China Prepares For New Cold War With Massive Military Buildup
by Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge.com
Thu, 03/01/2018
As we have been documenting for quite some time, China has been not-so-quietly transforming itself into a serious threat to the West – beefing up its military to contend with the Washington’s air, sea, space and cyber weapons capabilities, while scrapping constitutional term limits for President Xi Jinping.
Since 2000, China has built more submarines, destroyers, frigates and corvettes than Japan, South Korea and India combined. To put this further into perspective, the total tonnage of new warships and auxiliaries launched by China in the last four years alone is significantly greater than the total tonnage of the French navy. -IISS
Analysts on both sides of the Pacific believe Xi’s aggressive military buildup and power grab have put Beijing on a direct course for conflict with Washington – with the heavy U.S. presence in the region setting the stage for a new Cold War.
“In the Asia-Pacific, the dominant role of the United States in a political and military sense will have to be readjusted,” said Cui Liru, former president of the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, a think tank under the Ministry of State Security that often reflects official thinking. “It doesn’t mean U.S. interests must be sacrificed. But if the U.S. insists on a dominant role forever, that’s a problem.” Cui added that it was “not normal for China to be under U.S. dominance forever. You can’t justify dominance forever.”
“China’s military objective is to break through the first chain of islands,” said Mr. Cui, referring to the waters beyond Japan and Taiwan where the Chinese military wants to establish a presence. -NYT
China’s navy is also deploying further from home, including Europe, while their base in the Eastern African country of Djibouti will enable more naval deployments. In terms of military computing technology, China has also set out on an ambitious course, as vast resources have been sunk into “extremely high-performance computing and quantum communications,” which, along with their weapons advancements and overall defense capabilities mean the country is no longer merely “catching up” with Western progress.
Meanwhile, Xi and other Chinese officials are of the firm belief that the United States is a superpower in decline – which will require China to step into the vacuum left behind.
“In the Asia-Pacific, the dominant role of the United States in a political and military sense will have to be readjusted,” said Cui Liru, former president of the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, a think tank under the Ministry of State Security that often reflects official thinking. “It doesn’t mean U.S. interests must be sacrificed. But if the U.S. insists on a dominant role forever, that’s a problem.” Cui added that it was “not normal for China to be under U.S. dominance forever. You can’t justify dominance forever.”
“China’s military objective is to break through the first chain of islands,” said Mr. Cui, referring to the waters beyond Japan and Taiwan where the Chinese military wants to establish a presence. -NYT
“It is now clear Xi’s agenda to rebuild an Asian order with China at its center is here to stay,” said Hugh White, a scholar and former defense official in Australia who has argued that the United States must be prepared to share power with China in the Asia-Pacific region.
“I think Xi is impatient,” Mr. White added. “He wants China to be the predominant power in the Western Pacific. He wants to do it himself and for it to go down in history as his achievement. That makes him formidable.” -NYT
The Rest…HERE
