China Ready To Nuke USA

[oldsauroraman1]

China ‘ready to use N-weapons against US’
By Alexandra Harney in Beijing
Published: July 14 2005 21:59 | Last updated: July 14 2005 21:59

China is prepared to use nuclear weapons against the US if it is attacked by Washington during a confrontation over Taiwan, according to a senior Chinese military official.

“If the Americans draw their missiles and position-guided ammunition on to the target zone on China's territory, I think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons,” Zhu Chenghu, a major general in the People's Liberation Army, said at an official briefing.

Mr Zhu, who is also a professor at China's National Defence University, was speaking at a function for foreign journalists organised, in part, by the Chinese government. He added that China's definition of its territory includes warships and aircraft.

“If the Americans are determined to interfere [then] we will be determined to respond,” Mr Zhu said. “We Chinese will prepare ourselves for the destruction of all of the cities east of Xian. Of course the Americans will have to be prepared that hundreds. . . of cities will be destroyed by the Chinese.” Mr Zhu is a self-acknowledged “hawk” who has warned previously that China could strike the US with long-range missiles. But his threat to use nuclear weapons in a conflict over Taiwan is the most specific by a senior Chinese official in nearly a decade.

Rick Fisher, a former senior US congressional official and an authority on the Chinese military, said the specific nature of the threat “is a new addition to China's public discourse”.

China's official doctrine has called for no first use of nuclear weapons since its first atomic test in 1964. But Mr Zhu is not the first Chinese official to refer to the possibility of using such weapons first in a conflict over Taiwan.

Chas Freeman, a former US assistant secretary of defence, said in 1999 that a PLA official had told him China could respond in kind to a nuclear strike by the US in the event of a conflict with Taiwan.

“In the end you care more about Los Angeles than you do about Taipei,” Mr Freeman quoted this official as saying. The official is believed to have been Xiong Guangkai, now the PLA's deputy chief of general staff.

The rationale for the new threats is unclear. China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs could not be reached for comment.

Mr Zhu, who has risen from the rank of colonel over the past five years, insisted he was expressing his personal views, and that they did not represent the policy of the Chinese government. Nor was he anticipating war between China and the US.

But he said that, because China did not have the capability to fight a conventional war against the US, the threat to escalate might be the only way to stop a war.

His comments could provide insight into the thinking among some in the PLA amid growing anxiety in Washington about its capabilities. Last month, Donald Rumsfeld, defence secretary, voiced concern about China's military build-up.

news.ft.com/cms/s/28cfe55a-f4a7-11d9-9dd1-00000e2511c8.html

[JimW]

Sabre rattling. I wouldnt sweat it. The Chinese are the next superpower of the world based on economic potential.

“We . . . will prepare ourselves for the destruction of all of the cities east of Xian. Of course the Americans will have to be prepared that hundreds . . . of cities will be destroyed by the Chinese.”

The Chinese aren't radicals either, when was the last time you heard a threat followed by action from China.

Sounds like someone is blowin smoke.

[BuccaneersFan]

And the Chinese just wanted to buy our 8th largest oil company for the investment. Yeah right.

Zhu Chenghu is a moron, with our nuclear submarines alone, we could annihilate most, if not all, of China's cities in a matter of minutes.

The U.S. Navy is the best in the world. Stupid China

[oldsauroraman1]

Yes indeed they are stupid.

[GlennS87]

All the more reason to develop ABM capabillities.

[oldsauroraman1]

ABSOLUTELY! They are stupid enough to fire those nukes at us. They have a massive overpopulation problem and surely, their gov't. does not care about a few million people being killed by us.

[TJM]

oldsauroraman1 said:

ABSOLUTELY! They are stupid enough to fire those nukes at us. They have a massive overpopulation problem and surely, their gov't. does not care about a few million people being killed by us.

Maybe that's the whole idea?

[oldsauroraman1]

Could be!

[TJM]

buccaneersfan said:

we could annihilate most, if not all, of China's cities in a matter of minutes.

...but if we wiped 'em all out, where would we get our cheap lawn furniture and water torture kits?

[Letitroll98]

OK, let me explain to you what is going on here. General Zhu Chenghu is a leading professor at China's National Defense University, one of seven state sponsored think tanks like our Brookings Institution, Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, and Council on Foreign Relations. He is not an active military officer in the PLA. They have these conferences with their western counterparts all the time and exchange ideas and make speeches and reports and such. We also have a National Defense University and Zhu calls it a sister organization. He was suppose to be delivering a talk on obstacles to non-proliferation and went overboard during the question and answer period. He is not a spokesman for the Chinese government. Here are quotes from the article that were omitted from the original post:

"However, some US-based China experts cautioned that Gen Zhu probably did not represent the mainstream People's Liberation Army view. 'He is running way beyond his brief on what China might do in relation to the US if push comes to shove,' said one expert with knowledge of Gen Zhu. 'Nobody who is cleared for information on Chinese war scenarios is going to talk like this,' he added. Gen Zhu said his views did not represent official Chinese policy and he did not anticipate war with the US."

A bunch of spin delivered by Donald Rumsfeld before he reports to Congress about how much money the Pentagon needs next week. This type of reporting is not unusual for the Financial Times. However Alex usually sticks to her main beat in Hong Kong reporting on interest rates and housing prices, I wonder what she's doing all the way up in Beijing? BTW the tag on the article is "By Alexandra Harney in Beijing and Demetri Sevastopulo and Edward Alden in Washington", so that could be a reason for the discrepancy in the versions of the report.

[BuccaneersFan]

letitroll98 said:

He is not an active military officer in the PLA.

Then why does it say, "Zhu Chenghu, a major general in the People's Liberation Army," and "Mr Zhu, who has risen from the rank of colonel over the past five years?"

Or was that just a mistake.

letitroll98 said:

"However, some US-based China experts cautioned that Gen Zhu PROBABLY did not represent the mainstream People's Liberation Army view.

Probably didn't represent the mainstream People's Liberation Army view.

[BuccaneersFan]

tjm said:

buccaneersfan said:

we could annihilate most, if not all, of China's cities in a matter of minutes.

...but if we wiped 'em all out, where would we get our cheap lawn furniture and water torture kits?

Japan or Taiwan or Thailand etc. they all sell that same junk anyway. Or maybe the U.S. can start building some quality stuff instead of all this foreign crap.

[Letitroll98]

buccaneersfan said:

letitroll98 said:

He is not an active military officer in the PLA.

Then why does it say, "Zhu Chenghu, a major general in the People's Liberation Army," and "Mr Zhu, who has risen from the rank of colonel over the past five years?"

Or was that just a mistake.

letitroll98 said:

"However, some US-based China experts cautioned that Gen Zhu PROBABLY did not represent the mainstream People's Liberation Army view.

Probably didn't represent the mainstream People's Liberation Army view.

Listen, no offense, but if you don't know how China works and why everybody in the Chinese research institutes has a rank of some kind, then it will be hard for you to understand these issues. They make reports to their military just like our Brookings Institution does, and they have access to intelligence that we would consider classified, stuff like embassy cables and the like. The top leaders do have great influence and generally high rank in the Chinese Communist Party. So General Zhu does have a voice in Chinese policy, kind of like a senior professor at Brookings in the US.

However there are just as many liberal, left wing voices from institutes much more influential than the NDU, such as the Chinese Academy of Social Science (CASS). Many of China's most famous human rights activists came from CASS like Su Shaozhi and Yan Jiaqi. Li Tieying, who was appointed by the State Council as the president of CASS in March 1998, is also a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and serves as a State Councilor. CASS is studying development trends of modern capitalism, the formation of property rights system and public ownership in a market economy, financial globalization and national economic security, and the mechanism for achieving socialist democracy. All very liberal, democratic, western views. They all wear uniforms and have some stupid rank too.

So all I'm saying is that viewing all of Chinese foreign policy through the eyes of Gen Zhu will do nothing but lead you astray. Down the garden path that Donald Rumsfeld and his cronies would like to take you. I'm not quite that naive.

[oldsauroraman1]

Sounds like this general is a crackpot!

[oldsauroraman1]

US calls Chinese general's nuclear threat 'irresponsible'
07.15.2005, 03:30 PM

WASHINGTON (AFX) - The US shrugged off as 'irresponsible' a reported threat by a Chinese general to use nuclear weapons if attacked by the US in a conflict over Taiwan.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack called the remarks attributed to General Zhu Chenghu 'unfortunate' and said he hoped they did not reflect the views of the Chinese government.

'I haven't seen all the remarks but what I've seen of them, I'll say that they're irresponsible,' McCormack told reporters.

The Financial Times and the Asian Wall Street Journal on Friday quoted Zhu, a professor at China's National Defence University, as issuing the threat at a briefing organised by a private Hong Kong organisation.

[oldsauroraman1]

Beijing downplays general's nuke comment
BEIJING (AP) — China tried to quell an uproar Saturday over a general's comment that Beijing might use nuclear weapons against the United States in a conflict over Taiwan, saying the statement was his personal opinion.

But the communist government reaffirmed that it would not permit the self-ruled island to pursue formal independence — a step Beijing says it would go to war to stop.

The U.S. State Department on Friday criticized the remark by Maj. Gen. Zhu Chenghu, a dean at China's National Defense University, as "highly irresponsible" and asked for Chinese assurance that it didn't reflect official thinking.

Zhu told visiting Hong Kong-based reporters recently that China would respond with nuclear weapons if the United States drew its missiles and position-guided ammunition into the target zone on China's territory.

The official Xinhua News Agency said Zhu's comments were "personal views," citing a statement from the Foreign Ministry issued late Friday.

"Zhu had repeatedly emphasized that he would express personal view on the issues that the reporters were interested in," the statement said, according to Xinhua.

It did not say how China would respond to a U.S. attack or mention its nuclear readiness. China is one of five countries that have acknowledged their nuclear weapons stockpiles and agreed to negotiate toward nuclear disarmament. The other recognized nuclear states are the United States, Russia, Britain, and France.

The statement added that China would "never tolerate Taiwan independence" and would not allow "anybody with any means to separate Taiwan from the motherland."

China claims Taiwan, which split from the mainland in 1949, as part of its territory and has threatened to invade if the self-governing island declares formal independence or puts off talks on unification.

However, the statement said "we firmly abide by the principles of peaceful reunification."

In Taipei, an official in charge of Taiwan's policy toward Beijing said Zhu should apologize for comments that conflict with "mainstream thinking of the civilized world."