Misunderstanding Chinese Intentions
“The United States possesses only a limited understanding of Chinese intentions.”
Is that really true? It is, at least according to a draft report of the State Department’s International Security Advisory Board on the Chinese military. Perhaps the Board is right, but if we do not understand how Beijing intends to use the People’s Liberation Army, then it is our own damn fault. By now, the Chinese have made their intentions amply clear, and it’s way past the time for complaining, as the draft report does, about the lack of China’s transparency.
Last Wednesday, Bill Gertz of the Washington Times broke the story about the board’s draft internal report, entitled “China’s Strategic Modernization.” This ten-page study contains many sound recommendations about how the United States can meet China’s military challenges — by defending Taiwan, reassuring allies, countering espionage, and upgrading missile-defense capabilities, to name just a few examples — but the real problem for us is one of recognition of threats. More than anything else, the United States needs to confront reality and properly comprehend Beijing’s geopolitical ambitions. China, unfortunately, is a potentially hostile state.
By now you would think that diplomats, analysts, and military planners in Washington would understand that China, a nation that was the world’s sole superpower for centuries, today is preparing to regain that role — in other words, to first make itself a peer competitor of the United States and then push us aside. It cannot attain these goals without a military that is better than America’s, especially on the sea, in the air, and in space.
The draft report correctly perceives that China wants to project power across the oceans. Its conclusion is in line with a series of recent statements of Chinese analysts. For example, Hong Yuan, a military strategist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, noted last October that the country’s leaders had recently broadened their goals. China, he said, intends to project force in areas “way beyond the Taiwan Strait.”
Beijing has not exactly hidden its grand ambitions this decade or last.
Chinese diplomats have complained both privately and in public of America’s presence in Asia and have been active in forming multilateral groupings, like the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, that exclude Washington. China openly asserts claims on islands under Tokyo’s control and the Japanese continental shelf. It also declares as its own the continental shelves of five other nations — the Philippines, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam — as well as the entire South China Sea, often using force or threats to bolster its absurd territorial ambitions. The Chinese have sought to deny the U.S. Navy and Air Force passage through the high seas and international airspace, as the notorious EP-3 and lesser-known Bowditch incidents from earlier this decade show. Moreover, China’s submarines regularly intrude into Japanese waters despite demands from Tokyo to stop. The Chinese, in 2006, lasered at least one American satellite with the intention of blinding it. That, of course, is a direct attack on the United States and, therefore, an act of war. China is supplying, through Iran, the Taliban in Afghanistan and insurgents in Iraq with small arms and the components for roadside bombs.
Yet many in Washington think that Beijing is content with the world as it is. The argument is that in the past quarter century the people who have benefited the most from the American-led system are not Americans but Chinese. In a peaceful world the Chinese have manufactured and traded their way up through the ranks and, as a consequence, have transformed their country for the better. As they have done so, their leaders began to develop relations with other states, sign global treaties and conventions — including at least 21 international human rights covenants — and join a host of multilateral and regional institutions and groups. The People’s Republic, we are told, is now working inside the international system for the first time in its six decades of existence.
All of this may be true, yet American analysts miss the fact that China, both newly confident and increasingly assertive, is now trying to change the global system to suit its own purposes. Beijing’s leaders constantly campaign for a “multipolar” world, which means they want a global order where America is cut down to size as only one of many powers. “China is not America’s ally and never will be,” notes a prominent Beijing academic. Says American analyst Robert Sutter, “China is the only large power in the world preparing to shoot Americans.”
He’s right. “China is preparing for armed conflict with the United States,” the draft task force report states. The country’s military is being configured to fight the United States: students at China’s naval academy spend their time figuring out how to sink America’s ten active-duty aircraft carriers; Beijing’s initiatives in space, including its anti-satellite program, are intended to take down America’s communications and surveillance systems orbiting the earth; and China attacks American defense networks every day by computer, sometimes penetrating the Pentagon and other vital defense installations.
And there’s one more thing. “Chinese military modernization is proceeding at a rate to be of concern even with the most benign interpretation of China’s motivation.” That’s for sure. China discloses only a small part of its military budget, but the trend of expenditures is clear. This year will see the 18th announced double-digit increase in military spending in the last 19 years.
By now, I don’t think we need to ponder Beijing’s intentions. There’s more than enough information in the draft report to know what the Chinese are really up to.
God help us if Barack Obama is our next president. He is a self hating American who believes our country is greatly responsible for the troubles of the world. Obama wants to apologize to those desiring to hurt us—and not defeat them. I am reminded once again of how Nikita Krushev treated John F. Kennedy like an immature child. Our enemies will respond to Obama in the same manner. John McCain is not the perfect candidate, but he will vigorously defend the United States. The GOP presidential candidate is not ashamed of being an American.
David, do you believe that American activities in Iran, Latin America, Iran-Contra, arming Bin-Laden in Afghanistan have had no effect on geopolitical instability? It’s one thing to be weigh the evidence and criticize. It’s another to be self-hating. Why do you believe Obama will NOT defend the country? You recall that 9-11 happened under Bush right? I’m not blaming him by the way, but my question is where’s the evidence that Obama would dismantle our security forces/capabilities?
“The United States possesses only a limited understanding of Chinese intentions.”
State department garbage. in the military, you don’t worry about intentions, you examine capabilities.
No matter what their intent is, the Chinese capabilities are so insignificant as to be a joke.
This is the 21st century, hordes of men with spears just leave bigger mounds of bodies. Change the spears for Kalashnakovs and you still get mounds of bodies.
What has counted on the battlefield for the last 60+ years has been airpower. The Chinese have none and very little chance of getting any. Stealth is what counts today and stealth isn’t the sort of thing that can be stolen. You can steal bits and pieces here and there, but the techniques to assemble them into a working whole have to be discovered. Russia is decades of research and trillions of dollars away from building stealth aircraft. China is even farther behind.
That is for tactical and operational level efforts.
Strategy requires a navy when it’s done on a planet that is 3/4′s water. China doesn’t have a navy. They have a PLA navy, which is no different from not having a navy.
No it will take several generations before China can have the capability to be a threat.
In order to develope that capability, China MUST become a Capitalist Democracy. No other form of government can produce the technology. By the time that happens, China’s intentions will be a mater of public debate, both within and outside of China. I suspect their intent will be to make money. With capitalism, creating wealth is easier then stealing it, so war becomes an option only in dire emergencies against non-capitalist, non-democratic nations.
Is this a threat to America? Yes, but a non-violent one.
Sheep,
Never vote in the candidate that your enemies would vote for….
There has been a blind eye because of the communists in our goverment. Most of them are democrats, just like before WWII. It’s easy to spot, ANYONE who expounds making the male population weaker and disarming them. You know, the very people who keep this nation safe in battle.
barak hussian obama is a traitor and anyone who supports him is trying to destroy our nation. We are at war and the enemy is within the walls.
sheep
Just look at Obamas own speeches about cancelling weapons programs and dimanteling our nuke arsenal. Stop being a sheep and open your eyes before its too late.
When I left the Submarine Force in October 1982, it was plain to all of us in the FLeet that the Soviet’s were winding down, because we could not find ANY of their blue water navy at sea. They were all in port. It took them 8 more years to admit it to themselves, but we could see it then.
Power abhors a vacuum. With the Soviet Union gone, ask yourself who has been building submarines? Who has been developing intercontinental rocketry and nuclear weapons? Would it be the ChiComs? You bet your ass it would be them.
The rubble of the Soviet Empire is still dangerous and the PRC is moving to take their old place as the tyranny of the week. We will confront them eventually, in a hot or cold war, on and under the surface of the world’s oceans.
Remember, that State is full of leftard reactionary careerists who have been waging an undeclared war against the Executive branch since 1990 at least. Not all of the moles are in the CIA, clearly.
The only bright spot is that the PRC is becoming more capitalist by the day, and the hard line Commie “leadership” knows not to f**k with the peasent’s money too much. They will ALWAYS be rivals though.
I won’t give names and dates, but the Chinese have been caught trying to spy on DoD development facilities (aircraft, missiles, what have you). These are agents who have nationalized decades earlier, and are carrying out orders from that time. If a country was this vested in taking us down when we had already strong military and a no-nonsense approach to international aggressors, just think of the field day they’d have advancing plans to commit acts of war.
Some people I know have been lulled into a false sense of security (credit to aforementioned international efforts on our military’s part) and think such efforts laughable. Taking cues from the UK and downgrading military force and hardware for social programs, as BHObama and his ilk seem want to do, would be the “opportune moment” that these Chinese efforts have been building towards. Then again, what else would you expect from a puppet neophyte like BHO?
My main front to be wary of would be efforts to destroy communications. Many facilities, both DoD and private, are backed up to different geographical locations so that an EMP wouldn’t destroy data for good, but loose borders embedded Chinese agents could pull off the coordination to take out strategic locations. All the more reason to give credence to wire-tapping on international suspects
This kind of article baffles me, because it’s simply so ignorant of things it should know better than to state. Here are just a few of the howlers here:
“China was the world’s only super-power”. In fact, China was an intensely vulnerable empire, conquered by both Mongols and Manchus, Han only under the Chin Dynasty for much of its latter history, and divided between north and south. Its ‘super-power’ projection failed to reach the Turkic empires of Middle Asia, the Muslim ones of South Asia–or even Japan!
“China’s military is being configured to defeat the US”. China’s military exists only to continue doing what it’s been doing since 1952–repress the Tibetans and Uighurs and slaughter its own citizens like in Tianmen Square. In brief border skirmishes with the USSR and Vietnam, the Peoples Liberation Army performed miserably; its ‘success’ in Korea against a smallish US force came at the cost of nearly a million casualties.
The Chinese make poor soldiers. They are as brave and hardy as anyone, as the Boxer Rebellion proved, but they are badly trained (lacking the Western NCO system), poorly led, and indifferently equipped. Chinese resupply capability in recent wargames with Russia barely existed. But ultimately, China’s vulnerability lies in her dams: the real reason that Taiwan will never be invaded is that bombing of the large river dams that control China’s agriculture would flood the most populous parts of the country instantly. And Shanghai and Beijing are now intensely vulnerable to nukes.
With a declining birth-rate and shrinking professional military China can never afford to go to war again in the foreseeable future. The sabre-rattling is simply for nationalistic consumption and a sop to powerful army warlords–who are also major factory owners.
Why are there so many Chinese restaurants waitered by Chinese men around US Military posts?
Ex-fetus – You know nothing, don’t even attempt to read the Gertz PDF document.
http://video1.washingtontimes.com/video/ChinaStrategicPlan.pdf
This is the 21st century, hordes of men with spears just leave bigger mounds of bodies.
You just bloviate on your antiquated belief that China is still just a nation of spear-chuckers. You ignore China’s vast bolstering of it’s blue water Navy capacity, anti-naval air, submarine it’s current quintupling of SRBM, SLBM, and ICBM nuke missiles. That it is building a modern robust air force and army equipped with modern electronics and PGMs.
In order to develope that capability, China MUST become a Capitalist Democracy. No other form of government can produce the technology.
Bullcrap. Not being a capitalist democracy did not prevent the Nazis, the Soviets, the Japanese militarists from developing formidable war capacity and military technology – much of their stuff was better than US equipment of the same eras. We just had a huge industrial base, (now mostly given away to globalists profits) and could afford to make MORE stuff than they could..
Hope Muntz – “China’s military is being configured to defeat the US”. China’s military exists only to continue doing what it’s been doing since 1952–repress the Tibetans and Uighurs and slaughter its own citizens like in Tianmen Square. In brief border skirmishes with the USSR and Vietnam, the Peoples Liberation Army performed miserably; its ’success’ in Korea against a smallish US force came at the cost of nearly a million casualties
You fixate on events 30-50 years ago and extrapolate that – ergo – China has exactly the same abilities now…
You haven’t done much reading recently, have you? Thanks to the “one-child policy” China now has 11 million young males “surplus” to the number of women in the 0-30 cohort. It has 300 million underemployed outside the industrial cities. It is now the greatest creditor nation, with money galore for war if they choose it. And their professional “high tech” military has grown eight-fold since 1990, while they are phasing out “draftee” brigades.
Nothing new here. Communists are looking to expand their power base. Shocking. And we’re not ready. Duh! We’re always caught by surprise by world military events. Analysis on both sides of this argument have merit, which is why it can happen.
To the numbskull who demanded to know why we think BO would make us vulnerable: Well… he SAID SO! Gonna cut the military by tens of billions of dollars a year. Scale back military R&D. Whaddaya want: flaming letters in the sky? Libs are so way dumb.
Hi Gordon the privatized,
You can make an enemy out of anyone you want, just sell arms to their enemies. If the Chinese were selling arms to a bunch of Confederates off the California coast, we would be upset too.
Bill Gertz is not a credible source. I wonder if he also lost his job due to Chinese competition, like the rest of you.
The hatred from you losers is amazing. Did all that MSG made you hyper?
Jack.
There is no question that China poses a threat to U.S. interests. Uhmmm, thanks for the reminder.
As to why Washington doesn’t seem alarmed or seems to be lax about reacting? Could be worries about the large amount of America debt that China now holds. $1.25 trillion has been enough to keep us quiet on The Sudan, Tibet, Burma and now, sickeningly to the Melamine cover-up orchestrated directly by the Chinese government.
Bobby
http://idlewordship.com
Arm Japan. That could happen in 20 minutes.
Tell South Korea it’s time they took over their defense. We will leave our ships offshore, but no more American soldiers in South Korea.
We are broke. Tell the Germans that they should look to their own defense too. Ditto the French and the Brits.
Then, drill here and now with a vengeance. Fast-track oil and natural gas projects, as well as clean coal, oil shale, etc. We are broke and we are in a financial crisis. We have enemies circling (Venezuela and Russia and the Islamicists) Starve them all of funds by becoming not only energy independent but a net energy exporter.
Tell Wal-Mart which wanted American companies to move to China that because of Chinese bellicosity we want them to move back to the states.
Luckily, China has developed a truly “poisonous” reputation. Lead toys, poisonous milk, etc.
I bought a set of sheets online made in China. We’d never had to iron sheets before. But you can’t iron the wrinkles from the sheets. I will NEVER BUY anything produced by Red China, ever.
Our trade representatives with both China and Japan are a joke. No more one-sided trade deals. If we get tough, we will be respected. Being loved as a national goal is a fool’s errand.
I agree with Sandra. Traditional military powers like Japan and Germany must rearm to stand against communism. How ironic is it we must now turn to the two original signers of the Anti-Commintern Pact in 1937 to fight the same enemies again. I think supplying Russia with Lend-Lease aid in 1941 is a decision the world is living to regret. Without that US aid, Communism might have crushed forever. Instead… well all the global instability of the later 20th century and the 21st century.
“That it is building a modern robust air force and army equipped with modern electronics and PGMs”
Evidence please! C-4, we have different ideas of modern I think. I don’t include military equipment designed 30 years ago ‘modern’. The most modern Chi-com fighters are cheap copies of the Mig-29 and SU-27, designed during the 70′s with production starting in ’83 and ’84 respectivly.
If you consider that modern, then I cannot argue with you because we have no common ground to work from.
The PLA Navy is really inept. Their subs are noisy, left over Soviet boats. Their only aircraft carrier NEVER leaves the Pier, they have no naval air to speak of and only a few ASW ships. No, the PLA Navy would have trouble against any of it’s neighbors, not to mention the US Navy.
No, the Chi-com military exists to keep the peasants under control.
The Chinese DO NOT have JDAM type weapons. They are working om them. Just like the Russians. The Soviets tried to put up a GPS system back in the late 80′s and they couldn’t get it to work. The Chi-coms are having the same problems.
When the Russians invaded Georgia in August, they did so without GPS, since they still can’t get theirs to work.
Are you intentionally misunderstanding?
“Bullcrap. Not being a capitalist democracy did not prevent the Nazis, the Soviets, the Japanese militarists from developing formidable war capacity and military technology”
C4, WW2 is over. if you haven’t noticed. And the technology developed by the Nazi’s and Japs during WW2 wasn’t all that great. They did lose. It was their cities that were burned to the ground. Nazi technology was better in some places, worse in others. They built a jet fighter ( not the first, the Brits were ahead by a bit) but couldn’t build a strategic bomber. Fine subs, but no carriers. World’s bset LMG, but their anti-tank weapons were based on captured American ones. To give the Nazi’s credit for superior military technology is wrong. An urban myth.
The claim that is just American factories that won the war is wrong also.
Ex-fetus is way behind the time… first china has a very good air force.. for homeland defense probably the best short of the US…
They are also heavily upgrading that air force to make it even better and bigger nearly yearly…
Once china has a blue water navy it will be very much a threat…
While its doubtful it will be invading the US anytime soon that doesn’t mean it won’t invade its neighbors… if russia falls apart again you could very well see china move in and take over alot of land that is very resource rich…
Do not discount china as a huge threat to asia… even if it isn’t likely to be a direct threat to the US for decades.
And yes arming japan will scare the living crap out of china… it will likely be the first move made before the run up to a war…
the possible scenario as it seems from analyzing balance of power
Obviously Kremlin and Beijing are close allies better considered as one regime with two different territorial and language governments, like a Soviet Union in a different format.
China got nukes from USSR in 1955(?)
Kremlin knows well that China in military sense to Russia is like IRAQ military compared to USA.
So kremlin doesnt consider China a threat at all.
They have a common enemy: USA. They got to have an enemy because otherwise- the population in their authoritarian system without any feed back to the govrrnment WILL UPRISE
China need terrotories, Russia doesnt have nice land
USA has land , infrastructure and CLIMATE!
Destruction of USA will mean that THERE GOING TO BE NO FORCE to put an end to TOTAL control of the world by allied communist regimes: a
World Revolution
Well it is not about romantic che gevara t-shirst: it is about killing millions of people who are AN OBSTACLE
AMERICANS ARE AN OBSTACLE
WE ARE TARGETED
First we learned they will make sure economic depression is fully ON
Then our resources are getting shrunk
Then we dont have enough resources to maintain NUCLEAR parity of at least some kind
Gray terror like 9-11 acts will begin, possibly bio attack
and so on..
—————–
China has a capability to destroy USA because CHINA ACTS ALWAYS ALONG WITH KREMLIN
russia may have up to 40 000 nukes
we never checked if they dismissed the 30 thousand
and they have thousands may be 20 000 tactic nukes
Russia and China most likely develop bioweapons
They may bring that over here thru the drug trafficking routs or `polar break` model
Its time for US president to go and
TALK TO THE PEOPLE
It all may start happening soon , timed with depression
tens of millions of Americans may die, may be 200 million
those are WMD in ENORMOUS quantities
I had to laugh when I clicked on a link for Gordon Chang’s book. He wrote a book saying China had 5 years to go before it’s economy collapses . . . in 2001! By my calender that’s at least 7 years ago and China’s still going strong. In fact, it’s now the United States that has to borrow hundreds of billions of dollars in a desperate attempt to keep their economy from going under. And the money is mainly coming from China!
I have to wonder about the thinking people like Gordon Chang make. They say China is an aggressive, dangerous country out to invade its neighbors and destroy the US, but they also say China is a weak, corrupt country on the edge of collapse. How can a country one step from collapse be a danger to the US?
I wonder why Chang doesn’t view US military spending as dangerous. Its vastly more than is needed to defend the US homeland. No conceivable enemy today has the slightest chance of invading, despite what the people behind the Red Dawn remake might want you to think. Think of how the US looks to the rest of the world: a country spending more on war than the rest of the world combined, in an active ideological crusade around the world to spread its form of government. A country so feverishly addicted to power its willing to fund its military to the point the rest of its economy is in danger of collapse.
Hope Muntz makes a good point–that the Chinese Army is mainly a threat to the Chinese people. From what I’ve seen, not only is the Communist Party’s grip on power more tenuous than most Americans realize, but China’s territorial integrity is too. China has much in common with the Soviet Union. That is the biggest reason they cling so tenaciously to Tibet and Tiawan. Because if any piece is allowed to break off, the whole may fall apart.
I have no doubt that China is also working to increase its international prestige by trying to become a credible threat to the U.S., but I think it is more about perception than reality–the perception of power makes them important on the world stage, against the reality that it is mostly about ensuring the survival of Red China as a coherent one party state.
i believe the claim that the USSR came to the conclusion early in khruschov’s reign that subversion, not mutually-assured destruction, would determine the victor in the great ideological struggle. the nuclear stand-off – replete with “anti-nuclear” groups and false rumors about “nuclear winter” (gee, don’t people live in hiroshima and nagasaki today?) – was a sideshow. the dimensions of the real strategic game are easy to conceal and virtually impossible to discuss in medias res when a little apparently inscrutable crisis occurs. in my opinion, china would have no natural conflict with the usa – not least because the USA military umbrella keeps China’s natural regional rivals complacent and mollified. unfortunately, china is run by a communist cabal; its military is thoroughly indoctrinated, whether or not the vast and heterogenous population is increasingly exposed to USA media. the actual administration of government, from the central committee to the port authority clerk, is simply old-style imperial chinese but infused with the permanent rapacity and violent resentment for which communism actually stands. and its intelligence apparatus, designed by the KGB, and working with it, despite apparent strategic competition is very effective – and so active that many, many articles have appeared over the past decade suggesting they are very, very deep and active within all aspects of US government and private sector R & D.
the apparent transition to market capitalism – which of course it is not; it is state-capitalism – should not provide as much comfort, in my opinion, as it seems to. without an actual uprising and regime change, the vast resources of the chinese government are still directed by the PRC. their doubling of military budgets every year over the past 18 years may not give them US-parity, but that ignores the fact that similar goals can be achieved without direct hot war.
take for example this economic crisis: surely our enemies have been waiting for such a moment. remember the al qaeda attack on 9/11 (felix dzherzhinsky’s birthday, by the way) occurred 9 months into the equities collapse, when it was clear that the consequences of that economic deterioration were entrenched and permanent.
in my opinion something bad is about to hit, and it wouldn’t surprise me that there were chinese fingerprints on it, though plausibly denied.
if both our enemies and our european and korean allies are so hot to renegotiate or end our cold war dispositions, perhaps now is a good time to do so. see what russia and china make of germany and japan rearming. perhaps germany would not do so? perhaps that is the fear. but japan would certainly arm, and south korea has a rather large military. something to think about – and perhaps an obama presidency, little as i’d like to live through one, could give the required political cover to effect such a major, major strategic change.
TO: All
RE: Guys and Gals
The Russians and the Communist Chinese have been gearing up for war with US since mid-September 1999, when Clinton broke the last of all his promises to the Russians about what we were doing in Kosovo. Ever since that date:
[1] The Russians began rearming themselves for war.
[2] The Russians entered into an alliance with the Communist Chinese regime.
[3] The Communist Chinese started building and posting more and more missiles on the Straits of Formosa.
[4] The Communist Chinese started seriously working towards a ‘blue-water’ navy.
Modern warfare requires a LOT of materiale and high-tech. That isn’t established overnight. Indeed it takes years to develop. Look at how long it took Nazi Germany to build up to the point they were confident they could take on the world….1932-1940. Extrapolate for the advancement of technology.
Enjoy,
Chuck(le)
[If you think things are bad now, just wait.....]
P.S. If want it to come on faster, vote for Obama.
TO: All
RE: Mongo-Mentality
Mongo obviously can’t think any further ahead than his next plate of beans.
Regards,
Chuck(le)
[Candy-gram for Mongo.]
dan:
cant agree more
Interesting about OBAMA
“…they want a global order where America is cut down to size as only one of many powers”
The problem isn’t that China believes in that. The problem is that many Americans believe in that.
Today China supports Iran’s nuclear development. I’ve always wondered why. Now I think I know.
In the Chinese leadership there must be Americanists and anti-Americanists. Sort of like the Arabists in the US. Perhaps we can influence the outcome of this contest.
I’m confused. So China is arming to attack the USA? Why? America is China’s best customer. China is practicing 19th Century style capitalism. The army is to keep the working class in line. The capitalists in China (although they stick to the brand name “Communism”) learned the nature of capitalism from reading Karl Marx. That’s why they sell poison and lead from time to time.
One thing I wonder. How much U.S. Army equipment is made in China these days?
TO: Northern Light
RE: China v. US
Because:
[1] US protects Taiwan
[2] The Politburo is getting a big head
[3] The Politburo understands that if the capitalism goes on for too long, their regime will go the way of the previous imperial dynasties
Hope that helps….but….well….I have my doubts….
Regards,
Chuck(le)
[With Capitalism people prey upon People. With Communism its just the reverse.]
I just read in one of these news articles online linked from RCP in the last few days a side note that, apparently, China has greatly reduced its oil purchases lately.
I can’t decide if it’s because they’re expecting their economy to shrink along with the U.S., or if they were just pushing up prices by increasing demand. Need more info….
“Ex-fetus is way behind the time… first china has a very good air force.. for homeland defense probably the best short of the US…”
No, China has a horrible Air Force.
I’m not sure it even could be considered an Air Force;
http://www.softwar.net/plaaf.html
Peoples Liberation Army Air Force.
It is the largest in the world, with over 6,000 targets, half of which might actually be able to take off, if there was fuel for them.
We are not sure what the kill ratio would be against the F-15, which is a 2nd line American fighter. We are not sure because NONE of the plane types used by the Chinese have ever shot down a F-15. AFAIK, the score against Soviet block fighters is about 120 to 0 . That’s right ZERO.
Anybody that thinks the PLAAF is more then a large group of rusty targets is clueless about air power.
Human wave attacks don’t work with aircraft. Especially Fighters. Behind every human wave attack was a political officer with a machine gun. Can’t do that with air planes.
The Syrian Air Force developed a special maneuver to deal with Israeli F-15′s. As soon as their threat receiver went off, telling them that a F-15 had a target lock on them, they would chop throttle, pull straight up and as soon as the stall alarm went off, they would punch out. The IAF is very adaptable, as soon as they saw what the Syrians were doing, they would hold off on their launch for a heart beat to see if the Syrian Pilot was going to stay and die.
That way they could save missiles for the ones that wanted to die.
I expect the Chinese would soon learn the technique.
There are limits to how many aircraft can be put in the air at one time. Look at that URL and see how many air bases the PLAAF has. Taking off in pairs ( NOT recommended and maybe beyond the ability of Chinese pilots, depending on the runways) with a 30 second interval between pairs and it takes 6 minutes to get a squadron up. Lets ball park it at 4 per minute. So in an hour any one airbase can put up 240 aircraft. I use an hour because most Soviet Fighters have only 90 minutes or so of fuel on board. Strike fighters and recon fighters have more, but not much. So You either send them off in squadrons, 6 minutes apart, or you orbit the base while the strike force forms up. If they go off in squadrons, you lose the effect of an attack by large numbers of aircraft. If you have them form up into wings, you lose range.
No, the practical difficulties are beyond the Chinese capabilities.
Then there is the political side. The cold war came about because BOTH sides knew the other was doomed, it was just a matter of waiting. Both sides were right. Why should the thousands of years old Middle Kingdom take a chance on losing everything when they can wait a few centuries for the USA to collapse? It might not even be that long.
BTW, nobody is going to attack China thru the air. Only the USA and Russia have the strategic bombers that can do that. The PLAAF couldn’t stop either nation, if they were stupid enough to do that. A B-2 could go anywhere in China and the PLAAF wouldn’t know it was there until the bombs went off.
cool