This is either false humility or another version of China Threat scaremongering, or both. In either case, it is patently ridiculous that his statement is in any way true. Only blowhard fanbois lap up this kind of off-the-cuff statement like it was manna from heaven.
China's SCS Strategy Thread
- Thread starter lilzz
- Start date
Don't mean to argue, just putting more facts on the table.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Do you honestly think he didn't?
What was said is nothing more than the bare facts.
The US has the more powerful military, but that military is mostly based State side, with its overseas forces spread throughout the world, only a fraction of which are close enough to get into most potential conflict zones involving China.
Chinese forces OTH are almost entirely concerntrated within most such potential conflict zones, and can certainly redeploy far more rapidly compared to US reinforcements.
The US could bring significantly more forces to bare in any conflict Han what it has forward deployed, but that will take time.
It would be extremely foolish for any US local field commander to not always have that in the back of his mind - if a shooting war was to break out unexpectedly, China will absolutely enjoy significant local tactical and strategic force superiority in the opening stages.
That is why the US is stressing so much about local allies' 'defensive' capabilities.
In the event of open conflict between China and an US ally in the region, US PACOM forces are certainly not going to be rushing in immediately if they could help it, unless exceptional circumstances are in play which makes the US willing to spend thounsands of its troops' lives to buy time.
What the US would want is for its allies to be able to hold out independently for the weeks or even months it will need for them to pull sufficient forces from around the world to achieve the critical mass needed to have a good chance of victory before getting involved in the fighting directly. To engage prematurely would be to court defeat.
That time margin between Chinese expected victory time and the time it will take for the US to gather enough forces in the region to risk direct, open conflict is where the unofficial arms race is focused on, and what the military part of the pivot is all about.
In many respects, it's also what the SCS dispute is largely about.
The US wanted to build up allies and rivals of China in the SCS sufficiently that they could pose a threat to the oh-so-frequently mentioned vital shipping lanes that goes through the region.
The intention was to either build up proxies they could use to threaten China's sea bases trade and supply jugular without having to do dirty their own hands and reputation, and/or to force the Chinese to redeploy sufficient forces to face and counter the new Southern threat, that the balance of forces in North East Asia are less unfavourable for the US and its key allies of Japan and South Korea.
Without the new SCS island bases, it would have been quite a logistical distraction for the PLAN to maintain sufficient forces in the region to be able to comfortably outmatch any potential threat in the SCS. And that would only be against the likes of Vietnam. It would take significantly more forces to be able to stand up to an USN CSG.
Even if the PLAN does not need to draw ships and other assets from the ESF or NSF, it would at a minimal tie the SSF down such that they cannot redeploy to help out much in the East or North without risking leaving China's southern flank exposed.
First elevating the importance of the SCS disputes, and then increasing tensions to put pressure on China was entirely a calculated strategic move on the part of the US. That was to help encourage small countries with rival claims to openly challenge China on the first level; which gave the US the opening to insert itself into disputes that have nothing to do with them; which in turn paves the way for the US to establish military bases in the region to 'open up a southern front' in its containment Cold War-lite against China.
China saw the danger, and went big.
By building the islands, not only did China demonstrate a level of capabilities and resolve that gave the likes of Vietnam and the Philipines pause (see the quiet walk back on the part of Vietnam, and the not so quick push back from the Philipines after they realised playing America's game has fundamentally changed their entire strategic and security outlook for the worse); it also effectively neutered the usefulness of the ultimate prize the US was shoot for - a Subic Bay naval base.
The US could certainly still set up a nice big naval base there. But they must expect China to build a rival one on Scarborough Shoal in response.
The two bases will easily be within weapons range of each other, so the opening moves of any open conflict will most likely see those two bases wipe each other out.
The whole point of the US originally liking Subic was that it was close enough to be a useful base for SCS operations, yet still far enough from China to not really be at much risk of attack.
They were hoping to set up a large scale theatre command there, much like Diago Garcia. However, with the islands already created, and the not-so-suble hints about Scarborough, China is effectively throwing giant wrenches in America's grand plans by making it clear it could easily make what should have been a nice, safe rear-echelon command and staging base into a hot front-line FOB.
That will have enormous implications about the kind of assets and investments the US could deploy and build there, which ultimately will impact the importance of the base to the US.
Little wonder the US was going cold on the idea even before the new Philipines government started turning hostile to American leadership.
I have some disagreement on few things
1)Majority of US forces come from East (Okinawa, Guam) they will be entering the Taiwan and Philippines Strait. Dongsha Island instead of Spratley would serve better in intelligence gathering. There arent that much US forces coming from South toward Mainland.
2)Spratley island South China Sea is too shallow , not good for submarine. Paracel island area , Zhongsha reef have deeper sea depth. US anti-submarines planes would come, again from the east.
So, I not sure what's strategic values of those Spratley man-made islands from a military standpoint versus US.
Dongsha , guarding the entrance of taiwan and Philippines strait is alot more strategic than SCS man made island . That's the one needs to be militarized.
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antiterror13
Brigadier
Jura The idiot
General
LOL I'll give you 'Like' for no spin about 'building lighthouses', 'environment protection fund', etc.
Equation
Lieutenant General
May I borrow this from you whenever I needed to put down a troll who rails against China?
While China itself has little to worry about in terms of a potential US invasion of the mainland (I'm pretty sure the US has no interest in attempting this particular scenario), the US also doesn't actually need its allies to "hold out" for any length of time, as if China actually had the ability to take any of its surrounding countries, excepting possibly Taiwan. Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and Australia all have little to worry about in terms of an invasion from China. So really what are we talking about here? A US invasion of the Chinese mainland? Extremely unlikely. A Chinese invasion of any of its US-allied neighbors? Extremely unlikely. A Taiwan invasion scenario? This is the only scenario which is even remotely a possibility for a US-China conflict.
As for Taiwan, if it was in the interests of the US to retake Taiwan from China after China had successfully invaded Taiwan, assuming China could even accomplish this in the first place presently, it would be done. IMO China right now can barely take Taiwan without any outside interference and it would take weeks if not months. Even afterwards China's hold on the island would be tenuous as it raced to build up ground forces to defend against an overwhelming and imminent US response in the face of an openly hostile native Taiwanese populace. Keep in mind that we aren't talking about the Chinese military defending itself on the mainland of China, but rather a battle on the island of Taiwan itself, assuming the US is as cautious as you are trying to portray in gathering its forces prior to an attack. Reinforcing Taiwan will severely strain China's power projection and logistics capabilities as they exist now. Not only that, but just as the US is deployed worldwide and cannot easily bring all of its forces to bear on China, China itself cannot easily deploy all of its forces to the area of the Strait either. Not only because of the logistical and basing difficulties, but also because it still needs to deter both the military forces of neighboring countries as well as the military forces of the US in Central Asia.
The admiral stating that the US is no longer the biggest guy on the block is facetious at best. You can try and weasel it in that he was talking about forward deployed forces if you want, but even if he was this distinction as it stands now is essentially meaningless.
Uhh, no. Sadly, your giant wall of verbiage about the SCS is almost completely irrelevant to a large scale military confrontation between the US and China. As I have said before, Scarborough Shoal (and the rest of the reclaimed SCS) is a woefully inadequate military base against the likes of the US and serves only as a good peacetime base for monitoring military activities in Subic Bay should the Philippines ever allow the US back in there. The rest of the SCS is even less relevant to a US-China conflict. If US ships from the Middle East and Indian Ocean ever wanted to bypass the SCS on their way to support a Taiwan conflict, they could simply bypass the SCS altogether and spend a few extra days to circumnavigate the area entirely. Or they could just bomb the reclaimed bases to dust.
I think plawolf made a good analysis. You seem to forget that US and its allies do not have to attack or occupy mainland China in order to bring it down. Remember the Opium Wars? The point is, SCS is vital for Chinese commerce. Recent PLAN buildup is a response to growing chinese concern for its trade lifelines.
The reclaimed island bases are going to be fortified. Its not like US bombers can just come and go as they wish. Thousands of people are going to live on thoses remote island. Bombing large civillian and millitary populations will be an act of full scale war. Is America ready for that? A full scale war with China? Worlds second largest economy, largest standing army, nuclear power... You get the picture.
This discussion had already long since gone past 'risking' war with China, into straight up open warfare as an initial premise of the debate. I thought that part was already patently clear.
As for the SCS, those reclaimed bases can in no way pose any real threat to an advanced military, even if further built up than they are now. They have no logistical resupply routes, they have no strategic depth, and they have no natural barriers against attack. They are individual rocks on the ocean that are vulnerable on all sides to massed ASCM saturation attacks such as could be unleashed by the USN. Or, as I said, they could simply be bypassed via the Java Sea and Celebes Sea and dealt with later.