Nuclear Sea Denial: Leveraging the U.S. Tactical Nuclear Advantage in the Taiwan Strait

The United States faces a rapidly deteriorating balance of power in the Indo-Pacific. The modernization of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China’s Communist Party (CCP) continues at an accelerated pace, driven by decades of year-over-year increases in defense spending. [1] The PLA Navy (PLAN) now possesses the world’s largest fleet by battle force ship count, supported by a shipbuilding industrial base that outpaces U.S. capacity by a margin of 232 to 1. [2] [3] It is widely believed that President Xi Jinping has instructed the PLA to achieve the capability to seize Taiwan by 2027. [4] The window for effective conventional deterrence is closing. Consequently, the traditional threat of U.S. conventional intervention may soon be insufficient to prevent conflict in the Taiwan Strait.

To preserve the status quo in the First Island Chain, the United States must look beyond conventional parity. While the proximity of the Taiwan Strait favors the PLA in a conventional conflict, it presents a distinct structural vulnerability in the context of a limited nuclear exchange. A successful invasion relies on a massive, concentrated amphibious lift capability and a sustained logistical network. [5] This necessary concentration of assets upon Taiwan’s few suitable amphibious landing sites creates a target-rich environment uniquely vulnerable to low-yield tactical nuclear strikes. Neutralizing the invasion fleet would allow the United States to render the occupation of Taiwan physically impossible regardless of the remaining balance of military capacity. 

To offset the conventional imbalance, the United States should develop the capability to threaten nuclear sea denial and leverage its asymmetric advantage to target concentrated naval assets. By establishing a credible willingness to utilize low-yield nuclear weapons at sea, the United States can establish a flexible, cost-effective deterrent that fundamentally alters Beijing’s calculus for war.

Why Conventional Deterrence Is Closing

The era of uncontested American naval dominance in the Western Pacific has drawn to a close. Through the continued deployment of hypersonic anti-ship missiles, sophisticated sensor networks, and an industrial shipbuilding capacity that dwarfs American output, Beijing will effectively neutralize the traditional overwhelming U.S. conventional advantage. [6] The sanctuary once provided by the Pacific Ocean has already been eroded by the reach of the PLA Rocket Force, rendering forward-deployed U.S. carrier strike groups and airbases in Guam and Okinawa increasingly vulnerable to saturation attacks at the onset of hostilities. [7] [8]

Consequently, attempting to restore deterrence through symmetrical conventional means by matching the People’s Republic of China (PRC) ship-for-ship in its own backyard will become increasingly difficult over the next decade. The tyranny of distance places the U.S. at a severe logistical disadvantage, requiring power projection across thousands of miles into an Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) envelope specifically designed to degrade American forces. Rather than engaging in a contest of mass that favors the local power, the U.S. requires a capability that negates mass. The ability to render their numerical superiority irrelevant through asymmetric denial should be established. 

Furthermore, the United States no longer enjoys the luxury of focusing on a singular theater. A full-scale conventional commitment to the defense of Taiwan creates a window of vulnerability elsewhere, inviting opportunistic aggression from other adversaries. Whether it is the Russian Federation exploiting a Pacific distraction to press advantages in Europe, or the PRC capitalizing on a European conflict, the United States must reserve conventional capacity for global contingencies. Any plan to defend Taiwan must not require the total expenditure of the conventional Joint Force, continuing the viability of the U.S. military’s “two-theatre’ war doctrine. 

Compounding this conventional precariousness is China’s rapid ascent to nuclear peer status. Beijing is departing from its historical “minimum deterrence” posture, engaging in a massive expansion of its nuclear arsenal and second-strike capabilities. [9] [10] As China approaches parity, the threat of Chinese nuclear coercion increases; Beijing may calculate that its growing strategic arsenal neutralizes the US nuclear umbrella, thereby making a conventional invasion of Taiwan viable. They may calculate that the U.S. lacks the resolve to defend Asia in the face of escalating nuclear threats from China. To prevent Beijing from leveraging its newfound nuclear strength to coerce the United States into inaction, Washington must present a countervailing deterrent that is credible, usable, and distinct from the strategic exchange Beijing hopes to avoid.

Furthermore, conventional strike capabilities are insufficient to threaten the invasion fleet in a Taiwan contingency. The People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) has increasingly invested in and deployed at least thirty of its newest Type 052D guided-missile destroyers, each equipped with advanced integrated air defense systems. [11] [12] Recent deployments further highlight the acceleration of this trend within the Taiwan theater specifically. In March this year, the PLAN deployed two new Type 055 Renhai-class guided-missile cruisers to the Eastern Theater Command Navy, marking the first forward deployment of the PLAN’s most capable surface combatants to the theater with direct responsibility for Taiwan operations. [13] 

In response, the United States has fielded the AGM-158C Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) as its primary long-range weapon for engaging hardened naval targets within contested A2/AD environments. [14] Despite its low-observable characteristics and autonomous targeting capabilities, the LRASM, like all conventional missiles, requires direct warhead impacts with singular targets.

This creates an unfavorable munitions exchange ratio. The United States expends high-cost, limited-inventory offensive missiles while China counters with mass-produced interceptors and deploys an invasion fleet comprising dozens of high-value targets. Magnified by Beijing’s superior industrial capacity and rapidly advancing air-defense systems, maintaining adequate LRASM stockpiles sufficient to saturate both defensive systems and the invasion fleet itself will become increasingly difficult and expensive. [15] 

Compounding these structural disadvantages is the present state of U.S. munitions inventories. Sustained U.S. operations against Iranian forces have drawn down stockpiles of precisely the precision munitions most relevant to a Taiwan contingency. U.S. Navy surface combatants have expended hundreds of Standard Missile-2, SM-6, and ESSM (Evolved SeaSparrow Missile) interceptors in Red Sea operations alone, while Tomahawk cruise missile expenditures in response strikes against Houthi and IRGC targets have outpaced annual production. [16] [17] The Center for Strategic and International Studies has separately assessed that U.S. stockpiles of long-range anti-ship munitions (LRASM), including the AGM-158C, would be exhausted within approximately one week of high-intensity Taiwan Strait conflict at projected expenditure rates, while replacement production lines remain below wartime demand. [18] These drawdowns reflect a structural mismatch between the U.S. industrial base and the munitions intensity of modern peer conflict. A conventional deterrent that depends on saturation strikes against a numerically superior fleet is a deterrent the U.S. cannot presently afford to execute and cannot rapidly reconstitute.

Tactical Nuclear Weapons and their Maritime Use

While the term “tactical nuclear weapon” has largely receded from the official Pentagon usage, the concept of utilizing low-yield nuclear munitions to achieve conventional military objectives has a substantial historical lineage. [19] Throughout the Cold War, both NATO and Soviet planners extensively modeled the use of limited nuclear exchanges to offset conventional disparities. [20] However, these land-based operational concepts were frequently constrained by the inherent geometry of the battlefield: ground forces can disperse across vast frontages, diluting the military utility of nuclear strikes. To achieve a decisive operational effect against a dispersed army, a belligerent would need to expend a prohibitive volume of warheads, dramatically raising the risk of uncontrollable escalation to strategic exchange without guaranteeing a conventional victory. [21]

This limitation remains relevant in contemporary conflicts. In the ongoing war in Ukraine, the Russian Federation has leveraged the threat of non-strategic nuclear use as a potent psychological tool for coercion and signaling. [22] Yet the employment of such weapons has likely been deterred not only by political consequences but by a lack of viable military targets. Ukrainian forces operate in a highly dispersed manner, presenting few concentrations of mass that would justify the geopolitical cost of breaking the nuclear taboo.

The maritime domain, however, presents a fundamentally different target profile. Russian naval doctrine, which explicitly reserves the option to use non-strategic nuclear weapons to inflict “critical damage” upon superior enemy fleets. [23] Historical testing by the United States has confirmed the physical viability of utilizing nuclear overpressure and radiological effects to neutralize naval assets. [24] In this context, the weapon acts less as a weapon of mass destruction and more as a high-efficiency area-denial asset. Nevertheless, maritime nuclear employment has faced its own set of tactical countermeasures. In open-ocean engagements, carrier strike groups can mitigate vulnerability through wide dispersal and constant maneuver, complicating effective delivery. [25] 

The Atomic Moat

The ultimate victory condition for the PRC in a military confrontation over Taiwan is the physical occupation of the island. While air and missile campaigns can degrade defenses, they cannot hold territory. Achieving this objective requires the PLA to execute the most complex amphibious operation in modern history against a heavily fortified defender. However, the geography of Taiwan acts as a natural funnel; the island’s coastline limits large-scale amphibious assaults to approximately 14 suitable beaches. [26] Because the logistical throughput required to sustain a ground campaign is immense, the PLA is further constrained by the absolute necessity of seizing and securing major deep-water ports within days of the initial landing. [27]

To succeed, the PRC must concentrate its assets. An amphibious invasion forces the PLA to mass dense formations of troop transports, escorts, and supply ships into narrow littoral corridors. At the moment of disembarkation, these forces are stationary, soft, and clustered. This creates a critical vulnerability where a few low-yield tactical nuclear weapons employed against a grouping near likely landing sites, such as around Anping Port of the Kaohsiung coast, would not merely damage the fleet but effectively annihilate the invasion force. [28] This includes high-value, hard-to-replace assets such as the Type 075 amphibious assault ships and the massive landing barges intended to facilitate over-the-shore logistics. [29] By targeting these specific bottlenecks, a strike would achieve disproportionate effects with minimal expenditure.

Compared to conventional munitions, low-yield nuclear airbursts reduce the requirement for precision terminal guidance, as blast overpressure and thermal effects incapacitate fleet assets within a several-kilometer radius. [30] This standoff capability permits detonation at ranges exceeding the intercept envelope of terminal air-defense systems. Consequently, a limited number of nuclear-armed delivery vehicles with penetration aids can neutralize targets that would otherwise demand prohibitively large conventional inventories, altering the munitions exchange calculus in favor of the attacking force.

Crucially, the potential of this strike extends beyond the initial assault. Even if the PLA establishes a beachhead, they will require thousands of tons of daily supplies to sustain high-intensity combat. Low-yield airbursts near points of debarkation create a localized environment of physical destruction and radiological hazard that unhardened vessels cannot traverse. The PLA relies heavily on “Ships Taken Up From Trade” (civilian ferries and merchant vessels mobilized for war). These commercial crews and unhardened hulls are unlikely to operate effectively in a nuclear-contaminated maritime zone, nor would logistical networks survive the destruction of port assets, effectively neutralizing the combat effectiveness of the now partially stranded invasion force. [31]

Finally, this specific strike option limits collateral damage, thereby managing the risk of escalation. A detonation occurring several miles off the coast, executed as an airburst to minimize radioactive fallout, would limit immediate casualties strictly to naval combatants. This represents a nuclear use-case with the lowest possible threshold for escalation: it does not strike sovereign Chinese territory, it does not target population centers or counterforce capabilities, and it minimizes long-term environmental contamination. While Beijing may rhetorically claim that a strike on a naval vessel is equivalent to a strike on the homeland as the U.S. currently does, the credibility of such a claim is weak. [32] Counterintuitively, the increasingly sophisticated second-strike capability of the PRC further decreases the risk of nuclear escalation as it removes the ‘use-it-or-lose-it’ pressure, granting Beijing the confidence to absorb a limited tactical blow without the panic-driven launch of an immediate, full-scale response. When faced with the loss of an invasion fleet versus the choice to initiate a suicidal strategic nuclear exchange against American cities, the calculus of survival favors de-escalation.

The Retaliation Problem: A Cornered Dragon

The deployment of a tactical nuclear weapon against a Chinese invasion fleet would undoubtedly necessitate a substantial response from the PRC to preserve domestic credibility and international deterrence. However, an analysis of the escalation ladder reveals that the PLA’s options for retaliation are structurally constrained. Once the invasion fleet is neutralized, Beijing is left with a menu of retaliatory options that are either militarily ineffective or suicidally risky, granting the U.S. escalation dominance in any subsequent rung of the ladder. 

The most immediate option, an escalated conventional retaliation, poses manageable costs for the United States. Beijing is far more likely to respond in kind, crossing the nuclear threshold as well. The most proportional and theoretically “safe” option would be a reciprocal nuclear strike against a U.S. Carrier Strike Group (CSG) in the open ocean. PLA military planners would calculate that such a strike has the lowest risk of further uncontrolled escalation towards a strategic nuclear exchange. Yet this option is difficult. Unlike the stationary, constrained target of a Chinese invasion fleet, American naval forces operate in open water with high mobility. Successfully targeting and destroying a maneuvering CSG with a tactical nuclear weapon is a complex kill chain that is far from guaranteed.

Even assuming a successful Chinese counterstrike that destroys an American carrier, the strategic exchange remains decisively in America’s favor. The loss of even several carriers does not decisively cripple American capabilities. In contrast, the loss of the PLA’s amphibious lift capacity ends the Chinese dream of unification for a generation. The exchange rate is fundamentally asymmetrical.

The remaining escalatory pathways are even less attractive for Beijing. Tactical nuclear strikes against Taiwanese ground forces suffer from the same limitations seen in land warfare elsewhere: targets are dispersed, dug-in, and difficult to neutralize without expending a politically intolerable number of warheads. [33] An escalation to striking major U.S. forward bases, such as Anderson Air Force Base in Guam or Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, substantially raises the probability of an American strategic response. Such strikes cross the line from a tactical naval engagement to a strategic attack on American sovereign territory or treaty allies. This invites a full-scale American strategic response against the Chinese mainland, a risk both sides will find difficult to take. 

Crucially, destroying Guam does not resurrect the invasion fleet. Once the amphibious ships are at the bottom of the Taiwan Strait, the campaign is lost. Any subsequent nuclear strike by the PRC is purely punitive, generating no conventional military advantage. The U.S. would have the initiative to de-escalate, trading the destruction of Guam for Taiwan’s continuation. Faced with a fait accompli where the means of victory have been destroyed, Beijing’s most viable option is face-saving retreat.

Policy Recommendations

Crossing the nuclear threshold should not be undertaken lightly, and the proposed deterrent logic must be understood for what it is. Following Schelling, nuclear coercion does not work through the promise of controlled escalation; it works through the credible acceptance of its uncontrollability, “the threat that leaves something to chance.”[34] Beijing need not believe Washington can manage escalation precisely; it needs to believe Washington is willing to act despite knowing it cannot. 

The posture must also anticipate Chinese adaptation: dispersed PLAN basing, hardened command and control, and a potential reconsideration of Beijing’s no-first-use declaration, a doctrine already under limited internal debate. [35] Introducing a tactical rung could accelerate rather than constrain PRC nuclear modernization, weaken the international nuclear taboo; policymakers must price in the reciprocal preemption incentives it creates across the strait. 

This logic likewise imposes real costs on American allies in theater. Japan hosts forward-deployed U.S. forces at Kadena, Iwakuni, and Yokosuka, all within the retaliation envelope of any Chinese counterstrike, and its domestic politics place meaningful constraints on posture changes that implicate the alliance. South Korea similarly faces the same concerns. Taiwan itself, whose sea approaches would absorb the radiological effects of any airburst, would have no formal voice in U.S. targeting decisions. Operationalizing this posture without prior alliance consultation, without accounting for adversary adaptation, and without a disciplined account of how the threshold is held degrades both the signal to Beijing and the political foundations of U.S. presence in the First Island Chain. 

However, if Washington can effectively signal the capability and willingness to carry out such a strike, Beijing will need to contend with the vulnerability of its amphibious assault. This pushes the calculus of invasion beyond the point where the PLA believes it has a reasonable chance of success in a conventional confrontation. Importantly, the effectiveness of this deterrent threat means that successful deterrence can occur without the United States ever having to commit to carrying out the strike. The United States only needs to communicate sufficient resolve that this potential of American first-use is seriously considered. 

On the Chinese side, reactions to even slight changes to U.S. nuclear policy appear significant. Following the Trump administration’s inclusion of low-yield non-strategic nuclear weapons in the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review, discussion on reorienting the PRC’s nuclear doctrine was immediate. [36] Reports by the Department of Defense in 2018 indicate that PLA military literature started discussing the potential of American first-use in a Taiwan scenario after that revision. [37] 

Washington must communicate that the maintenance of the Indo-Pacific balance of power is a core national interest for which it is willing to accept incredible risk, countering the Chinese assumption that the U.S. is self-deterred by the fear of escalation. This need not directly mention a commitment to defend Taiwan to keep strategic ambiguity. Beijing just needs to believe that the United States considers any unilateral changes to the status quo in the Taiwan Strait to represent a serious enough threat to national security that Washington would break the nuclear taboo. 

To accomplish this, the next Nuclear Posture Review should explicitly refuse to rule out the use of non-strategic nuclear weapons against naval targets in international waters. This clearly creates a distinction between “tactical maritime use” and “strategic homeland strikes,” implying to Beijing that the United States would view an invasion fleet as a legitimate, non-existential target set. 

Congress must ensure sustained funding and deployment for the W76-2 low-yield warhead program. Possessing a low-yield option on undetectable Ship Submersible Ballistic Nuclear (SSBN) platforms creates an always-present threat that cannot be preemptively neutralized by PLA missile forces, unlike land-based tactical aircraft. [38] The United States Strategic Command should incorporate low-yield maritime strike profiles into its annual ‘Global Thunder’ exercises. [39] The decision by the Department of Defense to reverse the Biden Administration’s suspension of nuclear-armed Sea-Launched Cruise Missile (SLCM-N) was correct. A cruise missile trajectory is distinguishable from an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) or Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missile (SLBM) trajectory, reducing the risk that Beijing’s early warning systems misinterpret a limited tactical strike. [40]

Finally, and most critically, this strategy relies on the logic of limited war. If the United States corners a nuclear-armed power without an exit strategy, the risk of total war rises unacceptably. The U.S. must be prepared to offer a viable diplomatic off-ramp to the CCP. The U.S. must clarify that the nuclear strike is strictly limited to the invasion force and that no follow-on strikes against the mainland will occur unless the PRC escalates.

While the U.S. nuclear arsenal is our most potent asset, its value lies not just in existence but in credible application; preserving the peace in this new era requires the courage to reimagine its utility beyond the strategic threshold.

Clement Tsao ’28 serves as the President of the AHS chapter at the University of Pennsylvania, where he is majoring in International Relations and Mathematical Economics.

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Notes:

[1] U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China: A Report to Congress, October 19, 2023

[2] Alexander Palmer, Henry H. Carroll, and Nicholas Velazquez, “Unpacking China’s Naval Buildup,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, June 5, 2024, http://www.csis.org/analysis/unpacking-chinas-naval-buildup.

[3]  Cathalijne Adams, “China’s Shipbuilding Capacity is 232 Times Greater Than That of the United States,” Alliance for American Manufacturing, September 18, 2023, http://www.americanmanufacturing.org/blog/chinas-shipbuilding-capacity-is-232-times-greater-than-that-of-the-united-states/.

[4] Olivia Gazis, “CIA Director William Burns: ‘I Wouldn’t Underestimate’ Xi’s Ambitions for Taiwan,” CBS News, February 3, 2023, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/cia-director-william-burns-i-wouldnt-underestimate-xis-ambitions-for-taiwan/.

[5] David Sacks, “Why China Would Struggle to Invade Taiwan,” Council on Foreign Relations, June 12, 2024, http://www.cfr.org/photo-essay/why-china-would-struggle-invade-taiwan.

[6] Matthew P. Funaiole and Brian Hart, “China’s Military in 10 Charts,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, September 2, 2025, http://www.csis.org/analysis/chinas-military-10-charts.

[7] David Axe, “Think Tank: The U.S. Fleet Could Lose Four Aircraft Carriers Defending Taiwan,” Forbes, January 10, 2023, http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2023/01/10/think-tank-the-us-fleet-could-lose-four-aircraft-carriers-defending-taiwan/.

[8] Kelly A. Grieco, Hunter Slingbaum, and Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan M. Walker, “Cratering Effects: Chinese Missile Threats to US Air Bases in the Indo-Pacific,” Stimson Center, December 12, 2024, http://www.stimson.org/2024/cratering-effects-chinese-missile-threats-to-us-air-bases-in-the-indo-pacific/.

[9] John Lee, “Implications of Chinese Nuclear Weapons Modernization for the United States and Regional Allies,” Hudson Institute, July 30, 2025

[10] Fiona S. Cunningham, “The Unknowns About China’s Nuclear Modernization Program,” Arms Control Today, June 2023. https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2023-06/features/unknowns-about-chinas-nuclear-modernization-program.

[11] “World’s Fastest Destroyer Fleet Expansion Continues as New Chinese Type 052D-Class Destroyer Enters Service,” Military Watch Magazine, February 8, 2026, http://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/world-fastest-destroyer-expansion-type052d.

[12] Eric Wertheim, “Air-Defense Destroyers for the PLAN,” Proceedings 147, no. 6 (June 2021), http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2021/june/air-defense-destroyers-plan.

[13] Ministry of National Defense of the People’s Republic of China, “Chinese Navy Commissions Two New Type 055 Guided-Missile Cruisers to the Eastern Theater Command,” March 2025, http://eng.mod.gov.cn/2025xb/N/T/16447331.html.

[14] Brandon J. Weichert, “America’s LRASM Anti-Ship Missile Is the Future of Warfare,” The National Interest, January 28, 2025, http://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/americas-lrasm-anti-ship-missile-future-warfare-214435. 

[15] Colton Jones, “Pentagon Authorizes $53M Upgrade for LRASM Production Line,” Defence Blog, March 7, 2026, http://defence-blog.com/pentagon-authorizes-53m-upgrade-for-lrasm-production-line/.

[16] Ellen Mitchell, “U.S. Draws Down Patriot, THAAD, and PrSM Stockpiles in Iran and Red Sea Operations,” The Hill, https://thehill.com/policy/defense/5842118-patriot-thaad-prsm-expenditure-iran/. 

[17] Riley Ceder, “U.S. Navy Seeks 1,200% Increase in Tomahawk Missile Procurement for 2027,” Navy Times, April 7, 2026, https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2026/04/07/us-navy-seeks-1200-increase-in-tomahawk-missile-procurement-for-2027/. 

[18] Seth G. Jones, “Empty Bins in a Wartime Environment: The Challenge to the U.S. Defense Industrial Base,” Center for Strategic and International Studies, January 23, 2023, https://www.csis.org/analysis/empty-bins-wartime-environment-challenge-us-defense-industrial-base. 

[19] Jeffrey D. McCausland, Tom Nichols, and Douglas Stuart, Tactical Nuclear Weapons and NATO (Carlisle Barracks, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2012), April 1, 2012, http://ssi.armywarcollege.edu/SSI-Media/Recent-Publications/Display/Article/3633856/tactical-nuclear-weapons-and-nato/.

[20] Benjamin C. Stumpf, U.S. Army Tactical Nuclear Doctrine in the Cold War (U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, May 21, 2021), 53, https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/citations/AD1173645.

[21] Andrew Facini, “The Low-Yield Nuclear Warhead: A Dangerous Weapon Based on Bad Strategic Thinking,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, January 28, 2020, http://thebulletin.org/2020/01/the-low-yield-nuclear-warhead-a-dangerous-weapon-based-on-bad-strategic-thinking/.

[22] “U.S. Prepared ‘Rigorously’ for Potential Russian Nuclear Strike on Ukraine,” CNN, March 9, 2024, http://www.cnn.com/2024/03/09/politics/us-prepared-rigorously-potential-russian-nuclear-strike-ukraine/index.html.

[23] Russia Maritime Studies Institute, U.S. Naval War College, The Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the Field of Naval Operations for the Period Until 2030, trans. Anna Davis (Newport, RI: Russia Maritime Studies Institute, U.S. Naval War College, 2017), https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/rmsi_research/2.

[24] Desmond Ball, “Nuclear War at Sea,” International Security 10, no. 3 (Winter 1985–1986): 3–31, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2538940

[25] Daniel J. Carrison, “Defense Against Nuclear Attack at Sea,” Proceedings 90, no. 5 (May 1964), http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1964/may/defense-against-nuclear-attack-sea.

[26] Ian Easton, The Chinese Invasion Threat: Taiwan’s Defense and American Strategy in Asia (London: Eastbridge Books, 2019), 129–32.

[27] Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Publication 3-02, Amphibious Operations (Washington, DC: Joint Chiefs of Staff, January 4, 2019; validated without change January 21, 2021), II-9, https://www.jcs.mil/Portals/36/Documents/Doctrine/pubs/jp3_02.pdf.

[28] Gregory Weaver, “The Role of Nuclear Weapons in a Taiwan Crisis,” Atlantic Council, November 22, 2023, http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-research-reports/issue-brief/the-role-of-nuclear-weapons-in-a-taiwan-crisis/.

[29]  H. I. Sutton, “China Suddenly Building Fleet of Special Barges Suitable for Taiwan Landings,” Naval News, January 10, 2025 (updated March 13, 2025), http://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2025/01/china-suddenly-building-fleet-of-special-barges-suitable-for-taiwan-landings/.

[30] Samuel Glasstone and Philip J. Dolan, The Effects of Nuclear Weapons, 3rd ed. (Washington, DC: Dept. of Defense; for sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1977), https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GOVPUB-D-PURL-gpo106759/pdf/GOVPUB-D-PURL-gpo106759.pdf. 

[31] Tomohisa Takei, “Civilian Transportation Capacity Is Evolving the Capability of the Chinese Military Forces to Invade Taiwan: Centered on the Evaluation of the US Annual Report,” Sasakawa Peace Foundation, https://www.spf.org/japan-us-taiwan-research/en/article/takei_01.html.

[32] Anya L. Fink, “U.S. Extended Deterrence and Regional Nuclear Capabilities,” Congressional Research Service, In Focus IF12735, revised February 6, 2026, https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF12735.

[33] Mark Cancian, Matthew Cancian, and Eric Heginbotham, Confronting Armageddon: Wargaming Nuclear Deterrence and Its Failures in a U.S.–China Conflict over Taiwan (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies and MIT Security Studies Program Wargaming Lab, December 2024).

[34] Thomas C. Schelling, “The Manipulation of Risk,” Chapter 3 in Arms and Influence (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1966), pp. 92–125. 

[35] Fiona S. Cunningham and M. Taylor Fravel, “Dangerous Confidence? Chinese Views on Nuclear Escalation,” International Security 44, no. 2 (Fall 2019): 61–109.

[36] Michael S. Chase, “Chinese Views on the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review, and Their Implications,” China Brief 18, no. 4 (March 12, 2018), http://jamestown.org/program/chinese-views-on-2018-npr/.

[37] U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2022 (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, November 29, 2022), 93, https://media.defense.gov/2022/Nov/29/2003122279/-1/-1/1/2022-military-and-security-developments-involving-the-peoples-republic-of-china.pdf.

[38] Ben Werner, “Pentagon Confirms Low-Yield Nuclear Warhead on Ballistic Missile Sub,” USNI News, February 4, 2020, http://news.usni.org/2020/02/04/pentagon-confirms-low-yield-nuclear-warhead-on-ballistic-missile-sub.

[39] “Global Thunder 26 Underway as U.S. Strategic Command Tests Nuclear Deterrence and Readiness,” Defence Industry Europe, October 28, 2025, http://defence-industry.eu/global-thunder-26-underway-as-u-s-strategic-command-tests-nuclear-deterrence-and-readiness/.

[40] Valerie Insinna, “Biden Administration Kills Trump-Era Nuclear Cruise Missile Program,” Breaking Defense, March 28, 2022, http://breakingdefense.com/2022/03/biden-administration-kills-trump-era-nuclear-cruise-missile-program/.

Image: “Zhanjiang, China — Sailors of the People’s Republic of China South Sea Fleet watch the arrival of guided missile cruiser USS Cowpens (CG 63), pictured in the background, and guided missile frigate USS Vandegrift (FFG 48), arrive at Zhanjiang, China, for an historic port visit.” by the U.S. Navy, retrived from  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:US_Navy_030922-N-0000B-982_Republic_of_China_South_Sea_Fleet_watch_the_arrival_of_guided_missile_cruiser_USS_Cowpens_(CG_63.jpg#metadata. This file is a work of a sailor or employee of the U.S. Navy, taken or made as part of that person’s official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, it is in the public domain in the United States.