Ohio Republican Rep. Mike Turner said Wednesday that the Biden administration has not even “raised the bar” for dealing with China’s nuclear buildup.

Turner, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, told Fox Business presenter Larry Kudlow, “The leftist philosophy is, ‘We don’t want missile defense, because that would make other countries want to build nuclear weapons. ‘It was like,'” he said. , a former Trump administration official. “Unfortunately, we never did missile defense, just like other countries did, and they built even more nuclear weapons.” (Related: What Can China’s Anti-Ship Ballistic Missiles Really Do?)

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“When President Reagan called us to the challenge, not only did North Korea not have nuclear weapons, and Iran certainly did not have a nuclear weapons program, but China has tripled its nuclear arsenal to the United States. And we haven’t even withdrawn our nuclear arsenal,” Turner continued.

China is expanding its nuclear capabilities, including a build-up of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), The Wall Street Journal reported. report The augmentation includes silos for 100 DF-41 ICBMs, each carrying up to 10 warheads and capable of hitting targets up to 15,000 kilometers away. according to To the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“The left really believes that nuclear weapons themselves are a deterrent…they believe that missile defense itself is provocative and that it is a provocative step. I think it’s provocative to put it in a silo going to the United States,” Turner said.

Turner pointed to Israel’s Iron Dome system, which has seen action against rockets and missiles fired at the country by Hamas.

“We have the technology,” Turner said. “We deployed it in cooperation with Israel. I have.”

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