China is reported to have test-fired a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) capable of reaching the US mainland, but no official statement had emerged from the United States as of Saturday evening. Amid a chorus of concern from neighboring countries, some interpret the silence as a sign that Washington is prioritizing an improvement in relations with Beijing.
The Chinese military announced Saturday that one of its strategic nuclear submarines successfully launched a "submarine-launched strategic missile" carrying a training dummy warhead into international waters in the Pacific at 12:01 p.m. that day. The Chinese military did not disclose the missile's specifications. However, China's state-run Global Times, citing Chinese military expert Song Zhongping, said "there is a very high possibility that the launched missile was the JL-3." Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, also told The New York Times (NYT) that the JL-3 was most likely tested.
The JL-3, China's third-generation SLBM, has a range of more than 10,000 km, putting most of the globe, including the US mainland, within its reach. China unveiled the missile at a military parade last September. This test marks the first strategic missile test aimed at the Pacific in one year and 10 months, since the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launch in September 2024.
Some interpret this as China beginning to fully assert its military rise, breaking away from its long-held posture of "taoguang yanghui" (hiding one's strength and biding one's time) in diplomacy and military policy. Still, no official statement has come from the US government.
President Donald Trump, at a public White House event that morning, said, "When I recently went to China, I visited the grand banquet hall," adding, "It was a very large banquet hall." He only mentioned that "Chinese President Xi Jinping is scheduled to visit here around September 24," and said nothing about the SLBM. Japan's Nihon Keizai Shimbun assessed that "while the security threat to the United States is rising due to (Chinese) missiles that place the mainland within range, the US is prioritizing the stability of (US-China) relations that President Trump is aiming for."
Other countries, by contrast, all expressed concern. The Japanese government said in a statement, "We express serious concern over China's strengthening of its military activities." Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said, "Actions that undermine stability could lead to miscalculation and produce outcomes we do not want." New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters noted that it "is not consistent with regional stability."
