Very true. Meanwhile:
WONDERFUL TIMING FOR CHINA TO MOVE IN
China plans 'mock invasion' of Taiwan; War games fuel tension
BEIJING (Agencies):
China made sure Tuesday that Taiwan was in no doubt that it will be the target of military drills this month when state media publicized the usually secretive exercises that coincide with ballistic missile tests.
China believes Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian will push for formal statehood after winning a second four-year term in March and is readying for a showdown with the island, which Beijing has claimed since the Chinese civil war ended in 1949.
The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is to stage a mock invasion of Taiwan this month, with SU-27 fighters battling for air superiority and supporting an amphibious landing in land, sea and air exercises on Dongshan island, less than 300 km (200 miles) from Taiwanese soil, state media said.
The Russian news agency Itar-Tass said China had notified Russia of plans to test-fire three ballistic missiles this month.
The missiles, including the long-range Dongfeng 31 and the medium-range Dongfeng 21, would be launched from the northern province of Shanxi and land in the Taklamakan desert in northwestern Xinjiang, a distance of 2,500 km (1,600 miles), the agency said.
In a riposte to the long-planned Dongshan drill, Taiwan is holding annual exercises in August to test its combat readiness in the face of what Defense Minister Lee Jye has said was a significantly higher likelihood that China would use force to recover the island.
Beijing's official China Daily said the war games off Dongshan were a response to tension across the Taiwan Strait.
The start date would be decided depending on weather conditions.
Two Taiwanese fighter jets will practice emergency landings on a freeway as part of the island's measures against an attack by rival China, the defense ministry said Tuesday.
Two French-made Mirage 2000-5s will land, refuel and load ammunition on the road in Tainan, southern Taiwan, in the July 21 drill.
The exercise is designed to "check the air force's capability in using freeways for emergency landings and logistic support in case of war," defense ministry spokesman Huang Suey-sheng told reporters.
Also:
WASHINGTON: Knowledge of "Go," an ancient Chinese game of strategy, could help the United States better grasp the military thinking of its biggest potential rival, a study published by the US Army War College says. The study, by a Chinese diplomat who defected to the United States, is part of a series meant to spur new ways of thinking about US national security. "Go" - or weiqi in Chinese - is said to be the world's oldest and perhaps most demanding board game. Two players compete, typically on a 19 X 19 line grid of points, using black and white tokens called stones.
Moving on many fronts, competitors vie for territory, staking out spots they want to own. They surround, poke, invade and parry, forming a map of the contest of two minds. "A little knowledge and experience of the game of "Go" will be a valuable addition to the American political and military wisdom," says author David Lai, who defected in protest at the crushing of the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy movement.
www.arabtimesonline.com/a...2896&cat=a