Posted on 01/30/2014 5:18:41 AM PST by blam
China Is Playing 'Chicken' With US Warships In The South China Sea
GlobalPost
Benjamin Carlson, GlobalPost
Jan. 30, 2014, 7:51 AM
HONG KONG — As anyone who has seen “Rebel Without a Cause” knows, playing chicken is dangerous for California teenagers in hot-rods.
But playing chicken with warships, cruisers, and fighter jets — well, that’s just another level of crazy.
Unfortunately, vessels from the US military and from other countries increasingly find themselves in such high-stakes confrontations on the East Asian seas, where China has adopted a strategy of making rivals flinch or risk collision.
Just this week, Chinese sailors parked three ships on a disputed reef 50 miles from the Malaysian coast and performed a ceremony in which they swore an oath “to safeguard [China’s] sovereignty and territorial interests.” Malaysia also claims the reef, and is building a naval base nearby to protect it against China’s claim.
That’s just the latest in an escalating series of incidents.
In November, China declared its right to patrol and regulate a large swath of airspace, including a zone controlled by Japan and areas regularly used by the US military. Since then, China says it has repeatedly dispatched surveillance planes to tail, monitor, and identify foreign fighters.
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(Excerpt) Read more at globalpost.com ...
Saw a old video of a Russian ship bumping a US ship back in the 80s.
That must have been intense.
The irony of course is that the Chinese military was built using American money.
Reactivate the Iowa class battleships and send them over there. If a collision occurs - guess who loses!
Yeah, in 81 or 2 we were underway refueling with the Enterprise or Kitty Hawk in the Sea of Okhotsk. The Soviet ship - think a destroyer - steamed up and almost under the fuel hose stretched between the ships - then back off and turned away. Happened often and was fun. Just something to break up the monotany of life “haze grey and underway”
USS Henry B Wilson (DDG -7)
US Third Fleet, US Surface Forces Pacific 1979-84
In the early 70’s we always refueled at night when underway.
Damn. It was hard enough during the daytime.
And this time, China could win.
There is no will to confront any military challenge anywhere on the planet any more. The US military has been eviscerated and left bleeding by the lack of support in many crucial areas, and by the overuse of a valiant few in futile battles which are immediately traded away even when a clear victory had been achieved. In an effort to be “conciliatory” with an amorphous and often elusive enemy, that fades into the civilian population, and later strikes out in widespread asymmetrical warfare, the policy has been retreat and withdrawal.
Perhaps the business of policing the world SHOULD be turned over to China, even to the point of providing them with much of the recent developments of technology and some of the hardware to do the job.
But we would soon find ourselves bottled up in our own ports.
We have become Sweden.
They wouldn't do it - China is wiser than the USA in that regard, and only acts in its own national interest. Just try getting a Chinese force to go to, say, Syria for occupation duty. The UN would have to pay them in gold and cede them a couple of provinces. :)
Haze grey and underway? My "war" was the Cuban missile crisis; my ship (an AR) was tasked with evacuating military dependents and civvy contractors from GTMO. Funny thing, though- the EM club was open and the liberty section was cut loose for a few hours!
Had China taken a non-aggressive leadership role in SE Asia, it might have gotten many countries such as Indonesia and the Philippines into its orbit. By nakedly seeking territorial expansion on all fronts, the Chinese are playing a risky game. Instead of scattering their opponents, the Chinese may unite them. For allies, the Chinese have Myanmar, North Korea, and Pakistan, which are more liability than help in most situations.
Should India, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, and Malaysia form a concerted alliance, China will have a serious tactical problem. Granted there are issues with that happening, but China is greasing the skids.
China's Achilles heal is petroleum. It must import most of it, and mainly from the middle east. That means long shipment routes (LOC) that China does not and cannot control. Chinese aircraft carriers are not being built for the South China Sea, they are being built for the Indian Ocean. Keep your eyes on the Andaman, Nicobar, and Coco Islands. The Chinese are going to have to control those.
Of course, fracking could solve China's petroleum problem, as they have enormous shale reserves.
I agree with your observation.
Far too much “American” manufacturing has been sold out, and now is in China.
Making China richer, and making America poorer.
Bring back American manufacturing. Now.
these media types and their "playing chicken" stories . . I say BFD, we, while deployed to Asia would regularly have Soviet MIGs practice their dive bombing runs on us. You'll be out on deck and you don't even see them, I suppose because theyre doing about a Mach 2 - straight down at us - then . . . a huge roar of engine noise but nothing to see except a disappearing dot over the horizon. I'm sure Combat Information Control had them for miles and miles but we sure didn't "see" them. So much fun for a young guy - highly recommended.
shepherds chapel with Pastor Arnold Murray on current Events 2014 noted in reference to the end times Armies being formed even now— “Sadly we armed most of them— ‘Then he reminded us that when we left Iraq under Obama we left a lot of our arms behind-to be used against us no doubt.
If we were to maintain the Swedish policy of neutrality through marksmanship, I might not object so much.
I was on a DDG in the 70’s. Those have all been decommissioned. There was no room for separate facilities. Except for officers and chiefs we had one head aft. Berthing compartments were packed.
A war serves the interests of both parties. China knows that the monkey man is weak and cares little about foreign policy and defending US interests. The monkey man can always use a war as a diversion and as a way to rally the dumbed down public against a foreign threat. A war also allows the dictator to further consolidate power.
Unlike Syria, the public would likely view China as an existential threat, and the jingoism could work to the dictator’s advantage.
What we could see is a scenario of sabre rattling. The regime could pretend to act tough while giving away key concessions to the Chinese. Meanwhile, the run-up to a possible war would justify more police state actions, currency controls and executive power. Then, when war is suddenly averted, the media would hail the dictator as the resurrected savior, just in time for the 2016 elections.
"The prominent realist international relations scholar John Mearsheimer says there is a greater possibility of the U.S. and China going to war in the future than there was of a Soviet-NATO general war during the Cold War."
Our best ship handler was the warrant officer in charge of our division. He put the ship under the Kennedy’s flight deck once. The folks on the carrier went ape shit.
CIC always announced the ETA over the 1MC for the inbound Russian bombers. We used to wave at them.
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