The U.S. and China are in tension over Taiwan. But this is not a legal antagonism, founded on some poor understanding of Taiwan’s status. It is instead a strategic antagonism over mutually conflicting long-term political, military and economic objectives. The Sino-American relationship hinges on the status of Taiwan as articulated in the 1970s. The …
A Guarantee to China on Taiwan Would Be Pointless Continue Reading >>
It has been nearly 15 years since the Chinese started moving in on Japan’s Senkaku Islands. Chinese pressure is indeed troublesome, but for now, it’s manageable – even if the Japan Coast Guard and Maritime Self-Defense Force (MSDF) are overstretched. The Japanese have patiently dealt with near-daily aggression and pressure from Chinese naval, coast guard, maritime …
Escalation in the Senkaku Islands? It’s China’s Choice Continue Reading >>
The U.S. submarine fleet is in a dire state. The U.S. doesn’t have the domestic infrastructure to repair and sustain its existing subs, much less expand the fleet. America needs to get creative to sustain its undersea advantage. The Navy should procure conventionally powered submarines from U.S. allies, namely Japan …
The Sorry State of America’s Submarine Fleet Continue Reading >>
The Talisman Saber 2023 exercise has finished in Australia. The exercise included 13 countries and was an impressive and complex mix of amphibious, maritime, ground, air and combined arms training. And all geared toward war-fighting. Even Japan’s Self-Defense Force (JSDF) sent a contingent. Japan’s contingent included the Japanese navy, along with amphibious ships JS Izumo and JS …
Japan Flexes Military Muscles in Australia Continue Reading >>
The US has strategic interests in Taiwan, in part because of its geopolitical location in the center of the First Island Chain; in part because it is a bulwark against a potentially expansionist China, a country with multiple territorial claims over many islands in the region that belong to other …
An Industrial Tripwire Approach for Saving Taiwan Continue Reading >>
How does a great power get itself defeated? Sometimes it does too much – as in America’s 20-year effort to turn Afghanistan and Iraq into countries more to its liking. And sometimes it does too little – as is happening in the Central Pacific. That is where Chinese influence has gradually eroded …
COFA Renewals Key to US Defense of Pacific Continue Reading >>
During his recent visit to China, Secretary of State Antony Blinken repeatedly asked his hosts to set up a military-to-military crisis communications hotline. They declined. USINDOPACOM commander, Admiral John Aquilino complained earlier this year that the Chinese were ignoring his requests to establish direct communications channels with the Chinese military People’s Liberation Army (PLA) regional commands. And Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin was rebuffed when he …
The Chinese Military Won’t Talk To the US ー So What? Continue Reading >>
Okinawa isn’t in the news nearly as much as it was some year’s back, when most reporting focused on noisy protest groups demanding United States’ military forces leave. The Japanese government sometimes even seemed to wish the Americans might go away and only return when needed. Times have changed. Nowadays the …
Okinawa Is Still Strategically Important Continue Reading >>
Logistics is America’s Achilles heel in the Indo-Pacific region. If the United States is to fight and win a Pacific War with China – a war that seems increasingly imaginable over the coming decade – then it must ensure its military sealift system is up to the challenge of great-power …
he United States faces an unveiled threat from China. Beijing has made clear, in its public pronouncements and its strategic doctrine, that it seeks to conquer Taiwan and engorge the whole of the Western Pacific, ultimately bending Asia’s political structures to its will. The U.S., and the world at large, would be far …
5 Steps the US Must Take to Deter a War with China Continue Reading >>
