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Analyst's note:  Here is an analysis received from a friend of mine regarding this article. "China is working feverishly to increase its air and warship power projection capability to some 3,000 kilometers, or almost 1,900 miles, and that puts Guam and other possible targets within range, according to regional analysts.

Meantime, the U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta assured anxious Asian allies (ASEAN) on October 2, that the U.S. will maintain its large military presence in the Pacific as a counterweight to China, despite mounting pressure at home to cut spending.

Mr. Panetta's promise to "strengthen our presence in this part of the world" was part of what officials described as a "realignment" of U.S. interests, to include the relocation of 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam.

It is estimated that by 2030, China will have the ability to provide logistical support to maintain military forces to that distance, a radius of 1,900 miles. Within this distance will be Taiwan as well as all of the South China Sea which Beijing claims to be in China's sphere of influence.

It wants Western warships to stay away from those waters. Also, all of Indonesia and India will be within reach. This development is separate from China's intercontinental ballistic missile capability, which already is assessed to be able to reach much of the U.S. mainland.

"China's power-projection capacity is in its early stage of development," according to Andrew Davies of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in Canberra. "It reduces rapidly with the distance from China's coastline."

China is trying to expand its influence as its abilities previously were assessed to include assaulting Taiwan, which is within a few hundred miles of the mainland. In addition, its short-range ballistic missiles can only travel up to 600 kilometers and Chinese aircraft can't venture far from the mainland.

Also, Chinese intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, or ISR, capability is limited to the ability of aircraft to venture from the mainland. However, there are changes under way worth watching, particularly Chinese development of a nuclear ballistic missile submarine force and now its crash program to build aircraft carriers.  

Meantime, naively the Guam’s legislative speaker has asked the United Nations to “dispatch” a U.N. special mission to Guam to help the indigenous chamorros achieve a self-determined political status.

The legislative speaker, Dr. Judith T. Won Pat, a descendent of the chamoru people, read her speech on Oct. 3 to the U.N. Fourth Committee. And just the day before on Oct 2 at the ASEAN conference SecDef Panetta declared the U.S. will strengthen its presence in this region to ensure security and stability.

Won Pat called on the U.N. political self-determination process to be “without influence by the U.S. government.”  She made indirect references to the United States -- the giver of hundreds of millions of dollars to Guam’s local government every year in the form of food stamps, federal grants, Medicare, Section 30 monies, public housing, road projects and public education -- in the same light as perpetrators of “the tyranny of colonization,” or the “abuser” to an abused people.   

It is axiomatic China is developing anti-ship missiles that officials boast will be able to knock out an aircraft carrier. China also is expected to launch a number of intelligence and surveillance satellites and surveillance drones and near-space vehicles for ISR and work on increasing air-refueling capability to extend the range of fighters and bombers. While China will send out some ships to show the flag, its concentration now will be further into the Philippine Sea, South China Sea and into the Indian Ocean."

 

"[....] The plugged-in Asia Times Online reports that China wants to set up military hubs in Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa, formerly known as the Northwest Frontier Province. China’s reasoning will sound familiar to American ears: That’s where anti-Chinese terrorists operate. Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa abuts the restive, non-Han Chinese province of Xinjiang, home to ethnic Uighur separatists. With the People’s Liberation Army getting a foothold in tribal Pakistan, the Chinese reason, it can crush separatism, and make sure that terrorist factions can’t hide out across the border.

This is usually when Pakistan expects the U.S. to freak out over the spread of Chinese power and draw a line in the sand. When the Pakistanis threw a fit over the bin Laden raid, they publicly flirted with letting the Chinese see the wreckage of a secret U.S. stealth helicopter. They hug China close during periodic flare-ups with Washington, pointedly dubbing Beijing an “all-weather friend.”

The Asia Times Online story smells like a calculated Islamabad leak, especially since it comes on the heels of last week’s demand by Secretary of State that Pakistan cut off its terrorist proxies in the Haqqani Network. And since the Pakistanis want China to build a naval base on its territory, the Chinese even have leverage to move into the tribal areas. You can expect some thumbsucking think-tank type to lament the decline of American power any minute now. [....]

 

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