How many do they actually have

no first use policy at first sounds like a noble and and enlightend policy, that was enacted in the service of peace, until you learn china's doctrine on the use of thermonuclear weapons is counter value instead of counterforce, part of chinas no first use policy is the plan to execute the large revenge killing ever in human history.
that being said I admire India and china for having no first use policies, I wish the United States, Russia, Pakistan, North Korea, France and the UK had them

any spare source you could share about their thermonuclear policy of counter value, really interested, cause if that was the truth they should have more nukes than russia by now

Probably one of the few countries in the world that can reliably delivery a thermonuclear weapon to every square inch of US soil. So I'm betting they have enough to level every major city if they really wanted to.

already see it trough wiki, no need to source me

why would any government report the actual amount of nuclear weapons they produced?
why would they rely on goofy intercontinental rocketry when they could just permanently deploy the weapons in their potential target nations?

It's actually a really good policy to have considering you'll look like the good guy in any sort of limited nuclear exchange. You can always argue you didn't throw the first punch but you sure as shit made sure you won the fight.

Somehow I doubt they have as few nukes as they say they do. Not as many as us, for sure, but almost certainly more than the what, four or five hundred they say they have? Seems to me it would make sense to tell the world you have a bunch for the sake of deterrence, then keep a bunch in your back pocket, in case someone gets any fancy ideas concerning first strikes. Just a spitball.

The americans estimate that they have only 260

And how would that be made, and who would actually activate them

Countervalue is what you do when you don’t have enough throw weight to present a credible counterforce threat. Countervalue does not mean glassing every city, town, village, and hamlet your opponent has. It just means that you have the capability and the policy to incinerate some percentage of his civilian population.

Countervalue is a losing strategy, but it makes victory a very expensive proposition for the winner.

>when they could just permanently deploy the weapons in their potential target nations?

Until somebody forgets to pay the monthly bill for the self-storage unit, it goes to auction, and then a perfectly good nuke winds up on Craigslist for a couple hundred bucks.

>sure as shit made sure you won the fight.

Countervalue strikes are how you lose the fight. While you’re trying to kill your enemies’ population, he’s doing his best to kill your arsenal. Whoever finishes with the most nukes still available gets to dictate terms to the side that used all of theirs to kill civilians.

Only works if nuclear parity hasn't been achieved.

>when user posts on Jow Forums asking what the weird cylinder he just got from a self storage unit auction does
>when people tell user to cover it in gasoline and set it on fire
>when user actually fucking does it

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>Somehow I doubt they have as few nukes as they say they do.

Nuke production is such a mammoth undertaking that the various processes and precursors can easily be monitored by satellite recon. The amount of resources China has put into their nuclear arsenal gives them a warhead count in the 250-450 range. They’ve got fewer than 100 delivery vehicles capable of reaching the US.

That will be a pretty stupid comment, but I need to make it, can't the process be disguised in some way, maybe to look like another thing being made?

Which is the whole purpose of counterforce. In an adverse correlation of forcee, such as China v US, the US could expend 80% of its ready arsenal and still be on par with China. China’s policy of holding their arsenal as a deterrent is appropriate, given the size of their arsenal.

Land based perhaps.
How about submarine launched?

The footprint is too big. Uranium mining and transuranic production requires literally moving mountains and cooking them down into a few kilos of processed metal. Millions of tons of material have to be moved, billions of KWh are expended in the refining process. Disguising the process would be like trying to disguise a football game by having it inside a church.

What, delivery vehicles? It’s very likely they have a couple of dozen SLBMs, which brings a host of different problems. If they have boomers, chances are very high that each boomer has a fast attack boat or two keeping tabs on it.

>counter force
Counter force doesn't work. Submarines and TEL make it useless. ALL countries are working on a counter value strategy. McNamara calculated as much - if between 25% - 50% of the population is annhilated, a nuclear exchange becomes unthinkable and that is the basis of MAD. You think the US's arsenal is counter force? The US has more nukes than Russia has planes.

>counter force
What is, the early sixties? Counter force ignores survivable nuclear assets and human nature. Early detection and assets like TELs, submarines and China's supposed underground train network for nukes mean you cannot guarantee any substantial part of the enemy's nuclear arsenal is destroyed before it is launched.

>why would they rely on goofy intercontinental rocketry when they could just permanently deploy the weapons in their potential target nations?
Because they can't deploy them in target nations, these weapons give off a detectable signature and they'd be discovered in short order.

They are improving their delivery continuously. Which is the smart thing to do economically speaking since the R&D means they get to have something no-one else has while keeping credible threat.

The bible on nuclear policy is "On Thermonuclear War" by Herman Kahn

>good guy
To whom? Your dead population?

Your fucking insane, chinks are insects

Because it would discourage American adventurism. If all great powers have nuclear parity, there would be peace.

It doesn't take many to have a real deterrent especially when you have boomers.

And you’re just a pile of lard and shit.

You should maybe study some current material on the subject before posting anymore. You’re coming across as willfully ignorant.

>McNamara
Quoting outdated 60s policies, while simultaneously deriding the 60s doesn’t help your case at all. MAD hasn’t been a thing since the USSR folded. Increases in targeting precision have moved the doctrine in the direction of smaller yields and counterforce postures. China doesn’t have the warheads to sit at the MAD table, nor to they have the throw weight and precision for credible counterforce. Their alleged tunnel network is useless if they don’t have the delivery systems and warheads to make it effective. In their current posture, their arsenal could be eliminated by a single preemptive strike.

Worst case scenario, if they do launch a strike, they hit 20 or 30 US cities and then cease to exist when the retaliatory strike lands. US spends a couple of decades rebuilding while Korea and Taiwan split the former mainland Chinese tertitory.

we have to hit the big reset button, civilization was a mistake

Thanks

War is terrible, but peace is also terrible.

>falling for the MAD meme
Once everyone has nukes, we're all fucked. Everyone will be threatening one another with them until some brainlet in some 3rd world country fires one.