• Adm. Charles Richard warns that China is producing nuclear weapons faster than the US.
• He calls the situation a “near-term challenge”.
• The Pentagon warns about China’s military buildup and nuclear weapons research.

At a closed briefing earlier this week, the Commander of US Strategic Command, which supervises the US nuclear weapons program, cautioned that China is producing nuclear weapons faster than the US and termed the situation a “near-term challenge.”

For years, Pentagon officials have warned about China’s military buildup and nuclear weapons research, but Richard’s words paint a more dismal picture.

“The ship is slowly sinking,” Adm. Charles Richard stated. “They are putting capability in the field faster than we are, so it is sinking slowly.”

Richard labelled China’s nuclear weapons development a “near-term danger.”

“As those curves keep going, it doesn’t matter how good our [operation plan], commanders, or forces are—we won’t have enough of them. That’s an immediate issue.”

Richard spoke Wednesday at the Naval Submarine League Annual Symposium. Friday’s Department of Defense news piece released Richard’s comments from the closed event.

In policy documents describing the US’s defense and military strategy released at the end of October, the Biden administration has declared China the US’s principal global adversary and cautioned about its military and nuclear weapons program.

“The only rival with both the intent and increasingly the capability to systematically attack the United States across the board, militarily, economically, technologically, diplomatically is China,” a senior defense official said.

China “likely plans to possess at least 1,000 deliverable warheads by the end of the decade,” according to the Nuclear Posture Review.

In 2021, Richard called China’s nuclear program “strategic breakout.”

China is breaking out strategically. In 2021, Richard described its nuclear and conventional forces’ tremendous growth and modernization as astonishing.

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