Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

U.S. struggles on China-war planning - top officer


I am truly amazed at the US/China propaganda inundation.

I mentioned a long time ago that we would be programmed to accept China as our number one threat rather than Muslim extremists. And the US propaganda machine has hit the pavement running.

China is using strategically placed weapons, intervention and the ability to attack niche vulnerabilities and as such does not have to match the United States. The American mindset that overwhelming firepower is all will not serve us well.
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Nothing is quite as lucrative as a cold war, for some, that is.

China is using asymmetrical warfare.

Most analysts make the grave error of comparing China’s armed forces with those of the United States on an item per item basis.

While the following excerpt was written using a comparative analysis of India and China, the same may be said of the United States and China.

A country’s military potential must be viewed against the backdrop of its military ethos, its determination to win, its ability to take and absorb ‘punishment’, and the ingenuity / innovativeness of its military leadership. In the last aspect in particular, the keen interest of Chinese strategists in ways of waging asymmetric warfare must be borne in mind. Damage far out of proportion to the simplistic military capabilities of a battle group can be achieved by using asymmetric techniques.

“In their book Unrestricted Warfare, [iii] the senior Colonels Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, have proposed various methods of non-military warfare including inter-alia hacking into websites, targeting financial institutions, engaging in terrorism, and using the media. In an interview with Zhongguo Qingnian Bao, Qiao stated that “the first rule of unrestricted warfare is that there are no rules, with nothing forbidden.”

The evolution of Chinese strategy can be traced back to its written history itself. The military strategy of China is identified with its pre-eminent military strategists like Sun Tzu, Sun Bin and others. However, later Chinese writings do not restrict this to a narrow military dimension only. They trace their strategic heritage to a very broad spectrum of ancient Chinese thinkers and scholars, starting from Confucius. The Chinese are a very traditional people. Their traditional roots are very deep and an integral part of their lore is the treatise on military strategy, The Art of War by Sun Tzu. Sun Tzu was a great proponent of asymmetrical war, as were other strategists like Sun Bin and Mao Zedong.

“China’s history of war is replete with examples of the successful use of asymmetrical war, where wisdom rather than valor was used to subdue the opposing forces. In particular one finds great use of D-3 viz. diversionary tactics, deception and disinformation.
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The following text is a scare tactic. No mention is made of our forcing China into a defensive position with a predisposition to become offensive.
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The US policy has China as its geopolitical, economic and military fulcrum. A look at the Eurasian map and at the target countries for various US-sponsored color revolutions makes this unmistakably clear. To the east of the Caspian Sea, Washington in one degree or another today controls Pakistan, Afghanistan, potentially Kyrgystan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. These serve as a potential US-controlled barrier or buffer zone between China and Russian, Caspian and Iranian energy sources. Washington is out to deny China easy land access to either Russia, the Middle East or to the oil and gas fields of the Caspian Sea.
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-Am

U.S. struggles on China-war planning - top officer
June 29, 2005

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Defense Department is struggling to determine the right mix of bombers and other warplanes to fight China if it ever became necessary, President Bush's choice to become the next Air Force chief of staff said on Wednesday.

Lining up such firepower would top his list of priorities if confirmed as the Air Force's top military officer, Gen. Michael Moseley said at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Moseley said the right mix of long-range strike capabilities was "certainly one of the things that we are struggling with" as part of a sweeping U.S. defense review carried out once every four years and currently under way.

"The enhancements that we see in the Chinese military (do) cause concern," he added in reply to a question from Sen. John Thune, a South Dakota Republican.

Moseley who ran the air war over Iraq that led to the ouster of President Saddam Hussein in 2003.

"That is at the top of my list ... long-range strike and the ability to do that for this country," said Moseley, the vice chief of staff up to replace the retiring Gen. John Jumper.

Retired Air Force Col. Walter Boyne, a former director of the Smithsonian Institution's Air and Space Museum, said Moseley likely was referring to the warplanes -- manned and unmanned -- needed to take out command posts, radar installations, surface-to-air missile sites, air fields and military headquarters. Many such targets are deep in China's interior.

Moseley's comments reflected U.S. concern about mounting Chinese investments in ballistic and cruise missiles that could hold forward U.S. bases at risk of attack in places like South Korea and Japan, said Andrew Krepenivich of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a nonpartisan group specializing in military strategy issues.

"This is not the Air Force saying we want to go to war with China, he said. "This is the Air Force saying if we want to avoid war with China, we've got to be able to hold their critical capabilities at risk lest Beijing be tempted to use force to resolve disputes it has with other countries in the region."

© Copyright 2005 Reuters



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