China-U.S. inadvertent escalation has been a focus of recent international relations literature. The current debate, however, has not paid sufficient attention to two important factors: the survivability of China's nuclear forces under unintentional conventional attacks; and China's nuclear command, control, and communication (NC3) system. Based on detailed analysis of these two variables, three potential mechanisms of China-U.S. inadvertent escalation are examined: use-it-or-lose-it, unauthorized/accidental, and damage-limitation. Although the possibility of a major China-U.S. conventional war inadvertently escalating to a nuclear level cannot be excluded, the risk is extremely low. China's nuclear forces would survive U.S. inadvertent conventional attacks and, thus, are unlikely to be significantly undermined. Even though China's NC3 system might be degraded during a conventional war with the United States, Chinese leadership would likely maintain minimum emergency communications with its nuclear forces. Moreover, China's NC3 system is highly centralized, and it prioritizes “negative control,” which can help to prevent escalation. China's nuclear retaliatory capability, although limited, could impede U.S. damage-limitation strikes to some extent. To keep the risk of inadvertent escalation low, both sides must take appropriate precautions and exercise self-restraint in their planning and operations.

Many strategists argue that to deter a nuclear attack, states must be certain of their ability to retaliate after a nuclear first strike. China's nuclear posture of uncertain retaliation suggests an alternative logic. Given the catastrophic consequences of a nuclear attack, uncertain retaliation can have a strong deterrent effect, and assured retaliation is not necessary. A simplified nuclear exchange model developed to evaluate China's nuclear retaliatory capabilities against the Soviet Union in 1984 and the United States in 2000 and 2010 shows that China's nuclear retaliatory capability has been and remains far from assured. In its 2010 Nuclear Posture Review Report, the United States promised to maintain strategic stability with China; therefore, the 2010 scenario can be considered as a baseline for China-U.S. strategic stability. Both China and the United States are developing or modernizing their strategic offensive and defensive weapons. The technical competition between China and the United States favors each in different ways. A hypothetical scenario of China versus the United States in 2025 reveals that China-U.S. strategic stability will likely be maintained at no lower than its 2010 level.