Keeping a Potential U.S.-China Conflict Under the Nuclear Threshold

Rising fears that China could invade Taiwan, along with Beijing’s ongoing nuclear buildup, underscore the perilous stakes of a potential U.S.-China conflict. Any such clash would be distinct from past U.S. wars against regional powers that lacked nuclear weapons.

New RAND research examines this dire challenge, considering the role of U.S. joint long-range strike in a hypothetical conflict over Taiwan. If Washington is fully committed to fighting and winning a war with China, the researchers write, then it must be prepared for nuclear escalation and should place more emphasis on managing these risks. They also identify the single most influential factor under U.S. military control for managing escalation: target selection.

The United States could decrease the risk of escalation in several ways. For example, U.S. leaders can manage China's perceptions of long-range strike before a conflict even occurs. They can also incorporate considerations of escalation risk into the acquisition process, especially for weapon systems that are likely to appear highly escalatory to China. And they can avoid making U.S. long-range strike capabilities an attractive target for a limited nuclear strike by Beijing.

As Washington works to prevent a future war with China from ever occurring in the first place, these takeaways may help U.S. military strategists and planners as they consider the possibility that it nonetheless could. If that happens, then the task will be how to succeed without triggering catastrophic escalation.