This report is the second volume of a four-volume study that examines the risk of a military conflict between the United States and China over Taiwan escalating to Chinese nuclear first use. This volume provides background and context for the broader study, focusing on U.S. conventional joint long-range strike capabilities and employment options.

Denial Without Disaster—Keeping a U.S.-China Conflict over Taiwan Under the Nuclear Threshold

Vol. 2, Surveying U.S. Conventional Joint Long-Range Strike Capabilities, Operational Objectives, and Employment Decisions

Shawn Cochran, William Kim, Nathan Beauchamp-Mustafaga, Dahlia Anne Goldfeld, Edward Geist, Jeff Hagen, David R. Frelinger, Nina Miller

ResearchPublished Nov 15, 2024

This report is the second volume of a four-volume study that examines the risk of a military conflict between the United States and China over Taiwan escalating to Chinese nuclear first use, particularly looking at how the United States' employment of conventional joint long-range strike capabilities could trigger or at least contribute to this escalation. The aim of this volume is to provide background and context for the broader study, focusing on U.S. conventional joint long-range strike capabilities and employment options. To address the question of the nuclear escalation risks of U.S. conventional long-range strike in a war with China, the authors considered it important to first assess what capabilities would be available to U.S. leadership and how they might be employed. This consideration stems from the underlying hypothesis that different long-range capabilities and different types of long-range strike campaigns and associated target sets will have varying impacts on escalation dynamics. There is no singular or definitive answer to how the United States would employ conventional long-range strike in a war with China; in this study, the authors instead map out the underpinning logics and contours of the issue.

Key Findings

  • Geopolitical trends, advances in adversary military capabilities, and U.S. military interservice competition provide impetus for the United States to develop more diverse and advanced conventional joint long-range strike capabilities.
  • Variation across current and forecast joint long-range strike systems presents the United States with important trade-offs and China with different operational problem sets; however, it is not immediately clear how specific weapon system characteristics affect wartime escalation dynamics.
  • With forecast conventional joint long-range strike capabilities, the United States can hold most potential targets on the Chinese mainland at risk, which opens the door to a wide variety of operational objectives for conventional long-range strike.
  • Different operational objectives privilege different target sets, but the lines across target sets blur, raising the distinct possibility of China misperceiving U.S. intent for long-range strike.
  • History suggests that U.S. political leadership might not authorize U.S. kinetic strikes on mainland China during a future conflict.
  • Chinese mainland targeting represents a critical, but not binary, decision threshold for U.S. defense officials and policymakers.
  • In most Taiwan scenario wargames, the initial aim of U.S. conventional long-range strike is operational defense (pure denial) to stop an amphibious assault against Taiwan.
  • A lack of adequate conventional long-range strike munitions tailored for Chinese military maritime targets creates pressure on the United States to shift to strikes against the Chinese mainland.
  • In Taiwan scenario wargames, U.S. long-range strike is linked to multiple undesired or unintentional escalation dynamics.

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Cochran, Shawn, William Kim, Nathan Beauchamp-Mustafaga, Dahlia Anne Goldfeld, Edward Geist, Jeff Hagen, David R. Frelinger, and Nina Miller, Denial Without Disaster—Keeping a U.S.-China Conflict over Taiwan Under the Nuclear Threshold: Vol. 2, Surveying U.S. Conventional Joint Long-Range Strike Capabilities, Operational Objectives, and Employment Decisions. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2024. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA2312-2.html.
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