Posted on 11/29/2013 9:48:38 AM PST by Zhang Fei
(Reuters) - China scrambled jets on Friday in response to two U.S. spy planes and 10 Japanese aircraft, including F-15 fighters, entering its new air defense zone over the East China Sea, state news agency Xinhua said, raising the stakes in a standoff with the United States, Japan and South Korea.
The jets were scrambled for effective monitoring, Xinhua cited air force spokesman Shen Jinke as saying. The report gave no further details.
Japan and South Korea flew military aircraft through the zone, which includes the skies over islands at the heart of a territorial dispute between Japan and China, the two countries said on Thursday, while Washington sent two unarmed B-52 bombers into the airspace earlier this week in a sign of support for its ally Japan. None of those aircraft informed China.
The Pentagon has declined to offer specifics on any additional U.S. flights and it neither confirmed nor denied the Chinese report of two U.S. spy aircraft entering the zone.
One U.S. defense official, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said only the U.S. military was still flying routine missions in the region, including reconnaissance and surveillance flights.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
I’m no China expert, but I can’t recall the Chi-coms ever engaging in bluff and bluster. I suspect playing the game as we did with the Soviets may be a mistake. A fatal one.
“China would not target the United States in the zone as long as it “does not go too far”.”
Put some Raptors up there and see if that goes far enough.
FUPLAAF
Over the course of its long history, China has engaged - as one might expect of just about every country in the world, over time - in border clashes with all of its neighbors. The clashes where victory came at a low cost were exploited to the hilt, such that new provinces were added to the empire. During the present regime's rule alone, China has clashed with the Soviets, the Indians and the Vietnamese, and annexed both Tibet and East Turkistan (now Xinjiang). China's rulers are rational players - cost-benefit is the key consideration. The Korean War was a bloodbath for the Chinese (1m dead) because Mao ruled the country like living deity - worshiped by all except his closest compatriots - and even that war's casualties paled relative to historical Chinese losses (where anywhere from 1/3 to 1/2 of the entire population died, a number typical of medieval era wars everywhere, due to famine and famine-related epidemics). As far as the Chinese are concerned, god is dead, and he's embalmed in a mausoleum located at Tiananmen Square. Now that Mao, the Chinese deity, has expired, China's uncle point is much lower than the 1m dead of the Korean War.
In the old days, the ADIZ declaration would have been met
by planting a CVN right in the middle of it for a month of heavy flight operations.
Who thinks there will be a shooting incident with China by Christmas?
Neither trade nor internal markets were an issue in most of those earlier situations. GM, McDonald's and Yum Brands (among others) get a substantial chunk of both sales and profits from the Chinese market. Sparking off a trade war is in nobody's interest. For a lot of big US companies, China is either the biggest non-US market or one of the top 5. (20 years ago, it was a rounding error. Surging Chinese productivity and incomes mean that this is no longer the case). Until the shooting starts, it's better to keep a low profile.
Interesting. Given the current administration, I would say our uncle point is far lower than theirs. And, everybody knows it.
Has anyone found Wong Wei, and his plane yet? It's been 12 years already.
No matter, should get interesting soon. Let's see who gets "splashed."
5.56mm
With a weakly led America, they are testing US and Japanese and Philippine resolve, and others.
Chinese actions have already initiated naval and air strengthening plans from nearly every nation in the Pacific. China, knows this, and is shouldering the lines with force.
If they get no response, they will take. Whether it is the Senkaku, Mischief Reef, Spratly or Paracells. I believe it is a miscalculation that will only give them stronger alliances to bear down on them.
In any attempt at a shock first strike on a Japanese entity, the Chinese underestimate the Japanese naval forces at their own peril.
I think their uncle point is way lower, because outside of the Mao era, they've been pretty faithful to the Confucian prescription that one should look to one's family's interests before those of the state. They're also agnostic to a fault - no Japanese kamikaze instinct to die fighting in order to join a bunch of notional guardian spirits there. The average Chinese has no problem sending somebody else's kid to die for his country, but will balk and resist when his own kid's life is on the line, to the extent of sending him abroad. The default Chinese principle, drilled in over thousands of years, is "Don't waste good iron for nails or good men for soldiers", especially kin. Mao worship kept that in abeyance during his rule. But Mao is long gone, and no one else has been able to cast the hypnotic spell Mao once did over the Chinese people.
It’s not good if none of your neighbors likes you.
The U.S. is quite cleverly bring South Korea, Philippines and Vietnam into this along with Japan.
I suspect this will end in humiliation for China. Arrogance has been their historical downfall.
Yes it was clever
Now there is another story where the Chinese state media is making it clear that their target is Japan.
As if we did not know that.
Getting all those other countries involved makes this not just between Japan and China.
Much more likely that China goes no farther now that it knows Japan has a lot of back up.
The Chinese appear to disagree with you.
Obama would like nothing better that a openly violent encounter with the Chi-Coms.
He would welcome anything at all that would draw attention away from his clown-like blundering and lack of leadership at home.
The further away from the shores of the USA, the better as far as Obama is concerned.
If a few hundred innocent people have to die to give him a chance to look presidential on the world stage it wouldn’t bother him a bit
It’s going to be a close race. China’s one-child policy is a BIG ol’ timebomb and the fuse is burning, but America is about to run face-first into a horde of social issues that will bring her to her knees (ie; back to God) or to her grave.
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