Yes, a lot of people have discussed the possibility.
But consider: if any country - e.g.Taiwan, Japan, the US - made a conventional attack on China that did the same damage as one or more nuclear weapons, simply because of where it hit - then China would treat that as a nuclear attack.
They wouldn't slap their sides, and say 'good one! We are honor-bound not to reply with nukes, because you used only conventional missiles to kill a million people'
No. They would strike back, and launch 150 kt tactical nukes until they had inflicted damage roughly equivalent to the damage they'd received.
They don't have anything like the Russia or US nuclear stockpiles, but there’s not much out of range of the Chinese nuclear arm. Their Jin-launched missiles can strike Hawaii and Alaska. Their land-based stuff can hit pretty much anything made by man, except for the little flag at Tranquility Base.
So please Freepers, carefully consider what China would actually do if the US did blow up the Three Gorges Dam.
The Chinese would put several holes in San Francisco, or nuclear-snipe every CBG they could find and they would retain the moral high ground - because (in this awful scenario) the US would have struck first.
I think the idea of hitting TGD is to deter the CCP from invading Taiwan in the first place. And Taiwan is capable of it without the US, so it is like a Mutual Assured Destruction scenario.
However, like any doomsday weapon you would have to NOT keep it a secret in order to deter.
“ Their land-based stuff can hit pretty much anything made by man”
What makes you so sure ? They can’t even predict where their deorbited satellite will crash or make it descend in a controlled manner.
Once upon a time the Russians used to be an invincible superpower until they invaded a little country supplied with western weapons. Then they faced humiliation. Everything we know about Chinese capabilities is through propaganda videos and intelligence sources. We have never seen anything in actual combat.