[Mariner]

“The Chinese likely have thousands of nukes.”

More nonsense.

They would not be able to hide that arsenal from US surveillance. US intelligence pegs them below 300, mostly tactical.

[Zhang Fei]

[More nonsense.

They would not be able to hide that arsenal from US surveillance. US intelligence pegs them below 300, mostly tactical.]

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The way US surveillance was unable to predict the Indian, Pakistani and North Korean tests, I’d be leery of anything it says re foreign nuclear capabilities, especially with respect to a Chinese state that has enacted severe penalties against the disclosure something as commonplace as economic statistics. Note the wholesale rollup of Chinese agents, thanks possibly to Hillary’s use of a private (and penetrated) e-mail server.

The US intelligence services are probably the worst of all the major powers, except in wartime sigint and satellite intel. And even the latter were unable to prevent the shootdown of a stealth warplane operated by an adversary with 2% of the population of the US, and whose principal export was the Yugo. Then there was the miscued targeting of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade.

[Celerity]

If the Chinese have power, they will flaunt it. Perhaps not against us, but against everyone in their region.

But saying “over a thousand nukes” is like saying “A couple trillion, here and there”

If China wants to use even a single nuke then it’s end of life as we know it.