RUSSIA is helping China hugely increase its nuclear arsenal to give it apocalyptic levels of destruction, the United States has warned.

The chilling revelation that Vladimir Putin is helping China comes as Xi Jinping has effectively been made the country's leader for life.

Xi’s military leaders are seeking to compete with US by increasing the number of nuclear warheads from around 400 to 1,500 by 2035, the Pentagon has warned.

According to senior American official, Russia’s Rosatom state nuclear corporation is providing highly enriched uranium for Chinese fast breeder reactors.

John F. Plumb, assistant secretary of defense for space policy, was speaking at the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces.

"It's very troubling to see Russia and China cooperating on this," he said.

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"They may have talking points around it, but there's no getting around the fact that breeder reactors are plutonium, and plutonium is for weapons. So I think the Department is concerned.

“And of course, it matches our concerns about China's increased expansion of its nuclear forces as well, because you need more plutonium for more weapons”

China also has an ever-growing inventory of sophisticated long-range strike systems putting US forces at ever further distances, Plumb said. 

He told the committee: "China is engaged in a significant and fast-paced expansion and diversification of its nuclear forces.”

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China has been building two fast-breeder reactors on an island 136 miles off the northern coast of Taiwan.

One is already completed and the second will become operational in 2026.

Experts have warned that military co-operation between China and Russia would represent a "deadly alliance".

Isabel Sawkins, a research fellow at the Henry Jackson Society specialising in Russia, said that could be "potentially could be catastrophic" for Western powers.

"Bringing China into the conversation is a deadly addition for the West," she previously told The Sun Online

"This would mean America's standing in the world will be absolutely shot to pieces.

"If you have Russia and China working together the US is going to go into absolute panic."

It comes as the 69-year-old Xi has secured a historic third term from China's rubber-stamp parliament.

The more had been widely anticipated and makes him the most powerful leader since Chairman Mao.

Previously Chinese leaders had been restricted to two terms, to avoid any acquiring the same degree of power as Mao, whose rule resulted in millions of deaths and relentless terror.

In the days before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, Putin and Xi met and declared their “friendship without limits”.

But as full horror of the war began to unfold, China has distances itself from Putin and rebuked him for his deranged nuclear threats against the West in November.

China now appears more willing to back Russia with lethal military aid.

Putin’s struggling forces are reportedly due to receive hundreds of Chinese kamikaze drones that will allow it to carry out attacks on Ukrainian cities.

The two countries are said to be in talks about the sale of an initial batch of fully manufactured drones and then parts for many others to be made in Russia itself.

The two countries took part in enormous war games with 50,000 troops, 60 warships and 140 planes last year.

Beijing's mouthpiece the Global Times said the manoeuvres marked the first time the country has sent all three branches of its military to take part in drills with Russia.

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Thiswas a "show of the breadth and depth" of the two countries' military cooperation.

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