It takes a lot more to be a credible nuclear threat than just having some U235 sitting around...
It has a space program with rockets, a nuclear power sector, etc. It's the thing you do when you want all the pieces for a potential nuclear weapons program without signaling that you're looking to develop a nuclear weapons program.
I think the current contemporary estimate is that Japan could assemble a functioning nuke in 6-12 months.
History tells us that countries can and do declare war when it would be illogical for them to do so. There was a running theory before WW1 that the economic interconnection of Europe made war impossible, which was obviously false.
Does this mean China is gearing up for war? No. But to declare that China can’t declare war is fairly ahistorical.
> China is not trying to emulate the us … disregarding the propaganda
Ironically, I’d argue that this is propaganda. “We’re not like that other power, we’re so much better” is pretty classic stuff.
Although I’d argue that China isn’t emulating America, I’d argue that China is emulating 19th century Britain with its debt diplomacy.
Yes and therefore it stands to reason that they probably already have weapons ready (but maybe in a disassembled state) and simply don't disclose it.
Granted, I haven't read a ton of analysis on this, but my guess would be that you do if you're going up against someone with their own thermonuclear bombs. If China drops some of their own thermonuclear weapons on Tokyo, what's Japan's response? Dropping a fission weapon? If they got to that level, I'm sure that would be considered an acceptable risk for China. The converse is also true. If Japan dropped the fission weapon first, they'd instantly have a bunch of thermonuclear warheads headed their way.
I don't think it works that way. Fission bombs are perfectly capable of leveling a city. If a city gets leveled, no one's going to shrug it off because it was done with the "wrong" kind of weapon.
IIRC, modern thermonuclear warheads have yields along the lines of a couple hundred kilotons. Even through theoretically they can be made much more powerful, in practice they aren't.