Amid warning to US officials, Pentagon says China to have 1500 nuclear warheads by 2035

The Pentagon in its report to the congress has said that China has warned US officials not to interfere in its relationship with India.

The report on Chinese military buildup said,, throughout its standoff with India along the Line of Actual Control, Chinese officials sought to downplay the severity of the crisis, emphasising Beijing’s intent to preserve border stability and prevent the standoff from harming other areas of its bilateral relationship with India.

"The PRC (People's Republic of China) seeks to prevent border tensions from causing India to partner more closely with the United States. PRC officials have warned U.S. officials to not interfere with the PRC’s relationship with India," the Pentagon said in its latest report to the Congress on Chinese military buildup.

Additionally, the Pentagon report highlights that China is likely to have a stockpile of about 1,500 warheads by 2035, up from the current estimated number of 400. Adding that, Beijing aims to modernise, diversify, and expand its nuclear forces in the next decade

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China's current nuclear modernisation exercise has exceeded the previous modernization attempts in both scale and complexity, it said.

China is investing in and expanding the number of its land-, sea-, and air-based nuclear delivery platforms and constructing the infrastructure necessary to support this major expansion of its nuclear forces, it said.

China, it said, is also supporting this expansion by increasing its capacity to produce and separate plutonium by constructing fast breeder reactors and reprocessing facilities. In 2021, Beijing probably accelerated its nuclear expansion, it said.

Among other things, the report notes an intensified Chinese diplomatic, economic, political and military pressure against Taiwan. The report highlights increasing military pressure through 2021 and its increase in 2022, particularly associated with Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan.

The Pentagon report also offers some very important new insights on how the Chinese Army views the future of warfare. The Chinese Army refers to systems destruction warfare as the next way of war.

With Inputs from PTI