South China Sea and China (2011-2017)

[Dayuhan]

Korea ended in a stalemate. But I suggest that the US realised then that facing a Chinese army with modern weapons and a logistic system would require the use of nuclear weapons not just to win but to survive.

Wouldn't that depend on where the Chinese army was being faced?

The world has come a long way since then and found the weaknesses in the US's armour.

For example, one bomb in the Lebanon (killing 299) Marines in 1983 sent the US packing.

In 1993 in Mogadishu after 18 dead and 73 wounded the US folded.

So we know the US has limited will to engage in conflicts that represent no significant threat to the US and involve no significant US interests. Why would the Russians, Chinese, or anyone else assume that the reaction would be the same if core interests were involved?

9/11 brought a fairly vigorous response (chaotic, incoherent, and largely unproductive, but vigorous) and would suggest to most that while you can easily mess with Americans in peripheral areas where they have little reason to be concerned, an attack on the core is likely to generate an aggressive response. Ken has commented in the past that the US rarely gets serious about foreign affairs until there's a broad perception of immediate threat, and I suspect he's right.

Only a fool will entice the US into a conventional conflict and so we see a variation on the fiendishly cunning Chinese approach of 'death by a thousand cuts' being amended to 'death by a thousand IEDS' in Afghanistan and the US is already all but defeated.

Ken, I suggest that it is delusional to believe that the US (sleeping giant) will wake up to a real existential threat and defeat it.

We won't know that until there's an existential threat on the table. As of now there isn't one. Death by a thousand cuts sounds rather miserable, but so far the US isn't being cut.

[Ken White]

You said "We've overcome far worse embarrassment -- and note that's all it really is -- in my lifetime and certainly will again. Not a problem as, thankfully, nations are not people... ". From the context it seems you meant the US overcoming embarrassment but now you say the nation does not but some in the nation do. I get it now...no, I don't.

Let me put it this way. I haven't been embarrassed by anything the US has done in my lifetime. I could and have wished that some things had been done better but that's mostly from an effectiveness standpoint. You may or may not have been embarrassed, don't know -- but I do know some who've been embarrassed by US actions. Pity...

Regardless, the nation has not been embarrassed. As an expander, the word 'we' refers to persons, not things. A nation is not a person.

Us airplane drivers keep a close eye on the fuel gauge for when it gets low we have to land, on land to get filled up again. Islands are land.

Or you could become carrier qualified -- and don't bother with carrier killer ICBMS and / or cruise missiles. Unproven technology -- and unannounced technology (ours or theirs) are unknowns.

They also form needed bases for for ships to fill up too.

For that and the rest of your paragraph, nuke boats don't need fillups, are not susceptible to ICBMs or cruise missiles and we do not have a monopoly but do have a decisive (advisedly chosen word.. ) edge in that sphere. I doubt that will change in the next twenty to thirty years.

I don't need pundits to tell me that island bases are vital. The various history books I read superficially make that clear.

Um, you did note that I mentioned those guys were 30-40 years out of date? So are some of those inept Generals and Admirals you despise...

Et Tu?

Umm, question. Just out of curiosity, did you mean you read superficially or that the books treatment of things you read is superficial?

Everybody had better support them, or they will hear that midnight knock. We will have to disagree again.

Works for me...

Now that is some rhetorical technique. Just argue that the world is going to go the way you say, fairly rapidly, and when it does boy will the ground be cut out from under me.

Not a rhetorical technique, just a statement of opinion -- note the first word here; "If, as is quite probable, they become less totalitarian..." A statement of opinion and potential followed by a logical premise that isl predicated on that IF.

... I disagree. Given the history of totalitarian police states over the last 100 years or so, yes, I disagree....

Noted. We often disagree. Time will tell.

[Ray]

Taking actions out of context may indicate issues that the context doesn't support. It would be easy to conclude that a Philippine-American military exercise at a time when there's tension with China might be seen as a specific response to that tension... until you recall that the exercise is an annual ritual that's gone on for decades. The exercise would still be going on if there was no tension, and would likely be seen as a message to those who are considering support to Islamic militants.

One must also not ignore actions that occur and not put it in context of the issues happening around the world in general and of the area in particular.

The ideal example was Nehru's complacency and ignoring of actions happening in the Aksai Chin and not taking cognisance of the same or modernising the World War II Army. When 1962 happened, the good man sat stunned and impotent.

Indeed the US Philippines exercise could be a routine one. A little too routine, given that it occurred just a few months back. That apart, both the times (that and the current one), it gives the impression that they were occurring as reaction to the Chinese moves. Twice 'out of context'?

And why give any statement that may appear hostile to China? Unless there is a method in that madness.

The US does annual naval and other exercises with India and others. There is no aggressive statements and instead merely on 'interoperability' etc.

Sloppy journalism is obnoxious, but unanimous journalism would be very scary indeed. The world speaks with many voices, and most of them deserve a listen, if only to know what they're saying. World journalism needs to reflect that.

Journalism reports events that occur. If there is sloppy statesmanship, the journalistic effort will be equally sloppy.

[Ken White]

Yes Ken and the Chinese will have realised that they must not provoke the US until they have reached the military level to back it up.

Quite astute of you and the esteemed Asian gentlemen...

I use the metaphor of the Boiling Frog often to describe the policy the Chinese are using and should stick to...

I'm sure your advice for them is as well received as it by us here...

The only thing that is certain here is that the US will be the eventual loser... probably self destruct.

Mmmm. Loser? Quite doubtful. Self destruct -- almost certainly.

I won't be here when that happens and neither will you but (as stated before) the best thing you can do for your grandchildren is to encourage them to learn Chinese (they will need it).

Heh. Not likely. They do need to learn Spanish, though. You need a map refresher...

[slapout9]

I use the metaphor of the Boiling Frog often to describe the policy the Chinese are using and should stick to while I believe the Chinese version is 'death by a thousand cuts'. The only thing that is certain here is that the US will be the eventual loser... probably self destruct.

You got my vote. All this talk about China becoming Capitalist is nothing but propaganda put out by the American RPI(Rich People s's Insurgency)just because the Communist Chinese are (they are Commie to the corps)going to let the running dog Americans make some money does not mean they don't intend to try and dominate the world. Everything they are doing says just the opposite. Just wait till they land on the moon in a few years.

[Dayuhan]

Indeed the US Philippines exercise could be a routine one. A little too routine, given that it occurred just a few months back. That apart, both the times (that and the current one), it gives the impression that they were occurring as reaction to the Chinese moves. Twice 'out of context'?

There are a bunch of annual exercises involving Philippine and US forces. Cobra Gold and CARAT are multilateral, involving forces from around SE Asia. Balikatan was traditionally bilateral, but this year included a multi-nation disaster response drill. Cobra Gold is usually held in and around Thailand, Balikatan in and around the Philippines. CARAT moves around SE Asia. PHIBLEX, typically involving Philippine Marines and amphibious operations), is biliateral, involving US and Philippine forces. There's also Balance Piston, annual event I think bilateral working with ground forces. That's from memory; there may be other scheduled ones. With that many going on, almost any brush with the Chinese is going to be close to one of them.

The current exercise is clearly not a response to the Scarborough Shoal incident. If you look here:

http://vfacom.ph/

You'll see that a full schedule for the exercise was publicly uploaded to the website on December 15, 2011. The description:

Balikatan 2012 is the 28th iteration of PH-US bilateral Exercise but it will be the first ever multilateral event wherein other countries will be involved in the Humanitarian Assistance Disaster Response (HA/DR) Exercise from April 16-27, 2012. Other participating countries are Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and South Korea. The scenario includes a response to a large scale natural disaster centered on the Metro Manila Area.

Aside from Disaster Response, Field Training Exercise (FTX) for Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines and Special Operations Forces (SOF) will be held in Crow Valley, Tarlac; Luzon Sea; Basa AB and Clark AFB, Pampanga; Fort Magsaysay Nueva Ecija; Metro Manila; West Philippine Sea; and Tagkawayan, Ulugan Bay, Rio Tuba, Inagawan, and El Nido, all of Palawan. The 12-day event will comprise simultaneous events involving air, land and sea operations. Big footprints will be in Fort Magsaysay (Army), Palawan (Navy and Marines), Clark (Air Force) and Crow Valley (mixed). Special Operations Forces (SOF) Exercises will be held in Zamboanga, Jolo, and Basilan.

Again, this was announced before the recent brushes involving the Chinese, so it is clearly not a response to those encounters. Note the 28th iteration: annually for 28 years. Pretty predictable.

Since these exercises are publicly announced months in advance, it is of course possible that the Chinese, for reasons of their own, are initiating encounters timed to coincide with the exercises.

And why give any statement that may appear hostile to China? Unless there is a method in that madness.

No statement was given that sounded hostile. If you read the releases and watched the TV coverage they bend over backwards to avoid sounding hostile. That clip was simply poor reporting, not the intent of the people giving the statement.

Journalism reports events that occur.

Of course, and the reporting is always accurate and unbiased. I've a lovely bridge in Brooklyn for sale at a most excellent price...

[Ray]

So Dayuhan, the Philippine and the US officer who gave the impression were daft!

They wanted to cause some serious confusion, right?l

any clarification or denials thereafter?

[Dayuhan]

So Dayuhan, the Philippine and the US officer who gave the impression were daft!

They wanted to cause some serious confusion, right?l

any clarification or denials thereafter?

The statement in question was not attributed to any US or Philippine officer, neither was it a quote, just an inept journalist's poorly worded summary.

You can look around and find plenty of official releases on the subject by the US and Philippine governments, don't think you'll find that verbiage in any of them.

[davidbfpo]

Dayuhan cited in part and with my emphasis:

Other participating countries are Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and South Korea.

From:http://vfacom.ph/

Given my recollection that Sino-Vietnamese relations are poor and regional history the participation of Vietnam is significant IMHO.

[Dayuhan]

I persist in saying there is no threat to peacetime Chinese maritime trade posed by the USN because there is not a threat. None.

Now you've gone and put that little word "peacetime" into the picture. Of course there's no peacetime threat. Nobody's a threat to anyone in peacetime. Nations prepare for times when there is no peace - otherwise there would be no armies or navies - and they prepare for what they perceive to be potential threats.

The Chinese economy has not been hampered in the slightest by their having had a small navy in the past. Not a bit.

The US perceives Iran as a threat, because they believe Iran has the capacity to hamper the flow of vital resources through a critical waterway. We have not been hampered by that capacity in the past, but we see it as a potential threat in the future. The Chinese see that we have the capacity to cut them off from resources and markets that sustain them at any time of our choosing. If you were in their shoes, would you be comfortable with that?

none of those navies are built to challenge the USN. Not one, nor the Indian navy nor the Japanese. But the Red Chinese navy is. Why?

Possibly because they see us as a threat?

And as I also said many post before, the USN grows and contracts depending upon the threat. Wars, cold & hot, it grows. Peace, greater and less, it shrinks.

Even when shrunk it is very, very large.

Plus we have relationships and responsibilities that go back generations. Plus we took over from the RN in keeping open the worlds sea lanes, including those to mainland China. All that means we need a few more ships than the other guys.

From who, exactly have we been protecting the world's sea lanes?

We took on those responsibilities on our own, of our own volition. If some people prefer to take over the responsibility of protecting their own shipping, are we to tell them that they may not do that? If some see what we call "protecting" sea lanes as "controlling" sea lanes, would that not create a perception of vulnerability that others might not be comfortable with?

The Red Chinese are building big fleet in peace. That fleet is structured to fight the USN. They talk fight a lot and they keep bumping into other people's boats. It may not worry you but it does me.

What do you propose to do about it?

Is the factual accuracy of his reporting in dispute?

Hard to say, as the source document isn't public. It looks to me like what could be called the Michael Moore technique: pull a bunch of factoids that support your position out of context, discard all facts that don't support your position, slam them together in a hyped-up breathless style, tell the audience they must be very very afraid, and declare solemnly that everything you've said is verifiable and true. Works well when you're preaching to the choir.

Personally, I've never been much for joining choirs, left or right. I'm also inclined to be suspicious when someone tells me to be afraid. Personal thing I guess...

But you are right, we maintain the capacity to interfere with those who would interfere with freedom of navigation.

We also maintain the capacity to interfere with the other peoples navigation, any time we choose to do so. Just because we haven't used it doesn't mean we haven't got it.

When murderous police states want to some shoving, I get worried.

How many non-Chinese have been killed by China's government in the last decade? How many non-Americans have been killed by America's government in the last decade? Lots of people out there think we are murderers, and lots of people fear us. Most of them don't have the capacity to challenge those they fear. Some do.

It will be easier to get a grasp of the situation if we drop "Red Chinese", "Chicoms", "murderers", and deal with people who happen to be Chinese. Ok, we don't like their government. Lots of people don't like our government. That doesn't make it impossible to manage relations.

We may have had a coming out phase, maybe not. But if we did I don't remember us challenging the RN for control of the Atlantic.

Didn't the Monroe Doctrine involve staking out a sphere of influence and warning others to stay out of it?

Red China's dependence upon sea trade is not greater than anybody else on earth. If all sea trade were to stop tomorrow, I am sure the Japanese would perish first.

If you look at external trade as a percentage of GDP, China's will be close to the top of the list, due to a very underdeveloped domestic market. Possibly Saudi Arabia or other oil producing states would be higher. I'd guess not many.

If the Red Chinese are worried about that, the only way to assuage that worry is to control ALL of the worlds oceans, ALL the time. That will lead to a great big war if they try it.

You mean that would lead them to try to do what we already do. We wouldn't like to see them in that role, why would they like to see us in that role?

In any event, things are as they are. The Chinese have apparently decided that their security requires them to build a navy that can compete with ours on a peer basis in their coastal waters. If they want to do that, we can't stop them: they have the money and the technology, if they want to build the ships and aircraft, they will.

So what would you have us do about it? Preemptive war is tough with nukes in the picture. You want us to go out an build still more ships? Build until our carriers outnumber theirs 11 to 1, our cruisers outnumber theirs 22 to 0, our destroyers outnumber theirs 60 to 25... oh, wait, we're already there.

So do we build more and more, spend trillions on a race we don't need to be in? Is that something our economy can sustain? If we start from the premise that we must have absolute superiority to everyone, everywhere, all the time, we have to ask if that premise is consistent with our economic condition. Maybe we need to recognize that the premise is neither necessary nor economically sustainable, accept that we will have a peer competitor in one part of the world, and deal with it. It's not as if we have to sail into the China Sea and fight China there; in the unlikely event of conflict we have a whole range of options that don't require that.

So after all the angst and anguish, what exactly would you have us do?

[Bob's World]

Strategic Inertia.

A policy in motion tends to stay in motion.

The shortest distance (to war) between two nations is an outdated policy.

[Ray]

There has been some interesting pros and cons on the issue.

What does one make out of this?

Reports: US, Philippines building new naval base in Spratlys

A new seaport being built by the Philippine government in the Spratly islands could become the Pentagon's military outpost in the hotly contested South China Sea, according to news reports.

Manila is looking to rebuild the seaport and adjoining runway on Pagasa Island, which part of the chain of islands off the coast of the Philippines, Malaysia and Vietnam.

The Philippine government claims the effort is strictly designed to support commercial business and tourism to the island.

However local residents say the construction is the first step in creating a mini-naval base for U.S. and Philippine troops.

"It is near the Spratlys and U.S. can always check China’s aggressive campaign claim over Spratlys and maintain its military interest in the Asian region ... these advantages are non-negotiable," Salvador France, head of Pamalakaya, a local advocacy group in the region, told The Philippine Star on Monday.

The installation could also be used as a jumping-off point for counterterrorism operations in the Palawan region of the southern Philippines. The area is home to the Abu Sayyaf, an Islamic terror groups with ties to al Qaeda.

http://thehill.com/blogs/defcon-hill...e-in-spratlys-

[Ray]

[Dayuhan]

What does one make out of this?

Not much, if you take it in context.

The item in the lead paragraph is correct: the Philippine government is reconditioning a short airstrip and a very small port on one island in the Spratlys. So far there's been no sign of US involvement in the construction. Somehow that gets blown into a US/Philippine military base, solely on the unsupported word of a member of a fringe militant left group that sees US intrusion and a US base in the making literally everywhere.

Those who watch the Philippines closely will recall the case of the GenSan fishing port, which the Philippine left declared to be a US base in the making, on the grounds that the contractor was an American company that had done work for the military. Turned out to be a fishing port.

The stated purpose of the Spratlys facility is to bring tourists out, and the island does have very nice beaches. Of course it's more about staking a claim by establishing a presence.

Military relevance is going to be limited by the size of the place. It's tiny, to say the least.

Read this line:

France also asserts the new facility on Pagasa Island will be the new home for thousands of U.S. Marines scheduled to leave Okinawa within the next two years.

And look at this picture:



Where are you going to put "thousands of marines" on that little fleaspeck of an island?

This one:

The area is home to the Abu Sayyaf, an Islamic terror groups with ties to al Qaeda.

Is equally absurd, as a quick look at a map will reveal. The Spratly islands are not even remotely close to the ASG heartland.

[Ray]

It is then ridiculous to revamp the airstrip on the fleaspeck of an island.

Tourists?

With tourist infrastructure on an island that cannot take a 1000 troops?

Tourist infrastructure takes up a lot of space.

[Ken White]

Korea ended in a stalemate.

Yes, it did. Need not have but it did because the Politicians wanted it that way. Your'e familiar with that...

You might also look at the relative numbers of troops involved and relative degree of effort and expense to include reported casualties by the nominal combatants.

But I suggest that the US realised then that facing a Chinese army with modern weapons and a logistic system would require the use of nuclear weapons not just to win but to survive.

We'll never know about then but there was and is now no question that the numerical superiority would have to be countered by something. The nuclear option is certainly one but there are others.

It had and has been a long held tenet of US military (not foreign...) policy to avoid getting sucked into a land war in Asia -- that in spite of the fact that we helped the British with their mid-19th Century endeavors there, made several minor incursion during that century then went to Peking during the Boxer Rebellion kept a couple of Army and a Marine Regiment in China for many years. Then came Korea, Viet Nam -- all counter to that military policy and as a result of the US foreign policy of the moment; All dictated by US politicians who commit forces and then tie the hands of those forces. Hard to win wars when you're on a leash...

For example, one bomb in the Lebanon (killing 299) Marines in 1983 sent the US packing.

In 1993 in Mogadishu after 18 dead and 73 wounded the US folded.

Both political decisions based on US domestic politics, as you know -- and I would expect you to be smarter than Osama Bin Laden who foolishly cited the same things and built an er, 'strategy' on that house of cards. That hasn't worked out as he and his crowd expected...

...the fiendishly cunning Chinese approach of 'death by a thousand cuts' being amended to 'death by a thousand IEDS' in Afghanistan and the US is already all but defeated.

Fiendishly cunning? You're reading too much Graham Greene.

Defeated? Heh. There was NEVER any question but that we would stay (when we should not have) and leave with yet another politically determined stalemate / defeat -- call it what you will. There was never going to be a win in any of our post WW II foolishness...

However, I suggest you need to rearrange your Goat entrails or tea leaves. The fact that we are still in Afghanistan at this late date, no matter we should not be, totally negates the premise of Lebanon and Mogadishu as defining -- and makes 'defeat' borderline arguable

Ken, I suggest that it is delusional to believe that the US (sleeping giant) will wake up to a real existential threat and defeat it. Those days are past and the potential enemies of the future will be smart enough to understand how to deal with the standard US game plan.

Heh. Speaking of fiendishly cunning -- fooled you, there is no standard US game plan.

That changes with the wind, as we change Coaches...

Many things are past -- however, the US penchant for not making a big effort or getting things done right unless there's an overarching need to do so has not changed. We, the people; the troops; will avoid doing the hard things unless pushed. Hedonistic I know but there you are. We tend to accept barely adequate most of the time, rising to good enough to get the job done only with the correct impetus and never reach excellence -- no need for it. We're lazy and way too introspective. The Saturday game is more important than anyplace from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. We'd really rather not be bothered. Unless...

Excessive bother of the wrong kind will not invoke a sleeping giant scenario -- you're as dated as Carl and those pundits and think tanks I warned him to eschew. That was then, this is now. No sleeping giant, no fire up the industrial base. Those days are indeed gone. What is not gone is the ability to simply remove the leash IF and when warranted. Not a lot of Troops on the ground required, very few in fact.

We don't do the war among the people thing very well, never have (too selfish and hedonistic...) so insurgencies and the like are to be avoided. OTOH, if one has an infrastructure of any kind and wishes to keep it reasonably intact; if one has population centers, one is well advised to not try to get too cute. We may not be sophisticated or do nuances well but when pushed we can break things far further away and more rapidly and completely than anyone. I do not see that changing significantly in the next 30-40 years.

It should be noted that the "if and when" determination is a US unilateral decision which may come at any time and is somewhat unpredictable as is all US foreign and military policy. All, that is, except for a low to zero tolerance for SIGNIFICANT threats (the degree of significance also being a unilateral US determination...). Your or anyone else's definition of what constitutes such a threat is essentially irrelevant.

It should also be recalled that sometimes the Frog turns over the pot, spilling smelly hot water all over everything and everybody and forcing them to deal with a really pissed off Frog. Same deal with the cutting. Scalpel wielder slips, inadvertently cuts too deep in a sensitive area and then gets cold cocked and the OR gets thoroughly trashed.

[Ken White]

You got my vote. All this talk about China becoming Capitalist is nothing but propaganda put out by the American RPI ... Just wait till they land on the moon in a few years.

Uh, okay. How long will that be after we did that?

Seem like we have some time and don't need to go into the China panic mode...

[Dayuhan]

It is then ridiculous to revamp the airstrip on the fleaspeck of an island.

Tourists?

With tourist infrastructure on an island that cannot take a 1000 troops?

Tourist infrastructure takes up a lot of space.

I doubt that a tourism operation would ever be profitable. It would have to be very small and very expensive, there's very little space and literally everything would have to come in by plane or boat. It's out of the typhoon belt but would get bad weather during the SW monsoon and strong swell from during the NE monsoon. Not an ideal place.

As I said, tourism is a nominal purpose but it's more about establishing some kind of activity to reinforce a claim to the surrounding water.

A little vignette about life on Pagasa...

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jul...adise-prison26

I'm sure you could put a couple of patrol planes and a small garrison there and get some military utility out of it but as an actual military base?

This gives a better idea of the scale:



As you can see, the 1.3km airstrip is far longer than the island itself. Seriously, thousands of marines?

Is there any evidence of US involvement or plans for basing beyond comments from one guy, who's associated with a group that has - to put it mildly - little to no credibility?

[Ray]

I am reminded of small island called Diego Gracia.





It is an atoll and is approximately 1,800 nautical miles (3,300 km) east of the African coast and 1,200 nautical miles (2,200 km) south of the southern tip of India.

The US Navy operates a large naval ship and submarine support base, military air base, communications and space tracking facilities, and an anchorage for pre-positioned military supplies for regional operations aboard Military Sealift Command ships in the lagoon.

It is an atoll occupying approximately 174 square kilometres (67 sq mi), of which 27.19 square kilometres (10 sq mi) is dry land.

Info obtained from Wiki.

Imagine that having a very important base back of nowhere and in just such a small area of land!!

It controls much of US ops in the area and is so important that the local inhabitants have been banished from the atoll.


While one can be deprecating about the US and its reach and aims, I for one, do not underestimate either the US or China and go into complacency and later be awoken with a rude shock.

Every bit of info must be put into the jigsaw and analysed and not sit back and feel it was a day late and a dollar short when it zaps you between the eye.

If you want peace, be prepared for war is what the US is doing! That is what I feel!

Jingoism or pacifism apart, it would be worth seeing how an American reacts when they are on the losing side!

Have we not seen the US reaction here on Iraq and Afghanistan, when anything negative was suggested?

It is all very well to have intellectual goodness overflowing when all things go well. This applies to all nationals of all Nations!

[Ray]

China’s military rise
There are ways to reduce the threat to stability that an emerging superpower poses

http://www.economist.com/node/21552212