Top US Admiral Warns China Now Controls The South China Sea
by Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge.com
Wed, 04/25/2018
An unclassified 50-page transcript on Advance Policy Questions for Admiral Philip Davidson, USN Expected Nominee for Commander, U.S. Pacific Command, just confirmed the collapse of American exceptionalism in the South China Sea. Adm. Davidson, the likely nominee to replace departing U.S. Pacific Command Chief Admiral Harry Harris, warned that Beijing has the capability and capacity to control the South China Sea “in all scenarios short of war with the United States.”
In written testimony to the US Senate Armed Services Committee released last Tuesday, Adm. Davidson said China is seeking “a long-term strategy to reduce the U.S. access and influence in the region,” which he claims the U.S. must maintain its critical military assets in the area. He views China as “no longer a rising power,” but rather a “great power and peer competitor to the United States in the region.” Adm. Davidson agreed with President Trump’s recent assessment on China, calling the country a “rival.”
Adm. Davidson warns, that it is Beijing’s clear intent to disintegrate the seventy years of U.S. alliances and partnerships in the region.
“I am also concerned about Beijing’s clear intent to erode U.S. alliances and partnerships in the region. Beijing calls them a relic of the Cold War. In fact, our alliances and partnerships have been the bedrock of stability in the Indo-Pacific region for the past seventy years, and they remain a core element of our defense strategy.”
The Rest…HERE
