An annual report by the U.S. Department of Defense estimates that China is rapidly expanding its nuclear arsenal, tripling its stockpile over the past decade and placing Beijing on track to possess more than 1,000 nuclear warheads by the end of the decade.
According to a draft of the Pentagon report titled Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China, cited in an article published by Reuters, China has likely loaded more than 100 solid-fueled DF-31–class intercontinental ballistic missiles into three newly constructed missile silo fields in northern China. The report assesses China’s current nuclear stockpile at more than 600 warheads.
That figure represents a sharp increase from last year’s Pentagon estimate of roughly 550 warheads, suggesting an expansion of more than 50 nuclear weapons in a single year. The trajectory marks a dramatic shift from earlier decades, when China’s nuclear arsenal was long believed to number around 200 warheads.
China became a nuclear power in the 1960s but maintained a relatively small arsenal for decades. Analysts believe Beijing reassessed its deterrence posture around 2010, concluding that a limited stockpile was no longer sufficient in an era of advancing missile defenses and great-power competition.
In 2020, U.S. intelligence assessments indicated that China may have reactivated its Lop Nur nuclear testing site in Xinjiang, which had been dormant since 1996 following China’s signing of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Beijing has signed but not ratified the treaty, and Chinese officials have not publicly acknowledged any renewed testing activity at the site.
Despite growing concern in Washington, Beijing has rejected overtures from U.S. President Donald Trump to engage in trilateral nuclear arms talks. Chinese officials have consistently argued that any meaningful nuclear negotiations must first occur between the United States and Russia, which together possess the vast majority of the world’s nuclear weapons.
Over the summer, Trump generated confusion after announcing a resumption of nuclear testing following Russian missile tests, before later clarifying that the testing would involve missile systems rather than nuclear detonations. Trump has also repeatedly cited the Lop Nur site as justification for Washington’s desire to regain control of Afghanistan’s Bagram Air Base, claiming—incorrectly—that the base lies roughly an hour from the Chinese test site.
Trump went as far as threatening Afghanistan in September with unspecified consequences if Kabul did not hand control of the base back to the United States, linking the issue directly to concerns over China’s expanding nuclear capabilities.