US hype of China's "nuclear threats" lays bare its double standards, again

Source
China Military Online
Editor
Wang Xinjuan
Time
2023-01-28 18:23:41

By Le Shui

The recent "two plus two" meeting between American and Japanese foreign and defense ministers once again had China in its crosshairs. Not only did the two countries agree to expand their military cooperation targeting China as an imaginary enemy, but they also vowed to keep a close eye on China’s ongoing and accelerating nuclear weapon development. The new trick of "denouncing" China's "nuclear threats" is just a "thief crying 'stop thief'" stunt by Washington, which, with a long record of randomly imposing nuclear deterrence on other countries, once again showed the world its deft practice of "double standards".

According to data published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the US possessed 5,550 nuclear warheads in 2021, including 1,700 strategic ones in deployment, and the total number was 1,728 more than in 2017. A report by the US Congressional Budget Office estimated the country’s spending on nuclear weapons at 634 billion US dollars in 2021-2030, 28% up from the previous decade. The White House's multiplication of its nuclear arsenal regardless of the international community's call for "nuclear disarmament" and its own debt-ridden dilemma has aroused serious suspicions and concerns.

Soon after China successfully test-fired its first atomic bomb, the Chinese government made a solemn commitment to the world that it would at no time and under no circumstances use nuclear weapons first and would never use them against non-nuclear weapon states and zones. It has never and will never pose a nuclear threat to other countries because its development of nuclear weapons is aimed to safeguard national security and preserve world peace against the nuclear blackmailing by certain major powers.

Posing a sharp contrast to this is the US that has kept nuclear deterrence in its toolkit ever since it dropped two atomic bombs in Japan during WWII, and it has bothered less to cover up its intention of pursuing "nuclear hegemony" after the equilibrium was breached at the end of the Cold War. In 2019, the US’ official withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) it signed with the Soviet Union during the Cold War lifted the restrictions on its development and deployment of intermediate-range missiles. Last year, the US DoD's Nuclear Posture Review went back on the commitment to "no-first use of nuclear weapons" and vowed to use such weapons to counter both nuclear attacks and non-nuclear strategic attacks. The Biden administration minced no words about maintaining nuclear deterrence as one of its top priorities in the latest National Security Strategy. Wielding its nuclear stick on one hand and accusing China of nuclear expansion on the other, the US really knows no limit when it comes to preserving its nuclear hegemony.

Washington is also a master hand at double standards regarding nuclear issues in order to attack its rivals and protect the allies. While pushing the nuclear weapon non-proliferation strategy in the world and flagrantly invading Iraq allegedly for its possession of weapons of mass destruction, the US has nevertheless decided to assist Australia in forming its own nuclear submarine fleet in defiance of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), a move likely to trigger a nuclear arms race in the Asia Pacific.

America's obsession with maintaining absolute nuclear superiority is rooted in its long-term pursuit for absolute military security, which requires absolute military superiority, and that has been on top of its agenda ever since the Cold War. Under this security goal, no wonder the superpower has left no stone unturned in keeping up its nuclear hegemony.

Yet this kind of pursuit of one's own absolute security at the price of others' security is essentially a manifestation of hegemonism. Nuclear equilibrium is the cornerstone for world peace in the nuclear era. This cardinal principle, however, has been ignored and trampled upon by the US as it seeks to secure absolute nuclear superiority to maintain nuclear deterrence on other countries.

But the Cold War era is long gone, and peace and development are the main theme today, when America's clinging to the Cold War mindset and constant fomentation of division and confrontation across the world seem all the more out of place. Instead of hyping up the "nuclear threats" from China, the US should reflect on itself more and earnestly fulfill its obligations of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation to keep the nuclear cloud left from the Cold War period from haunting humanity today.

Editor's note: Originally published on china.com.cn, this article is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information and opinions in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.

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