Double Zero said: "My main worry is China, the nutter middle east states wouldn't care about being wiped out, so little deterrent effect."
China is certainly an impressive military power, but somehow, I can't see them nuking anybody. - They appear to be a bit too smart for that; they've cottoned on to the fact that you can win more easily through trade.
When European nations wanted wealth from Africa, they colonised various countries, farmed them, mined them, did help the locals to improve their standard of living, but extracted a considerable amount of wealth. Then they were booted out.
Nowadays, China is probably the biggest (in wealth) foreign power in Africa. They don't build hundreds of schools and hospitals, they don't import thousands of Chinese as permanent residents to colonise the countries - they have a much simpler, cheaper and more efficient method. Make impressively large payments to the local ruler, provide him with any 'assistance' he may need to stay in power, rent some farmland from him at favourable prices, import Chinese labour to do the work - then send them back home later (they've got a lot of people to feed back home) and all they ask for in return is cheap access to minerals.
China needs sources of energy and the raw materials -- including copper, cobalt, cadmium, magnesium, platinum, nickel, lead, zinc, coltan, titanium -- that African nations can supply. China competes with the United States for Angola's oil, controls most of the Sudan's oil, and is exploring for oil onshore and offshore in five other African countries. It is a major purchaser of timber from West Africa.
Where do you think Mugabe got those beautiful blue tiles which roof his palace outside Harare?
Supporting a government - particularly a government which may be under threat from its own people - is much cheaper than colonisation.
Another example: I've heard it said that the real reason for the war in Iraq was oil. (I'm not getting into that argument.) The 'coalition of the willing' spent huge amounts of money, materiel and manpower fighting a war in Iraq.
The Iraqi government finalised its first major post-war oil treaty this summer.
With China.
The Chinese are fighting (and winning) their 'wars' by trade. They import materials from Africa and other places in the 3rd world (cheaply) and they sell their products to the Western world.
Who would they want to nuke? - Their suppliers or their customers?