In a formal military study, China's People's Liberation Army Rocket Force has called on Chinese cities to prepare for nuclear attack scenarios, singling out Japan as a source of growing concern over its nuclear posture. The document does not anticipate a great-power nuclear exchange so much as it warns of a world in which smaller actors — state or otherwise — might act on grievance rather than deterrence logic. It is a reminder that the architecture of nuclear restraint, built on treaties and declarations, is only as durable as the trust and compliance that sustain it.