How CCP mouthpieces covered China’s ‘routine’ missile launch

While Beijing insists the launch of a nuclear-capable missile is no big deal, its flagship propaganda unit hailed the test as a show of military might that countries like Australia “will sooner or later have to accept and get used to.”

According to the Albanian government, the People’s Liberation Army fired an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) from a nuclear submarine that had been hiding “for some time” in the South China Sea.

It was the first sea-based launch of its kind in four decades and came just hours after Australia and Fiji signed a mutual defense agreement that could expand to include other Pacific nations.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Mao Ning, who attended the closely choreographed daily press conference, urged people “not to comment too much” on the launch.

“This is a routine military exercise,” he said.

“It does not target any third party or target, and is notified to the relevant countries in advance in accordance with international law and international practices.”

It was a sentence widely reported in China’s state media apparatus, and the official news agency Xinhua repeated it almost verbatim.

China Daily, the country’s largest English-language newspaper, also reported the launch as “routine” but acknowledged that the last such test was in 1988.

It was also acknowledged that the launched missile was “limited by its short operational range” and “served as a symbol of the PLA Navy’s nuclear capability rather than a usable deterrent.”

According to China Daily, this was not the case with the JL-3, the missile that was confirmed to have been fired.

It was unveiled at a mega military parade in Beijing last year, where Chinese President Xi Jinping hosted his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

But it was the Chinese Communist Party’s media attack dog, Global Times, that offered a deeper look into Beijing’s thinking.

On Tuesday, the newspaper responded to criticism by publishing a lengthy editorial outlining the military significance of the test, China’s nuclear philosophy and China’s role as a force for regional peace.

“Some powers have never given up on the ‘salami-slicing’, risk-taking mentality and gambling based on the assumption that China will not dare to take real action,” the article said.

“This mentality is based on blind faith in and worship of US strategic nuclear strike capabilities.”

The statement also stated that China is “continuously strengthening its strategic deterrent force system, including its nuclear triad of strategic nuclear forces” and that this “will force foreign powers and their followers to abandon attempts to force China to make concessions through maximum military pressure or preemptive strikes.”

He also dismissed protests from Australia, New Zealand and Japan as “grumblings from operational-level officials” and claimed anger was “significantly lower” than when China last tested an ICBM in 2024.

“This shows, on the one hand, that China’s actions are flawless, and on the other hand, China’s peaceful attitude in recent years has won the trust of the international community,” the newspaper said.

Whether the malicious voices or even those with remorse are nervous or scared, this is a situation that they must sooner or later accept and get used to.

China has nearly tripled its stockpile of nuclear warheads since 2020 and now has an estimated 620, according to independent observers.