Chinese Fighters Violate Taiwanese, Korean And Japanese Airspace

In keeping with China’s strategy of methodically encroaching on its geopolitical rivals via air force and naval drills in the Pacific, both Japan and South Korea scrambled fighter jets earlier this week as China suddenly expanded the scope of naval drills being held in the waters off the Korean peninsula.

The Associated Press reported that China sent a squad of fighter jets and bombers on a long-range military drill to the Sea of Japan. During their journey, the planes traveled through South Korean, Japanese and Taiwanese air defence zones, a move widely seen as China flexing its military muscles and asserting its dominance in the region.

The drills marked the first time China has sent warplanes through the strait that lies between South Korea and Japan.

Chinese air force spokesman Shen Jinke said the air force dispatched bombers, fighters and reconnaissance planes through the Tsushima Strait to the Sea of Japan to "test its ocean combat ability."

"This is a regular annual training arrangement of China"s air force that accords with the relevant international laws and practices and it isn"t aimed at any particular state, region and target," Shen said in a statement.

Seoul"s Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed that five Chinese warplanes — two bombers, two fighter jets and one reconnaissance plane — entered South Korea"s air defense identification zone off a southern South Korean island all at the same time.

The plane then flew to the Japanese air defense zone above the waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan, a JCS official said on condition of anonymity, citing department rules.

In what’s perhaps the most galling detail of the story, South Korea used a military hotline to warn China of its planes" entrance to the zone, according to an anonymous official. China replied that the unannounced intrusion was part of its routine training.

Self-ruled Taiwan"s military says China"s air force held a separate drill Monday morning through the Bashi Channel separating Taiwan from the Philippines and then through the Miyako Strait, which lies north of Taiwan and to the south of Japan.

The Taiwanese defense ministry said Japan dispatched F-15 fighter jets to intercept the Chinese planes. Japan had no immediate comment on Monday"s drill.

It was the second time this week that China had conducted drills around Taiwan.

As US generals have warned, China is pursuing an extremely aggressive military presence in the Pacific to assert itself as a dominant power in the region. China’s willingness to test boundaries has caused the number of confrontations between Japanese and Chinese fighter jets to escalate dramatically...

To be fair, China has also been alarmed by US naval vessels conducting so-called “freedom of navigation” missions near the contested Spratley Islands in the South China Sea.

US officials have described China’s repeated confrontations as part of a strategy of normalization, whereby Chinese officials repeatedly test boundaries until regional rivals gradually come to accept their expanded presence. Ultimately, the strategy is aimed at forcing the international community to accept “the nine-dash line” – the contest maritime border surrounding islands in the South China Sea that China has claimed and developed, but has been the subject of an international dispute with several of China’s regional neighbors.
 

China Has Practiced Bombing Runs On Guam

Just as President Donald Trump is preparing to embark on a nearly two-week tour of Asia – his first since taking office – where he is expected to discuss, among other topics, the regional threat posed by North Korea, Defense News is reporting that China has reportedly been conducting bombing drills targeting the US territory of Guam.

Reports of China’s aggressive expansion of its air force – an attempt to exert its dominance over contested territories in the South China and East China seas – were relayed by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford during a briefing with reporters.

China “is very much the long-term challenge in the region,” Dunford said. “When we look at the capabilities China is developing, we’ve got to make sure we maintain the ability to meet our alliance commitments in the Pacific.”

The notion that both North Korea and China have threatened Guam, either explicitly or tacitly, speaks to the fact that China is the biggest threat to US security in the Pacific, nuclear standoff with North Korea notwithstanding, Dunford said.

To wit, a conflict with North Korea is still viewed as “a fight we can win,” military officials said during the briefing. With China, they said they “worry about the way things are going.”

Followers of US activities in the Pacific may have noticed the increase in confrontations between US and Chinese forces, both in the water and in the sky. While it hasn’t been nearly as widely publicized as the Chinese military’s buildup in the South China Sea, China has also been building its fleet of fighter jets, operating daily, aggressive campaigns to contest airspace over the East China Sea, South China Sea and further out into the Pacific, Defense News reported.

The officials described the escalatory behaviors by China in a briefing they provided to reporters traveling with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford.

China’s willingness to test boundaries has caused the number of confrontations between Japanese and Chinese fighter jets to escalate dramatically…

Over the last year Japan has scrambled 900 sorties to intercept Chinese fighters challenging Japan’s air defense identification zone, or ADIZ. In 2013 China announced borders for its own ADIZ, borders which overlapped Japan’s zone and included the disputed Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea. Since then, increased interactions between Japanese and Chinese aircraft ultimately resulted in Japan relocating two fighter squadrons to Naha Air Base on Okinawa to more easily meet the incursions, the officials said.

 

“We now have, on a daily basis, armed Chinese Flankers and Japanese aircraft” coming in close proximity of each other, the officials said, adding that intercepts between the U.S. and China are also increasing.

…While US military officials have accused the Chinese air force of provoking the US by staging intercepts of US aircraft.

“It’s very common for PRC aircraft to intercept U.S. aircraft” these days, the officials said, referring to the People’s Republic of China.

 

Chinese aircraft are also testing U.S. air defense identification zones, the officials said. Chinese H-6K “Badger” bombers upgraded with 1,000 mile range air launched cruise missiles are testing U.S. defense zones around Guam.

 

The Badgers run “not infrequent” flights to get within range of the U.S. territory, they said.

 

“The PRC is practicing attacks on Guam,” the officials said.

 

The vast majority of the flights occur without an incident, such as a report of unsafe flying, for example. The officials said they follow U.S. Pacific Command guidance on how to respond in those events, so they do not further escalate.

DefenseNews noted that the military relationship between the US and China remains open, if guarded. US officials meet twice a year at the Military Maritime Consultative Agreement conference, where the incursions are discussed along with other security topics.

However, officials described China’s repeated confrontations as part of a strategy of normalization, whereby Chinese officials repeatedly test boundaries until regional gradually come to accept their expanded presence. Ultimately, the strategy is aimed at forcing the international community to accept “the nine-dash line” – the contest maritime border surrounding islands in the South China Sea that China has claimed and developed, but have been the subject of an international dispute with several of China’s regional neighbors. Last year, an international court ruled in favor of the Philippines’ claim of ownership, but the ruling was promptly ignored by the Chinese.

The expanded Chinese fighter and bomber runs are just one part of the country’s effort to “win without fighting” to gradually normalize the gains China has made in the South China Sea, the officials said.

 

There are other pressures. For example, the officials said they estimate the People’s Liberation Army Navy has placed as many as 150,000 Chinese commercial fishing vessels under its direction, even though they are not official Chinese navy. The Chinese fishing vessels make coordinated attacks on Vietnamese fishermen, the officials said, ramming and sometimes sinking boats near the Paracel Islands. China took the territory from Vietnam in the 1970s and has militarized some of the islands. The area remains a traditional fishing area for the Vietnamese.

 

Taken together, China’s activities suggest it is preparing to defend expanded boundaries, the U.S. officials worry.

 

“I think they will be ready to enforce it when they decide to declare the Nine-Dash line as theirs,” one of the officials said, referring to the territorial line China has identified that would notionally put the entire South China Sea under Chinese control if enforced.

Ultimately, the US fears that Chinese systemic provocations will erode the so-called “rules-based order” – the system of international codes and treaties that governs military relationships between sovereign states.

If unchallenged, the U.S. officials worry that China could slowly force countries away from what they describe as the “rules based order” — essentially the standing international treaties and norms — in the region and make them shift their security alliances to Beijing for their own economic survival.

 

Dunford said the U.S. would not allow that to happen.

 

“We view ourselves as a Pacific power,” Dunford said.

 

“There are some who try to create a narrative that we are not in the Pacific to stay,” he said. “Our message is that we are a Pacific power. We intend to stay in the Pacific. Our future economic prosperity is inextricably linked to our security and political relationships in the region.”

 

While all of the officials stressed that there is no imminent danger of a conflict with China, U.S. forces in the region are rethinking what a Pacific fight would look like.

 

“If we find ourselves in conflict out there we will be under air attack,” the official said.

While North Korea will likely be the main topic of discussion during Trump’s Asia tour, Dunford said he expects Trump will convey the US’s displeasure with China’s increasingly aggressive posture in the Pacific.

Of course, while China has cooperated with the US in passing sanctions against North Korea, while partly acquiescing to US demands that Beijing curtail economic support for the Kim regime, Dunford seems to suggest that China’s cooperation on these issues is nothing more than a ploy to create a buffer of goodwill as it gradually expands its reach in the Pacific. The question now is: Will the US seek to more boldly counter China’s advance? Or, like the famous analogy of the frog in the pot of boiling water, will US reticence allow China to keep pushing until it is the dominant military power in the Pacific?

What do you think?
 

China Warns Japan: "Get Used To Our Warplanes", Sends Spy Ship Near Alaska

In an unexpectedly brazen rattling of sabers, just days after China deployed troops to its first foreign base in Djibouti, a move which the Global Times clarified is "about protecting its own security, not about seeking to control the world, Beijing made a less than subtle reversal, when it told Japan on Friday to "get used to it" after it flew six warplanes over the Miyako Strait between two southern Japanese islands in a military exercise.

It all started late on Thursday night, when Japan"s defense ministry issued a token statement describing the flyover by the formation of Xian H-6 bombers, also known as China"s B-52, earlier that day as "unusual", while noting that there had been no violation of Japanese airspace.

The flyover was hardly surprising: the Chinese navy and air force have been carrying out a series of exercises in the Western Pacific in recent month, both as they hone their ability to operate far from their home shores, as well as a trial balloon to gauge the reactions of their increasingly more nervous neighbors.

What made this flyover different, is that usually following a formal protest by the "offended" country, Beijing would take note and issue a token statement of its own, "neither admitting nor denying" guilt, but certainly without assurances of further transgressions. But not this time. On Friday the Chinese defense ministry said it was "legal and proper" for its military aircraft to operate in the airspace and that it would continue to organize regular training exercises according to "mission requirements."

In other words, Beijing pushed back against Japan"s complaint suggesting that China had not only done nothing wrong, but that this behaviour would escalate:

"The relevant side should not make a fuss about nothing or over-interpret, it will be fine once they get used to it," the ministry said in a statement.

Furthermore, the Miyako Strait is between Japan"s islands of Miyako and Okinawa, to the northeast of self-ruled Taiwan, which China claims as its own.

It wasn"t just Japan: also on Thursday, Taiwan"s Ministry of National Defense said the Chinese bombers flew just outside its air defense identification zone and that it had "closely followed" the movements.

It is probably safe to assume that several more such close encounters, coupled an escalation in the harsh language - don"t expect Japan to back off diplomatically, especially not under Abe who militant ambitions are hardly secret - and a repeat of the tensions that erupted in 2013/2014 over territorial claims in the East China Sea, and which ended with diplomatic relations between China and Japan collapsing as well as nationalist sentiment in both China and Japan erupting, appears likely.

In a separate close encounter, at the same time that the US was conducting a succeeful THAAD-based intercept of a ballistic missile on Tuesday, a Chinese spy ship was lurking just 100 miles from Alaska"s coast to witness the said test for itself, Fox News reported. Furthermore, it was the first time the North American Aerospace Defense Command had seen this class of Chinese spy ship before near Alaska, an official told Fox News. The ship was spotted off the coast of Kodiak, on Alaska"s southern tip.

The THAAD test came after North Korea successfully test launched an alleged ICBM missile (this has subsequently been challenged with many claiming the missile was only intermediate range) that flew longer than any test conducted by Kim"s regime to date. Officials have said that Kim may now have the capability to strike Alaska. Prior to the test, both China and Russia have repeatedly demanded that the US remove its THAAD installations from South Korea over concerns that the balance of power in the Pacific Rim could shift, and destabilize the region.

China has sent warships to Alaska before, most famously in 2015 when former Barack Obama visited Alaska, China "greeted" him by sending five ships, while more recently a Chinese warship trailed a U.S. warship when it sailed earlier this month near a contested island in the South China Sea.

China also recently launched a new class of destroyer in Shanghai, which military experts say is on par with modern U.S. Burke class guided-missile destroyers. Furthermore, China now has roughly the same number of destroyers, cruisers and submarines as the U.S. Navy, according to new study from CNAS a Washington think tank.

In a separate naval adventure, China"s first fully functional aircraft carrier recently sailed near Taiwan after making a port call in Hong Kong that marked 20 years since the British handed the city over. The carrier was declared combat ready following initial tests in November. It does not, however, have advanced steam catapults to launch jets like a modern U.S. Navy aircraft carrier.

It was not clear where the Chinese spy ship had moved to after its brief trip to the Alaska coast.

Taiwan Scrambles Jets, Navy After Chinese Aircraft Carrier Group Enters Taiwan Strait

While much of America was preparing to listen to Obama speak one final time, the Chinese had far less lofty ambitions, and on Wednesday morning Beijing sent a group of Chinese warships led by China"s sole aircraft carrier north through the Taiwan Strait, resulting in Taiwan scrambling jets and navy ships in the latest sign of heightened tensions between China and the self-ruled Taiwan.

According to Reuters, The Soviet-built Liaoning aircraft carrier, returning from exercises in the South China Sea, was not trespassing in Taiwan"s territorial waters but entered its air defense identification zone (ADIZ) in the southwest, Taiwan"s defense ministry said.

China"s Liaoning aircraft carrier conducts a drill in an area of South China Sea,
in this undated photo taken December, 2016

As a result Taiwan scrambled jets and navy ships to "surveil and control" the passage of the Chinese ships through the narrow body of water separating Taiwan and China. "We have full grasp of its movements," Taiwan defense ministry spokesman Chen Chung-chi said.

The defense ministry spokesman added that the Taiwanese military aircraft and ships have been deployed to follow the carrier group, which is sailing up the west side of the median line of the strait.

Previously, China has said the Liaoning aircraft carrier was on drills to test weapons and equipment in the disputed South China Sea and its movements comply with international law.

As Reuters adds, the latest Chinese naval exercises have unnerved Beijing"s neighbors, especially Taiwan which Beijing claims as its own, given long-running territorial disputes in the South China Sea. China claims most of the energy-rich waters of the South China Sea, through which about $5 trillion in ship-borne trade passes every year. Neighbors Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have claims.

While China traditionally distrusts Taiwan, and especially the new President Tsai Ing-wen, it has has stepped up pressure on her following a protocol-breaking, congratulatory telephone call between her and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump last month.