Fox News reported that China flew two J-11 fighters to Woody Island in the Parcel Island Chain (claimed by China, Vietnam and the Philippines). The previous fighter deployment to the island occurred around 24 February. The timing of the Chinese appears to be deliberately intended to coincide with a Japanese port call, which was well publicized beforehand.
Woody Island is the main Chinese forward base in the South China Sea. The South China Sea has become militarized and Woody Island (turned from a reef to an Island by artificial means by Chinese engineers) is the dominant permanent military feature in the Sea. Asian leaders know to expect deployments by Chinese air and naval assets. They will become routine and they will be followed by regular air and sea patrols on the periphery of China’s claims. China will aggressively defend the territory that they have seized.
Two Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force (MSDF) guided-missile destroyers made a port call at Cam Ranh Bay naval base on 12 April. The call by the guided-missile destroyers and Setogiri was the first to be made by any MSDF ship, according to the Japanese embassy in Hanoi.
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| Japanese DDG’s in port (Setogiri – DDG 109 – pictured) |
This is another historic milestone in post-war Asia because it also is the first visit to Vietnam by any Japanese warship since World War II. The antagonists are familiar to all, but the roles are reversed. This time Japan is part of the gathering alliance that opposes Chinese hegemony.
It is difficult for small nations to go it alone against China, which is building its navy at an unprecedented rate and is constructing and fitting out aircraft carriers to defend the vast maritime area (about as large as mainland China) that they have claimed, and that they intend to defend against outsiders…while they fish the place dry and drill for oil. The Chinese have never demonstrated much interest in ecology, their penchant for unrestrained pollution or in “saving the planet”.
The $338 billion annual trade imbalance between the US and China has helped fuel their military expansion, cost the US many tens of thousands of jobs and we are living to regret it – but you’ll never hear that in the mainstream media or from Pres. Obama’s blue lips.
In effect, the Chinese Navy is our Navy because we've paid for it, but does it serve as a strategic balance to our transsexual Sea Command?
LSP's cooment makes me wonder when Obama will call for China to allow gays to serve.
How many of our fellow citizens can find the South China Sea on a map, let alone care what happens there?
Not many, my friend — not many. And that strikes at the heart of the problem.
Obama will make it a "human rights issue" – to embrace sodomy as part of every other nation's military program.
I know that it sounds funny when you put it like that, but it really makes my heart heavy to see how thing are being mismanaged in the US – so see the slippage culturally at such a level.
And while we have weak Presidents, we will not do anything about it, for fear they call our debt. What a great place we are at. Not.
Be safe and God bless.
America is in debt to China to the tune of about $3 trillion. I'm sure that emboldens them to do what they do. Obama has rung up more debt than all previous presidents COMBINED. And what do we have to show for it? I don't see anything.
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