• China's nuclear arsenal now stands at 600 warheads, according to the Pentagon.
• Its new estimate means Beijing is still tracking to reach 1,000 nukes by 2030.
• It's not just about sheer quantity. The US says China is building a wide range of launch methods too.

China has been fielding over 600 operational nuclear warheads since mid-2024, up from about 500 last year, according to an estimate by the Pentagon.

That reported growth puts Beijing on track to hit 1,000 warheads by 2030, a prediction that US defense officials made in 2021.

Those findings come from the Defense Department's 2024 China Military Power Report, an annual summary of Beijing's capabilities and an assessment of its ambitions for its armed forces.

The Pentagon says China isn't just making more warheads — it's building a wide array of capabilities to launch them, too.

"When you look at what they're trying to build here, it's a diversified nuclear force that would be comprised of systems ranging from low yield, precision strike missiles, all the way up to ICBMs with different options at basically every rung on the escalation ladder," a senior defense official told reporters at a briefing on Monday. ICBMs refer to intercontinental ballistic missiles.

"Which is a lot different than what they've relied on traditionally," the official added.

China says it maintains a "no first-use" nuclear policy, meaning it will only ever deploy a nuke in retaliation for another nuclear strike.

But the US has been startled by what it says is a rapid build-up of Beijing's nuclear forces in the last few years. In 2020, the Pentagon thought that China had only 200 nukes and would have 400 by 2030.

The Defense Department's newer estimate of 1,000 warheads by 2030 would put China closer to being a peer threat to the US and Russia, the two behemoths of the Cold War.

A strategic treaty between the US and Russia limits their active arsenals to 1,550 warheads, though they are stockpiling thousands more.

Now, Western arms analysts are concerned that China isn't engaging in talks about its nuclear build-up — a key mechanism that the US and Russia used to prevent nuclear war.

"The PRC has not publicly or formally acknowledged or explained its nuclear expansion and modernization," the 2024 report said.

Advanced systems to counter US defenses

Meanwhile, a debate is raging in Washington about a need for the US to expand and explore more advanced nuke launch methods so it can maintain an edge over China.

The Pentagon's report for 2024 said Beijing is likely developing advanced missile systems "in part due to long-term concerns about United States missile defense capabilities."

These include hypersonic glide vehicles, which use the edge of Earth's upper atmosphere to fly incredibly fast, and fractional orbital bombardments, which launch weapons into orbital space to extend their range and flight time.

Those technologies can make a nuclear strike difficult to detect or track. In mid-2021, China is believed to have combined them in a hypersonic missile test.

For the US, expanding on nuclear weapons will cost taxpayers, a point that arms control advocates often raise when asking for restraint. An already-approved program to modernize America's aging nuclear triad is expected to cost $1.5 trillion over the next 30 years.

The Chinese embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment sent outside regular business hours by Business Insider.

• Russia's head of chemical weapons was killed on Tuesday when a scooter bomb exploded in Moscow.
• Ukraine was behind the attack, a Ukrainian Security Service source told BI.
• Igor Kirillov is the most prominent military official to be killed since Russia invaded Ukraine.

A high-ranking Russian general responsible for Russia's chemical weapons was killed on Tuesday by a bomb placed in a scooter on a Moscow street.

A source inside Ukraine's Security Service with knowledge of the attack told Business Insider the agency was behind the death of Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov.

The Wall Street Journal also reported Ukrainian officials as saying the killing was a special operation by the Security Service of Ukraine.

Kirillov, the head of Russia's Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Protection Troops, was killed by a bomb planted in a scooter parked on a street in Moscow, Russia's investigative committee said in a statement on Telegram on Tuesday.

"According to the investigation, on the morning of December 17, an explosive device was detonated in a scooter parked next to the entrance of a residential building on Ryazansky Prospekt in Moscow," the statement said.

"As a result of the incident, the head of the radiation, chemical and biological protection troops of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation Igor Kirillov and his assistant were killed," it added.

The committee said it had opened a criminal case and that investigators and forensic experts were working at the scene.

The Russian investigations committee didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from BI.

According to the Ukrainian source, the bomb on the scooter was detonated when Kirillov and his assistant were entering a nearby house on Ryazansky Prospekt. BI couldn't independently verify the claim.

"Kirillov was a war criminal and an absolutely legitimate target," they said, accusing Kirillov of giving orders to use banned chemical weapons against Ukrainian forces.

"Such an inglorious end awaits all those who kill Ukrainians. Retribution for war crimes is inevitable," they added.

Kirillov is the most prominent military official to be killed since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, according to the Financial Times.

He was sanctioned by the UK in October for the use of chemical weapons in Ukraine, including the choking agent chloropicrin.

Kirillov's death follows a string of similar attacks, some of which sources said were the work of Ukraine's Security Service or other agencies.

Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chair of Russia's Security Council and a former Russian president, described Kirillov's killing as a terrorist attack, and offered his condolences to Kirillov's family, per the TASS news agency.

He also said that Ukraine would pay for its actions.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

• A Russian deserter who was an officer at a top-secret nuclear weapons facility spoke with the BBC.
• He described an atmosphere of paranoia, with personnel subjected to lie-detector tests.
• The deserter said his job involved making sure his subordinates didn't bring phones onto the base.

A Russian deserter who once served as an officer at a top-secret nuclear weapons facility in Russia said everybody at the base was regularly subjected to lie-detector tests.

The deserter, identified only as Anton for his protection, disclosed little-known details about guarding Russian nuclear weapons to BBC News.

The media outlet said it verified his unit, rank, and base using official documents.

"There are constant checks and lie-detector tests for everyone," Anton said, offering rare insight into the pervasive paranoia and surveillance on a Russian nuclear base.

Anton recounted that on the day Russia invaded Ukraine, his unit was placed on combat alert and that, "in theory," his base was ready to carry out a nuclear strike.

Anton told BBC News his unit was "shut inside the base" from day one of the invasion, going on to describe life there as regimented and heavily monitored.

"It was my responsibility to ensure the soldiers under me didn't take any phones onto the nuclear base," he said, adding that no strangers were allowed on-site and that even parental visits required clearance from Russia's Federal Security Service at least three months in advance.

The Federation of American Scientists estimated that as of March, Russia's military stockpile included about 4,380 nuclear warheads, along with some 1,200 retired warheads waiting to be dismantled.

Since the 2022 invasion, Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly threatened to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine and the West. Last week, Putin approved major changes to Russia's nuclear doctrine, lowering the threshold for an attack.

Anton told BBC News he carried out his duties guarding nuclear weapons at the start of the full-scale invasion, but things changed when he was asked to deliver lectures to his troops.

Using specific written guidelines, he said, he was told to characterize Ukrainian civilians as "combatants" that should be "destroyed."

"That's a red line for me — it's a war crime," Anton told BBC News. "I said I won't spread this propaganda."

In response, Anton said, senior officers ordered him to be transferred to a regular assault brigade, preparing him to be deployed to the front lines.

But before being sent to fight, Anton signed a document refusing to participate, and a criminal case was opened against him, BBC News reported.

The outlet said it reviewed documents confirming both his unit transfer and the criminal case.

Anton managed to escape Russia with the help of an organization of deserters. He told BBC News this was only possible because he was no longer stationed at the high-security nuclear base.

He said he believed security forces were still searching for him and was taking precautions to avoid appearing on any official systems.

He also said he'd had to cut off contact with all of his former colleagues. "They must take lie-detector tests," he said, "and any contact with me could lead to a criminal case."