State Department: Chinese nuclear buildup 'concerning'
Spokesman Ned Price said satellite evidence of more than 100 new missile silos under construction in the Chinese desert raises questions about Beijing's intent and its decades-old minimum-deterrence strategy.
The United States said China's rapid buildup of its nuclear forces is "concerning," after satellite imagery analysis showed Beijing constructing more than 100 new missile silos in a desert area of the country's west. State Department spokesperson Ned Price, addressing the reports at a briefing, said the pace of the buildup suggests China's nuclear arsenal will expand faster and further than Washington had previously anticipated.
I think what is fair to say is that these reports and other developments suggest that the PRC's nuclear arsenal will grow more quickly, and to a higher level than perhaps previously anticipated. This buildup – it is concerning.
Price added that the development "raises questions about the PRC's intent," according to U.S. News & World Report's account of the briefing. The silo construction was first identified by researchers at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, who located roughly 119 construction sites near the city of Yumen in Gansu province that resemble existing Chinese launch facilities for nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles; the Washington Post had reported the findings days earlier.
A shift from minimum deterrence
Price said the scale of the construction had become difficult for Beijing to conceal and appeared to mark a departure from China's decades-old nuclear doctrine, which has historically relied on a comparatively small arsenal sized for minimum deterrence rather than parity with the US or Russia. He called on Beijing to engage with Washington on "practical measures to reduce the risks of destabilizing arms races," framing the buildup as a reason for arms-control dialogue rather than only a security threat.
What officials are saying
China's government has not confirmed the purpose of the sites identified by satellite imagery, and the reporting retrieved for this account does not include an on-the-record Chinese government rebuttal to the specific silo-count figures. Later Pentagon assessments in 2021 built on the same concern: the Defense Department's annual China Military Power report, released that November, said Beijing appeared to be on the cusp of a nuclear buildup that exceeded the department's earlier projections, projecting China could have 700 warheads by 2027 and 1,000 by 2030 — more than double the prior year's estimate.
What it signals
A State Department spokesperson using the word "concerning" about another nuclear power's silo construction is calibrated diplomatic language, but pairing it with an explicit call for arms-control talks signals Washington sees this as a structural shift, not a one-off report. Price's comment that the buildup "raises questions about intent" is notable because it does not allege a specific use for the silos — the concern is about the strategic doctrine shift, from minimum deterrence toward a much larger force, more than a single new weapon or threat.
US In News compiled this archived account from contemporaneous coverage by U.S. News & World Report and reporting on the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies findings. It restores a story originally published on this site in July 2021; figures are as reported at the time.