China's new Doomsday Express

Is Beijing planning high-speed nuke trains?

The Soviets had ‘em. (Not the high-speed kind, but definitely nuke-capable.) The Putinists—after decommissioning the Soviet ones—reportedly had a modern replacement in development well beyond the drawing board; but that project is unlikely to see the light-of-day due to its exorbitant cost, especially in the wake of Russia’s catastrophic war in Ukraine.

Now China, already the biggest player in hyperfast railway development, is “exploring a possible high-speed ‘missile train’ that can whizz part of its nuclear arsenal around the country and make it more difficult to track and destroy,” says the Times of London.

Note the word “exploring.”

Yes. Also past the drawing board: enough so for U.S. intelligence sources to confirm that Beijing has already test-launched one of its DF-41 ICBMs off the back of a rail car.

But could this be a bit of false-flexing? What the Russians call maskirovka. The art of deception. A shiny rock to keep us looking one way while their missile forces go another.

Let’s hope we never find out—at least not the hard way.

Unlike Russia, China has the technology (high-speed trains), the infrastructure (a massive railway system with tunnels in which to hide the missile trains), and something else: the money.