Commentary
This “strategic signaling” is a subtle nuclear threat against the United States that the administration in Washington is downplaying so as not to give Beijing and Moscow too much propaganda value. Yet it indicates Chinese and Russian willingness to engage in nuclear brinkmanship on a range of issues, the most important of which are U.S. military support for Ukraine and Taiwan. The flight plan’s proximity to the Arctic also sends a message about the coordinated Arctic ambitions of both Moscow and Beijing.
As the flights were within the U.S. and Canadian air defense identification zone, U.S. and Canadian fighter jets scrambled to meet the incursion and send our own message: Stay out of North America.
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The United States could slow nuclear proliferation in East Asia by offering to base U.S. tactical nuclear weapons on Japanese, South Korean, and Taiwanese soil. The United States has done this for some European countries to deter Russia, and the same could be done to deter China.
However, that puts us in the middle of what could become a nuclear war. Giving our support for an independent nuclear deterrent for our East Asian allies would remove us as the nuclear middleman. That decreases the risk to the United States were a nuclear war to break out and arguably decreases the probability of such a war in the first place.
Beijing’s promotion of a nuclear “no first use” policy would put smaller and more peaceful countries that want to spend less on their conventional militaries, like Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, at a disadvantage. For example, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has at its disposal many more soldiers, sailors, ships, and planes than Taiwan. If the PLA attacks Taiwan with conventional forces, as it might around 2027, and Taiwan and the United States do not have the conventional forces necessary for defense, an independent tactical nuclear weapons capability possessed by Taipei could make the difference. The credible threat of a tactical nuclear strike on PLA forces crossing the Taiwan Strait, or about to cross, might deter the decision to invade in the first place and, thus, keep the peace even without strategic nuclear weapons.
Thus, wars can be averted through the threat of a nuclear first strike, especially if that threat were made more credible by providing Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea with their own nuclear weapons. The peace in East Asia is currently unstable in part because Beijing could believe that Washington is bluffing about its willingness to defend these countries. It is difficult for Washington to credibly commit to this deterrent, given the risk of nuclear retaliation against the United States. If Taiwan were under an overwhelming attack anyway, Taipei would have less to lose through the use of its own independent nuclear deterrent. This makes its deterrent more credible, rather than just cheap talk, and so more likely to stop a war from starting.
As successive U.S. administrations hope that they can convince the CCP to return to a path of peace and trade, the CCP’s expansive territorial ambitions appear to be hard-baked into the organization. This is evidenced by its attempt to expand its own nuclear weapons capabilities while stopping the nuclear deterrence capabilities of its neighbors. Nothing could be more irresponsible and destabilizing. The United States and allies in both Asia and Europe need a better and more unified plan to keep the peace.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
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