarmament Agreements and Commitments report to Congress that the PRC is not complying with the zero-yield nuclear testing ban and accused the PRC of blocking the flow of data from the monitoring stations in China.
The Department of Defense 2020 Report on Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China states that the PRC intends to increase peacetime readiness of its nuclear forces by moving to a launch on warning posture with an expanded silo-based force . The Department of Defense report also states that, over the next decade, the PRC’s nuclear stockpile—currently estimated in the low 200s—is projected to least double in size as the PRC expands and modernizes its nuclear force.
The PRC is conducting research on its first potential early warning radar, with technical cooperation from Russia. This radar could indicate that the PRC is moving to a launch-on warning posture. The PRC plans to use its increasingly capable space, cyber, and electronic warfare capabilities against United States early warning systems and critical infrastructure in a crisis scenario. This poses great risk to strategic security, as it could lead to inadvertent escalation. The PRC’s nuclear expansion comes as a part of a massive modernization of the PLA which, combined with the PLA’s aggressive actions, has increasingly destabilized the Indo-Pacific region.
The PLA Rocket Force (PLARF), which was elevated in 2015 to become a separate branch within the PLA, has formed 11 new missile brigades since May 2017, some of which are capable of both conventional and nuclear strikes. Unlike the United States, which separates its conventional strike and nuclear capabilities, the PLARF appears to not only co-locate conventional and nuclear forces, including dual-use missiles like the DF–26, but to task the same unit with both nuclear and conventional missions.
Such intermingling could lead to inadvertent escalation in a crisis. The United States Defense Intelligence Agency determined in March 2020 that the PLA tested more ballistic missiles than the rest of the world combined in 2019. A January 2021 report from the Institute for Defense Analysis found that many United States and international observers viewed China’s no first-use policy with skepticism, especially in the wake of the expansion and modernization of its nuclear capabilities.
The long-planned United States nuclear modernization program will not increase the United States nuclear weapons stockpile, predates China’s conventional military and nuclear expansion, and is not an arms race against China. The United States extended nuclear deterrence— provides critical strategic security around the world; is an essential element of United States military alliances; and serves a vital non-proliferation function. As a signatory to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, done at Washington, London, and Moscow July 1, 1968, the PRC is obligated under Article Six of the treaty to pursue arms control negotiations in good faith.
The United States has, on numerous occasions, called on the PRC to participate in strategic arms control negotiations, but the PRC has thus far declined. The Governments of Japan, the United Kingdom, Poland, Slovenia, Denmark, Norway, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, the Netherlands, Romania, Austria, Montenegro, Ukraine, Slovakia, Spain, North Macedonia, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Croatia, and Albania, as well as the Deputy Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, have all encouraged the PRC to join arms control discussions.