Hong Kong, January 1 : Chairman Xi Jinping continues to invest heavily in the People's Liberation Army (PLA), as China's military approaches his 2027 "centennial military building goal". To realize the goal, which Xi publicly enunciated in October 2020, China is strengthening its nuclear deterrence and military coercive capacity.
On 23 December 2025, the US Pentagon issued the latest edition of its annual report examining the status of the PLA. The document, "Military and Security Developments Involving the People's Republic of China 2025", was the 25th edition to appear. It covers developments through the start of 2025, so some developments were not listed, such as landing barges that revolutionize the PLA's ability to land at beaches previously thought unviable for amphibious invasions.
According to Dr. Andrew Erickson, Professor of Strategy at the US Naval War College, among the 2025 Pentagon report's greatest revelations is the fact that China has fielded a conventional intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) able to reach parts of America's homeland. This DF-27 ICBM features both land-attack and anti-ship capabilities, thanks to different missile variants.
Erickson noted, "This makes China the first nation publicly assessed to have fielded an operational, conventionally armed ICBM...albeit at the low end of the ICBM range band and with variant-dependent roles. America's homeland is not a sanctuary from either PRC nuclear or conventional missiles."
Estimated to have a range of up to 8,000km, the DF-27 can reach targets in the northwest continental USA, as well as Hawaii and Alaska. As such, it is China's longest-range anti- ship missile, and it puts US Navy (USN) vessels almost anywhere in the Pacific Ocean at risk.
The 2025 report is the first to confirm the DF-27's deployment, its categorization as an ICBM (traditionally, ICBMs were always nuclear-armed missiles) and the existence of an anti-ship variant. The DF-27 is indeed a global first. Last year's report also said the DF-27 may have a hypersonic glide vehicle payload option.
Erickson commented, "These developments bespeak larger dynamics of tremendous importance. Conventional ballistic missiles have been a priority for China since its strategic rocket force...began building a conventional missile component in the early 1990s, in the wake of PLA reassessments prompted by US precision strike performance in the 1990-91 Gulf War." Even as Russia and the USA constrained themselves via the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty - which banned conventional and nuclear missiles in the 500km-5,500km range - China created the world's largest arsenal of ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles in that range band.
Erickson added too, "China today has the world's most active and diverse ballistic missile development program, rapidly producing and fielding purpose-built systems at staggering scope and scale." The Pentagon report also adjudges "China has the world's leading hypersonic missile arsenal, and continued to advance the development of conventional and nuclear-armed hypersonic missile technologies during the past year".
Erickson assessed, "China's fielded hypersonic missiles, including its anti-ship ballistic missile families, combine very high speed with maneuverability to greatly complicate missile defense and fleet operations. Maneuvering payloads can approach from unexpected azimuths, fly at lower-than-traditional trajectories, and potentially exploit gaps in radar and interceptor coverage ... Taken together, China's anti-ship ballistic missiles - now potentially extending to intercontinental ranges with the DF-27 - pose a potent threat to surface ships across much of the Pacific. In effect, they constitute a new form of naval force."
The American professor believes "China has dramatically changed the naval balance and the prospective ways of war in the Western Pacific and beyond". Furthermore, because missiles like the DF-21, DF-26 and DF-27 can have either nuclear or conventional warheads, this creates dangerous ambiguity, since the USA or another adversary cannot know which type of warhead has been fired in times of crisis. Weapons like the DF-27 present both an operational risk and escalation uncertainty for the USA.
More than that, Erickson summarized, "China has thus far proven unwilling to engage in sustained, substantive nuclear or conventional ballistic-missile risk reduction or arms control discussions. As Commander-in-Chief Xi Jinping seeks to expand operational options across manifold rungs of the escalation ladder to strengthen coercive leverage and potential warfighting capabilities (particularly regarding a Taiwan contingency), the attendant risks continue to grow."
Whilst on the topic of Chinese missiles, the Pentagon report pointed out China has pursued the world's most rapid and expansive buildup of nuclear and conventional ballistic missiles. It assessed that Beijing snowballed its operational nuclear-warhead stockpile from the low 200s in 2020 to the low 600s by the end of 2024. Furthermore, China is on track to surpass 1,000 nuclear warheads by 2030.
The sea leg of China's nuclear triad includes JL-3 submarine-launched ballistic missiles aboard Type 094 submarines. The Pentagon believes JL-3s have a 10,000km range, so they could impact the continental USA from patrol areas. The air leg, meanwhile, includes the JL-1 missile launched by H-6N bomber. The report described the JL-1 as a "highly precise theater weapon...well suited for delivering a low-yield nuclear weapon".
Low yield means a warhead of less than 10 kilotons. Apart from the aforementioned maturing nuclear triad and low-yield theater systems, the Pentagon's annual assessment listed an early-warning counterstrike (EWCS) posture too, which offers Beijing more flexible options on the escalation ladder. An EWCS capability is conceptually similar to launch on warning, whereby early detection of a missile strike enables a counterstrike launch before the incoming first volley detonates.
China launched two extra Tongxun Jishu Shiyan geosynchronous early-warning satellites in 2024 and early 2025, with the Pentagon beleiving these "early-warning infrared satellites can reportedly detect an incoming ICBM within 90 seconds of launch," and with an alert sent to a command center within 3-4 minutes. Incidentally, the USA is into its second generation of such early-warning satellites.
China also has multiple, ground-based, large phased-array radars that detect incoming ballistic missiles thousands of kilometers away high in the atmosphere. Of interest, the USA reported that in December 2024 the PLA "launched several ICBMs in quick succession from a training center into Western China, indicating the ability to rapidly launch multiple, silo-based ICBMs, as required for an EWCS operation".
Significantly, the report continued: "The PLA has likely loaded more than 100 solid- propellant ICBM missile silos at its three silo fields with DF-31-class ICBMs, which are very likely intended to support EWCS."
Based on this information, Tom Shugart, Adjunct Senior Fellow with the Defense Program at the Center for a New American Security, expressed the opinion that this "makes it even less likely they're pursing a 'shell game' strategy, as some folks theorized a few years ago." Instead of installing limited numbers of missiles in its silo fields and moving them around, China seems intent on filling most silos with missiles.
Shugart added, "Regarding China's reasons for its recent (and massive) nuclear force expansion, the report posits that one major reason is likely so that China has more confidence conducting conventional military operations. I've thought this for some time - that by having a robust, survivable nuclear arsenal, China removes the nuclear option as a credible US response to large-scale conventional strikes (or even crippling strategic cyberattacks in the continental US)."
Moving on to other topics in the US report, it revealed the removal of flag and general officers is wider than previously thought. Of 42 military Central Committee members chosen at October 2022's party congress, eight have been removed or are under investigation. The PLA Rocket Force (PLARF) and its supporting defense-industrial base have experienced the most extensive removals since Xi intensified his anti-corruption program in 2023.
"Beijing is pursuing a zero-tolerance approach to corruption and is willing to purge the military of perceived disloyalty, regardless of the disruptive impact on the PLA," the report suggested.
Does that mean the PLA's capability is affected? Erickson assessed: "As with other aspects of PLA development, multiple things are true at once: short-term readiness risks coexist with the possibility of future advancement if China proves successful in fixing what have clearly been identified as systemic problems. Discoveries of disciplinary violations within the PLARF and its supporting industry have clearly shaken PRC leadership confidence and generated organizational churn. Yet the Pentagon's 2025 report explicitly warns against assuming long-term weakness: it states that while these purges very likely create short-term disruptions to operational effectiveness, China's nuclear forces could very well emerge more reliable and capable than ever before."
Shugart concurred, saying, "While there are likely to be short-term impacts to PLA readiness, in the long term it's probably going to be a good for the force's military effectiveness. That said, the report notes that, in the absence of empowered independent bodies (like strong inspectors general), corruption is likely to continue to be a problem."
For the first time, the Pentagon speculated on how many aircraft carriers the PLA Navy (PLAN) wants. "The PLAN aims to produce six aircraft carriers by 2035, for a total of nine." This figure is higher than what many analysts predict. Indeed, nine Chinese carriers would compare favorably with the eleven the USN possesses, especially considering that American carriers cover both the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, whereas the Chinese fleet currently concentrates near its own territory.
Erickson commented, "Building six aircraft carriers by 2035 would head Beijing toward some semblance of blue-water force structure parity with Washington, but would be a heavy lift indeed."
This is because it took China ten years to complete its third carrier Fujian, although satellite imagery shows that a fourth - likely nuclear-powered - carrier is now under construction.
The report also confirmed that China's first Type 041 Zhou-class diesel-electric submarine sank at its pier, in mid-2024. This observation occurred in the report's section about corruption's impact on defense. "Corruption in defense procurement has contributed to observed instances of capability shortfalls, such as malfunctioning lids installed on missile silos or possibly the pier-side sinking of the PLAN's first Zhou-class submarine as it prepared for sea trials."
Another interesting snippet is that the PLAN now has a naval facility operational at Ream Naval Base in Cambodia. Additionally, the report accused Chinese companies of selling dual-use components that Houthi fighters have used in Red Sea attacks since November 2023.
China's overall aim is to be able to confront US forces in the Indo-Pacific and to coerce Taiwan's leadership to the negotiation table on Beijing's terms. Indeed, three capabilities are necessary for China to achieve its 2027 goal: strategic decisive victory; strategic counterbalance; and strategic deterrence and control.
According to US analysts, this requires the PLA to credibly prevail in a conflict at an acceptable cost, to deter or restrain the involvement of the USA, and limit horizontal escalation and dissuade other states from getting involved if it does decide to invade Taiwan.
Erickson concluded: "Within this framework, Xi has clearly elevated nuclear weapons as core to realizing PRC great-power status, constraining American options, and coercively enveloping Taiwan. The central importance of nuclear weapons capabilities to these top-priority aims readily explains unprecedented nuclear emphasis and development throughout the 13 years and counting of his rule."
Shugart also remarked, "Discussing China's options to force unification with Taiwan, the report makes a point that somehow seems lost on some folks: that as risky as an invasion would be, it's the only assured way to force Taiwan to give up. While lesser options like a blockade/missile bombardment might seem lower risk, they require Taiwan to give up.
(Though in any case, I would expect those to be preliminary parts of an invasion plan that Beijing might hope would cause Taiwan to fold before pulling the trigger.) That all said, the report reiterates previous assessments that the PLA doesn't seem to be building the landing ships necessary for an invasion, though they continue to train with civilian roll-on/roll-off vessels."
It must be remembered that 2027 is simply a waypoint in Xi's development of China's military. By 2035 the PLA is supposed to complete its desired military force structure. That 2035 milestone is itself a step in achieving the complete "China dream" of a fully world-class military and all the attendant capabilities that this implies by 2049.
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