The 156-page IISS assessment examines evolving military doctrines across the region and how a conflict over Taiwan might play out.
While US and Chinese forces had different aims in a Taiwan scenario – the Chinese to keep the US and its allies at bay while the US bolsters Taiwan’s resilience – the two sides could be expected to launch vast operations across military domains.
“Conflict with China would risk escalation, potentially to a nuclear level, given the strategic importance of Taiwan to Beijing,” the document says.
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“There is currently little public evidence to suggest that both militaries understand the necessary guardrails to prevent, or rules of engagement that would restrict, both sides potentially targeting each other’s key command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance nodes,” the assessment says.
“The prospect of nuclear escalation will thus continue to loom large in a major US-China conflict.”
IISS senior fellow Daniel Salisbury noted that there were no nuclear-specific conversations at the latest Trump-Xi summit, and that the relationship between the two superpowers was “quite difficult” on the nuclear front.
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He said at a press conference that during the Cold War, the US had a long history of conversations with the Soviet Union about arms control and risk reduction measures. However, he said any conversation with China would be more complicated given how a lot of China’s nuclear arsenal is concealed.
“That culture of discussion is just not there at the moment so there’s far less to build on in that relationship,” he said.
While both the US and Russian nuclear arsenals still dwarf China’s stockpiles, US officials and arms control analysts say China is expanding and improving its atomic weapons capabilities faster than any other nuclear power.
A Pentagon report released in December said China was on track to field 1,000 warheads by 2030.
The Federation of American Scientists estimates that Russia and the US field 4,400 and 3,700 active warheads respectively, while China has 620.
