CHINA FLEXES MILITARY MUSCLE

While the US waits for China to agree to a military to military hotline to avoid serious misunderstandings in the seas around Taiwan the Chinese military continues to show off its military might in the region.
In November, following a visit to Beijing by US Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, the Chinese military, navy and air force conducted more than a week of military exercises which some experts said were designed to show how China’s Peoples’ Liberation Army and its other services would seek to control the seas around Taiwan, as well as air corridors in advance of a full-scale assault on the island.
Before the maneuvers began on November 19, the seas north of the Philippines and to the east of Taiwan were closed off as were air routes normally used by Chinese civilian Aircraft along China’s south east shoreline. At the same time, the US Kitty Hawk and its battle group were denied access up Hong Kong’s harbor to prevent them monitoring the exercises. In a sign this was all geared to show the Chinese people and their neighbors that China was a big military player the normally secretive PLA – Peoples Liberation Army – allowed details of the exercises to be discussed on its own Internet sites and other sites affiliated to them in Hong Kong. There was also a hint in comments made by China’s military leaders that they were determined to demonstrate to Washington that they were unhappy with the US move to honor the Dalai Lama, whom they regarded as a threat to their rule in Tibet, and with President Bush’s agreement to a $1 billion upgrade to Taiwan’s missile defenses. But above all else, the brazenness of the maneuvers and the openness with which they were conducted represented a deliberate projection of China’s military power. The way they were planned demonstrated they were part of a military war game to seal off Taiwan in a pincer movement to prevent the US from using its naval power to resupply the island in the event of an attack.
The war game had the following elements. Taiwan would be blockaded by the Chinese navy and air force before being surrounded and subjected to an assault. In order to determine if this would work in reality, the PLA used substantial elements of China’s military and for the first time showcased new weapons. That represented a departure for the PLA which normally prefers to hint at weapons that it has in development rather than putting them on public display. Among the new weapons were Russian-made cruise type missiles that could be used to take out US frigates, aircraft carriers or destroyers. There were also 022 stealth missiles in evidence and Russian designed Kilo class submarines. Two upgraded 965EM Sovremenny class destroyers had pride of place in one part of the war game. They were supplied by Russia in 2005-2006 and, at the time, their arrival in waters round Taiwan worried the US and the Taiwanese authorities.
As part of the air component of the exercises, there were bombers and Chinese-designed Flying Leopard fighters with battalions of naval special units standing by for a mock landing on the shores of Taiwan. Chinese J-10 fighters were also on show. When they first emerged in 2005 they were compared to US F-16s. They were modeled on lines similar to Israeli fighters but it was unclear at the time if the Chinese had bought the plans for the fighter from the Israelis or had stolen them. The Israelis refused to comment but Pentagon sources confirmed there were close military links between China and Israel which have continued to this day. In the latest exercises, there were unconfirmed reports that the PLA had a prototype of its much lauded Jin-class submarine in the waters near Taiwan. The Jin-class is designed to carry nuclear warheads.
An outcome of this war game will be a heightened awareness among the US and its allies in the region, especially Japan, that there should be a renewed willingness to be ready to confront and defeat China in the event its military rather than civilian leadership decides to attack Taiwan or advance Chinese interest in disputed parts of south east Asia such as the eight Senkakus islands or areas of the seabed in the Yellow Sea. At the heart of those disputes are natural resources, especially oil and gas much needed by a vast developing Chinese economy.
For US military experts watching this latest display of Chinese military might, there could well be a growing awareness that if China decides to fulfill its long term goal of seizing Taiwan, it may be able to do that before the US can get the necessary military assets in place to stop it. In that event, a US president may face two difficult options. Would it be too costly to try to oust China from Taiwan or would it be better to launch attacks on China’s military or its military- industrial complex in order to seriously weaken it and to punish it for its aggression. The latter might prove to be the better option because it would have a two-fold benefit. First, it would cripple the PLA and secondly it would demonstrate that the US and its allies in the region were not prepared to tolerate continued Chinese aggression. Of course, both options could lead to a fully fledged war with China and that is far from being a remote possibility the longer China prepares, as it did last month, for a military assault on Taiwan.