Underground Great Wall of China

The Underground Great Wall of China is the informal name for the vast system of underground tunnels China uses to store and transport mobile ICBMs. Due to the immense amount of secrecy surrounding the tunnels, not much information about them is publicly available however it is believed that the tunnels allow for mobile ICBMs to be shuttled around to different silos and/or stored in reinforced underground bunkers. This greatly enhances the ICBMs to survive a direct nuclear strike, and thus be capable of delivering a second strike unlike American ICBMs based in static nuclear silos which are generally agreed to not being able to survive a direct nuclear attack.

A report written by a Georgetown University team led by Phillip Karber conducted a three-year study to map out China’s complex tunnel system, which stretches 5,000 km (3,000 miles). The report determined that the stated Chinese nuclear arsenal is understated and as many as 3,000 nuclear warheads may be stored in the underground tunnel network. The study went on to state that the network of tunnels is not likely to be breached by conventional or low-yield earth-penetrating nuclear weapons such as the B61-11.