U.S ships will continue to make Taiwan Strait transits. U.S will also continue to perform Freedom of Navigation operations in Indo-Pacific. Hitting out, U.S. said China's bid to coerce the international community 'won't work'. U.S is expected to conduct some Freedom of Navigation operations in the coming days. Pentagon said U.S will continue to sail in international waters, wherever it is allowed.
US pledges to send warships through Taiwan Strait in standoff with China
Following U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan, which deliberately provoked the greatest crisis in the region in a quarter century, the United States has announced plans for its next provocation: sending aircraft and warships through the Taiwan Strait.
The US will conduct “air and maritime transits through the Taiwan Strait in the next few weeks,” White House spokesperson John Kirby said.
In June, Fortune reported that Beijing told US officials that China sees the Taiwan Strait as its territorial waters, leading to the possibility Chinese military forces could seek to block a transit by a US warship, potentially leading to a military clash.
Kirby announced that the USS Ronald Reagan carrier strike group, which is operating in the waters outside Taiwan, will extend its deployment in the area.
The US announcement came amid a military standoff over Taiwan. After Pelosi’s visit, China carried out live-fire exercises in the waters on all sides of Taiwan, forcing the cancellation of flights and the re-routing of ships.
China deployed over 100 aircraft and over 10 warships in its largest-ever military drills in the Taiwan Strait. China fired at least 11 ballistic missiles, some flying directly over mainland Taiwan, and deployed drones that flew over Taiwan’s Kinmen Islands.
Over 900 flights involving 18 international air routes have been adjusted, and 66 flights have been cancelled.
The Global Times reported that the military drills “featured advanced weapons, including long-range rocket artillery, anti-ship ballistic missiles, stealth fighter jets and an aircraft carrier group with a nuclear-powered submarine, as well as realistic tactics that simulated a real reunification-by-force operation.”
For the first time, the Chinese drills included a “carrier group deterrence exercise,” the Global Times reported, and at “least one nuclear-powered submarine has been deployed.”
Both of China’s aircraft carriers were reported to have been steaming toward Taiwan, and either one or both participated in the drills.
Critically, China also fired missiles into Japan’s territorial waters, in what was interpreted as a message about its ability to strike US bases in Japan. The Global Times wrote: “The PLA exercise zones set in the northeast, east and south of Taiwan island are designated not only to blockade Taiwan and hit targets on the island, but also to prevent external forces like the US from intervening from its bases in Japan and Guam via the Philippine Sea.”
Japan, whose population overwhelmingly opposes militarism following Japan’s crimes in World War II and the US mass murder of the populations of the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, is being swept into the US-led war drive against China. This year, officials pledged to double Japan’s defense spending, up to 2 percent of GDP, and politicians have proposed stationing US nuclear missiles on Japan.
Even as the US made clear it would continue its efforts to goad China into military conflict, White House officials asserted—which neither they nor anyone else believe—that Pelosi’s visit was meaningless.
Kirby, the White House spokesperson, said in a statement Thursday: “I want to reiterate, as I’ve been saying all week: Nothing—nothing—has changed about our One China policy, which is guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the Three Joint US-PRC Communiqués, and the Six Assurances. And we say it that way every time because it’s exactly consistent.”
He added: “The provocateur here is Beijing. They didn’t have to react this way to what is completely normal travel by congressional members to Taiwan... The Chinese are the ones who are escalating this.”
Amid the ongoing military standoff, the US Senate is moving to formally abolish the One China policy, which is already a dead letter in practice.
The so-called Taiwan Policy Act of 2022, sponsored by Democratic Senator Bob Menendez and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, would designate Taiwan a “major non-NATO ally” alongside Japan, effectively giving it diplomatic recognition and ending the One China policy.
The bill would provide Taiwan $4.5 billion in military aid, a figure in order of magnitude greater than current expenditures.
“Our bill is the largest expansion of the military and economic relationship between our two countries in decades,” Graham said, deliberately referring to Taiwan as a country.
US TAKE POSSESSION OF SCARBOROUGH SHOAL LOCATED AT THE GATES OF MANILA, 120 MILES WEST OF SUBIC BAY. TOGETHER WITH SANCTIONS IN THE US SENATE MUTUALLY AGREED BY THE DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICAN ALIKE
Scarborough Shoal. NASA Photo
Starting in early 2016, Scarborough Shoal suddenly became an issue of serious concern for U.S. officials. According to articles in the press reports information was obtained that strongly suggested that China was about to start turning Scarborough into another artificial island, similar to what they had done in the Spratlys. Apparently, one of the factors that suggested Beijing was about to act was a posting found on a Chinese website that included satellite photographs based on a construction bid proposal that would turn Scarborough into an island base similar to what China has constructed on seven Spratlys Islands.
A modern Scarborough airfield with radar and other modern information, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) facilities so close to Philippine bases where U.S. has been granted rotational access by the Philippine government possess obvious strategic issues. As shown in the graphic below from the office of U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), turning Scarborough into a base with air search radars would allow China to have full-time radar coverage over most of Luzon.
Whether this is China’s intent is not known, but Washington reacted as though they thought it was. Whatever information the Department of Defense has it was deemed credible enough to trigger a “full-court” press aimed at dissuading Beijing from taking those steps. Given that Scarborough is ideally located to “control” the northeast exit of the South China Sea and is only 150 nautical miles west of Subic Bay, if it was turned into a PLA base with a jet capable airfield it would enable among other things a credible Chinese South China Sea Air Defense Identification Zone.
The U.S. response included beginning the rotational deployment of a small task force of US Air Force tactical aircraft to the Philippines, the presence operations of the USS John Stennis Carrier Strike Group in the South China Sea for much of March, April and May of 2016, along with a many high-level public statements, the most dramatic of which came from the Secretary of Defense in testimony before the Senate Armed Services committee. Carter was quoted as saying that Scarborough is “a piece of disputed territory that, like other disputes in that region, has the potential to lead to military conflict…That’s particularly concerning to us, given its proximity to the Philippines.” According to New York Times reports, President Obama also mentioned Scarborough Shoal to President Xi Jinping during their meeting on March 31st on the margins of the Nuclear Security Summit:The stakes are so high that Mr. Obama warned the Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, during their recent meeting in Washington not to move on the Scarborough Shoal or invoke an air defense zone, said an American official who was briefed on the details of the encounter and spoke anonymously because of the diplomatic sensitivities.
In essence, the flurry of activity regarding Scarborough in March, April and May of 2016 was meant to send a clear signal to China that the United States sees Scarborough as being different from the Paracels and Spratlys. Although official U.S. policy of taking no position on the merits of disputed sovereignty claims to features in the South China Sea includes Scarborough Shoal, recent US action suggests that it does in fact have a different unofficial view. Since Scarborough is not in either the Spratly or Paracel chains and is not also claimed by any littoral state other than China and Taiwan, and for almost 50 years was treated as though it was under US jurisdiction, changing the US position on sovereignty over Scarborough would not be a stretch. It is the author’s view that the evidence supports Philippine sovereignty over the Shoal. To this point:
When comparing the Chinese and Philippine cases, evidence of effective occupation is not overwhelming in either case – but, of the two, the Philippines’ case is stronger. Most mariners charted this feature only in order to remain well clear of it since it was a hazard to navigation. Similarly, the presence of itinerant fishermen from either China or the Philippines is legally insufficient to establish a legal presence.
But, past activities by the U.S. Navy and Philippine authorities to survey the Shoal so that it could be safe for shipping, constitute some positive occupation, along with its contemporaneous appearance on Philippine charts. Past actions by the Philippine armed forces to exercise law enforcement jurisdiction in the 1960s, both to eject smugglers and to monitor future movement, show intent to exercise jurisdiction over the atoll.
The past uses of the shoal by the U.S. Navy for military activities and its legal assessment that the atoll was part of the Philippines also support the case that the Republic of the Philippines was exercising sovereignty over the atoll. Even though the Philippines today asserts that its current claims are independent of the territory that was ceded by Spain to the United States, the key point is that the U.S. government considered it to be part of the Philippines, and any “occupying” activities which it undertook can be vicariously attributed to the Philippines because the United States was the legal proxy for the Philippine people until full independence in 1946.
In short, it would not be legally difficult for the U.S. government to persuade itself that the Government of the Philippines does have a superior claim to sovereignty over Scarborough Shoal. The obvious political and security implication of such a judgment would be the US-Philippine Mutual Defense Treaty could be interpreted to cover Scarborough Shoal; an act that hopefully would deter Chinese island building.
But, this is a card that Washington should keep close at hand while waiting to see how things play out. Unless the almost three months of recent US naval and air posturing around Scarborough was simply a bluff, it suggests that Washington has already decided that Scarborough is important enough to the security of the Philippines (and to the United States position in the Philippines) to accept the risks associated with doing something that will really irritate Beijing.
There will unlikely be any large scale fighting near American soil in a strictly conventional war situation. Firstly, let us start with Asia. The United States, Japan, and South Korea. would send their navy to counter North Korea, and China. South Korea would strictly focus on North Korea and would win with relative ease. The United States would focus on China, and Japan would focus on North Korea and China. The United States, India and Japan would form a blockade around China. This would lead to the US and Japan destroying their nuclear launch sites and all aircraft that can carry nuclear weapons. The US air-force, assisted by Japan, would control the skies over China. They would launch devastating airstrikes and would pierce their land defenses. This would all lead to the withdrawal of China, as they would probably not want to surrender. This would be a major victory for the US and Japan in Asia. Overall, it would be a costly US led coalition victory. China, would be recovering from the massive Japanese/American bombardment. North Korea would be under South Korean rule and they would begin to slowly recover and become prosperous. Japan would be trying to recover from the Chinese. They would still remain prosperous. The United States and Canada would remain relatively safe. America, being a war based economy, would profit greatly. Australia would be safe and would not really change at all.
The underlying factors are the growth of Chinese power, Chinese dissatisfaction with the US-led regional security system, and US alliance commitments to a variety of regional states. As long as these factors hold, the possibility for war will endure.
Whatever the trigger, the war does not begin with a US pre-emptive attack against Chinese fleet, air, and land-based installations. Although the US military would prefer to engage and destroy Chinese anti-access assets before they can target US planes, bases, and ships, it is extremely difficult to envisage a scenario in which the United States decides to pay the political costs associated with climbing the ladder of escalation.
Instead, the United States needs to prepare to absorb the first blow. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the U.S. Navy (USN) and U.S. Air Force (USAF) have to wait for Chinese missiles to rain down upon them, but the United States will almost certainly require some clear, public signal of Chinese intent to escalate to high-intensity, conventional military combat before it can begin engaging Chinese forces.
If the history of World War I gives any indication, the PLA will not allow the United States to fully mobilize in order to either launch a first strike, or properly prepare to receive a first blow. At the same time, a “bolt from the blue” strike is unlikely. Instead, a brewing crisis will steadily escalate over a few incidents, finally triggering a set of steps on the part of the US military that indicate to Beijing that Washington is genuinely prepared for war. These steps will include surging carrier groups, shifting deployment to Asia from Europe and the Middle East, and moving fighter squadrons towards the Pacific. At this moment, China will need to decide whether to push forward or back down.
On the economic side, Beijing and Washington will both press for sanctions (the US effort will likely involve a multilateral effort), and will freeze each others assets, as well as those of any co-belligerents. This will begin the economic pain for capital and consumers across the Pacific Rim, and the rest of the world. The threat of high intensity combat will also disrupt global shipping patterns, causing potentially severe bottlenecks in industrial production.
Whether US allies support American efforts against China depends on how the war begins. If war breaks out over a collapse of the DPRK, the United States can likely count on the support of South Korea and Japan. Any war stemming from disputes in the East China Sea will necessarily involve Japan. If events in the South China Sea lead to war, the US can probably rely on some of the ASEAN states, as well as possibly Japan. Australia may also support the US over a wide range of potential circumstances.
China faces a less complicated situation with respect to allies. Beijing could probably expect benevolent neutrality, including shipments of arms and spares, from Russia, but little more. The primary challenge for Chinese diplomats would be establishing and maintaining the neutrality of potential US allies. This would involve an exceedingly complex dance, including reassurances about Chinese long-term intentions, as well as displays of confidence about the prospects of Chinese victory (which would carry the implicit threat of retribution for support of the United States).
North Korea presents an even more difficult problem. Any intervention on the part of the DPRK runs the risk of triggering Japanese and South Korean counter-intervention, and that math doesn’t work out for China. Unless Beijing is certain that Seoul and Tokyo will both throw in for the United States (a doubtful prospect given their hostility to one another), it may spend more time restraining Pyongyang than pushing it into the conflict.
The US will pursue the following war aims:
1. Defeat the affirmative expeditionary purpose of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN).
2. Destroy the offensive capability of the PLAN and People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF).
3. Potentially destabilize the control of the CCP government over mainland China.t
Except in the case of a war that breaks out on the Korean Peninsula, the first task involves either defeating a Chinese attempt to land forces, or preventing the reinforcement and resupply of those troops before forcing their surrender. The second task will require a wide range of attacks against deployed Chinese air and naval units, as well as ships and aircraft held in reserve. We can expect, for example, that the USN and USAF will target Chinese airbases, naval bases, and potentially missile bases in an effort to maximize damage to the PLAN and PLAAF. The third task probably depends on the successful execution of the first two. The defeat of Chinese expeditionary forces, and the destruction of a large percentage of the PLAN and the PLAAF, may cause domestic turmoil in the medium to long term. US military planners would be well-advised to concentrate the strategic campaign on the first two objectives and hope that success has a political effect, rather than roll the dice on a broader “strategic” campaign against CCP political targets. The latter would waste resources, run the risk of escalation, and have unpredictable effects on the Chinese political system.
Japan is very much the flavor of the current Indian season. Especially when juxtaposed against China, Japan is acknowledged by New Delhi as being one of the most significant maritime players in the Indo-Pacific. Indeed, Japan’s steadily deteriorating and increasingly fractious relationship with China is a prominent marker of the general fragility of the geopolitical situation prevailing almost throughout the Indo-Pacific. Within this fragile environment, New Delhi is seeking to maintain its own geopolitical pre-eminence in the IOR and relevance in the Indo-Pacific as a whole by adroitly managing China’s growing assertiveness. In this process, Japan and the USA (along with Australia, Vietnam, South Korea, and Indonesia) collectively offer India a viable alternative to Sino-centric hegemony within the region. However, before it places too many of its security eggs in a Japanese basket, it is important for India to examine at least the more prominent historical and contemporary contours of the Sino-Japanese relationship. As India expands her footprint across the Indo-Pacific and examines the overtures of Japan and the USA to seek closer geopolitical coordination with both, it is vital to ensure that our country and our navy are not dragged by ignorance, misinformation or disinformation, into the law of unintended consequences.
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