The Chinese Ministry of Defense called the U.S. the world’s “biggest disruptor of regional peace and stability” in a scathing rebuttal Wednesday of a Pentagon analysis of Chinese military threats.
The Pentagon report, released last week, claims that China is growing its nuclear arsenal more quickly than previously believed. U.S officials said the People’s Republic of China (PRC) could have as many as 1,000 warheads by 2030.
“Over the next decade, the PRC will continue to rapidly modernize, diversify, and expand its nuclear forces,” the report reads. “Compared to the PLA’s nuclear modernization efforts a decade ago, current efforts dwarf previous attempts in both scale and complexity.”
The Chinese military officials denounced the U.S. report as false on Wednesday and shot back at U.S. threats and military activity worldwide.
“The U.S. has sent depleted uranium munitions and cluster bombs to Ukraine, sent its carrier battle groups to the Mediterranean and weapons and munitions to Israel, is this the so-called ‘gospel’ the ’human rights defender is bringing to the area?” Wu Qian, the spokesperson for China’s defense ministry, said.
U.S.-China relations have deteriorated in recent years between a Congress increasingly focused on the country and Beijing’s more overt threats to Taiwan — which China claims as its own territory.
The U.S. has upped its military support for Taiwan amid the fallout with China, including a first-of-its-kind $80 million direct military transfer in August, which a Chinese government spokesman said the country “deplores.”
President Biden requested $2 billion for security in the region as part of his $100 billion budget supplement request last week.