Today’s guest post is again from Jenny Moss [LinkedIn]. Snowboarder, China Analyst, Team Alumnus, in that order. This one is about PLARF detonation readiness (or rather the lack thereof).
Multiple branches of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) feel they are at risk of suffering a nuclear attack or accident but lack the training to properly respond to an emergency. To address this, nuclear emergency response units have begun conducting preliminary emergency response training for nuclear attacks and radiation injuries. Results have, so far, yielded less-than-ideal results according to researchers, who hope that the PLA will devote more research and resources towards nuclear emergency response.
This author reviewed over a dozen PLA nuclear emergency response medical and scientific studies. While more articles on this topic surely exist, the evidence available points to serious academic concern over a systematic unpreparedness amidst the PLA to adequately respond to a nuclear disaster.
This not only endangers those servicemen who are stationed near or aboard nuclear installations, but also potentially endangers the entirety of the People’s Liberation Army, many of whose branches believe they are at increasing risk of a nuclear attack by an unnamed enemy.
In a 2024 study on strengthening rescue capabilities related to nuclear radiation damage to warships at sea, researchers from China’s Journal of Navy Medicine write that the PLAN is at increased risk of nuclear attack and nuclear fuel and material leaks. Fuel leaks are becoming more likely as the number of nuclear-powered elements in the naval fleet increase, as are natural disasters and unspecified “war.” Increased risk of nuclear accident or attack is attributed to the PLAN’s “increasingly diverse mission set” resulting from “the Belt and Road Initiative’s continual expansion and the PLAN’s ongoing transformation.”
The study concludes by stating that China’s offshore naval medical support system is still in its early stages and lacks experience in dealing with nuclear radiation. This leaves the PLAN unequipped to protect its personnel or the environment in the case of a nuclear emergency.
At least one medical military researcher in PLA Medical University’s Rocket Force Injury and Medical Protection Joint Laboratory is so concerned by the PLARF’s unpreparedness for that branch’s bespoke injuries that he is suggesting an entirely new medical discipline: Rocket Force Medicine. The PLARF is the PLA’s steward for every nuclear weapon not fired from a submarine. Thus, injuries resulting from nuclear materials and radiation, propellant burns, tunnel operation, and unique PLARF-related stresses on mental health are the chief concerns, as are the lack of nuclear emergency medical rescue and combat training.
Without Rocket Force Medicine, the PLARF will be “seriously restricted in its ability to build up its own specialized medical staff.”
Given these results, the PLA may be putting itself at far more risk than was previously realized as it expands its use of nuclear materials past simply warheads. Recent satellite imagery analyzed by researchers at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, show that the PLAN is in the process of building what US analysts assess will be its largest and first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. The PLAN’s newest Zhou Class Type 041 attack submarine currently being fished out of China’s Wuchang Shuangliu ship yard after sinking in spring 2024, is also reported to run on a nuclear propulsion system, supplementing China’s at least six Type 093B nuclear-powered Shang Class attack submarines. The 2024 China Military Power Report, released by the Pentagon each year, expects the number of Type 093Bs to grow by 2025.
As the PLAN continues to expand its nuclear-powered fleet and nuclear-equipped multi-range ballistic missile arsenal, its ability to respond to potential disasters – as has already occurred with the sunk Type 041sub – lags well behind.
The next disaster might be just around the corner. Bloomberg reported in early 2024 that a US intelligence report stated a pervasive graft and corruption problem in the PLARF led to, among other things, faulty silo lids in the ICBM silo fields in Western China that “that don’t function in a way that would allow the missiles to launch effectively.” This likely refers to Yumen silo field in Gansu Province or the Hami field in Xinjiang, which both began construction in 2021.
ICBMs launched from faulty silos are at a higher risk of causing accidents upon launch that may expose nuclear materials and cause related injuries. To make matters worse, the silo operators might be experiencing their own medical crisis. A 2019 PLARF study on an anonymous PLARF brigade living in a tunnel showed that out of 200 troops, 25% experienced at least insomnia, fatigue, and other unspecified “nervous system symptoms” and “respiratory system symptoms.” Half of the patients experienced two to three of these symptoms.1
Another 2023 PLARF study on air support systems in confined spaces like missile silos stated that personnel in such environments have an elevated risk of experiencing hypoxia, low levels of oxygen in the body, which can lead to confusion and restlessness.2
Workplace hazards are not the only eventuality for which the PLA seems ill-prepared.
Researchers from the PLA Academy of Military Science and the PLA Defense Engineering Institute devoted a 2025 article to how key military infrastructure protection has been continuously neglected, leaving these sites highly vulnerable to attack. Long-range, precision strikes from ICBMs and hypersonic missile have proven highly effective and destroying critical infrastructure in Ukraine, raising fears that they could reap equally deleterious effects against PLA infrastructure, which will cripple the PLA’s ability to conduct a second strike. 3
Beyond infrastructure destruction, if ICBMs or hypersonic weapons loaded with nuclear warheads are launched against China, the medical response system may not be able to bear the brunt of the attack.
One 2019 study follows an anonymous PLA nuclear incident response unit as it held its first nuclear emergency response training, focusing on biological sample collection. The pretext given to the trainees was that the unit had just suffered an unidentified enemy nuclear attack.4
Results from the training showed that, while being lauded for “responding effectively,” unit members failed at both of their two main tasks — to take an adequate number of biological samples from patients in the field and send the samples away for testing. Just as in the PLAN study, the final note from examiners was “far more training is required.” -0-
For more information on PLA academic papers cited, please contact the author: @apt_jenny
