China trials experimental system for simultaneous nuclear strikes

A recent Chinese military study published in the journal Explosion and Shock Waves details a pioneering laboratory simulation of multiple nuclear warheads striking the same target in rapid succession. Led by Xu Xiaohui of the People’s Liberation Army’s Army Engineering University, the research demonstrates that coordinated multi-point nuclear detonations can produce significantly greater destructive power than single blasts. This challenges the traditional focus on single warhead earth-penetration strikes and highlights the potential of low-yield, precision-guided warheads capable of delivering several re-entry vehicles in a tight cluster to maximize damage. To overcome the difficulty and cost of testing simultaneous underground nuclear blasts, Xu’s team developed a novel vacuum chamber system using similitude theory to scale down the effects of massive explosions into controlled laboratory experiments. Their setup involves shooting tiny projectiles into pressurized glass spheres filled with simulated blast gas, replicating the shock waves of nuclear detonations on a smaller scale. Results showed that triple strikes could quadruple the damage area compared to a single 5-k