The US Pacific Fleet is drafting plans for a global show of force to warn China and demonstrate resolve to deter Beijing’s military actions, CNN reported yesterday, citing several unidentified US defense officials.
The draft proposal from the US Navy recommends that the fleet conduct a series of operations during a single week next month that would involve US warships, combat aircraft and troops to demonstrate that the US can counter potential adversaries quickly on several fronts, CNN said.
The plan fits with the “larger consequences” to which US Secretary of Defense James Mattis referred at June’s Shangri-La Dialogue security conference that China would face for militarizing the South China Sea, said Kelsey Broderick, an associate for Asia at Eurasia Group in Washington.
“China would view a US naval exercise of this magnitude in its territorial waters as a significant provocation, likely further cutting off mil-to-mil [military-to-military] contact,” Broderick said. “It would also empower the hardliners in China that view the US as committed to containing China economically and militarily — making a settlement on the trade dispute even more unlikely in 2018.”
The US this week accused China’s navy of “unsafe and unprofessional” conduct near an occupied reef in the South China Sea after a Chinese destroyer maneuvered close to the bow of a US warship attempting to assert navigation rights.
The US Navy proposal was being driven by the military, CNN said, without giving a precise date.
“We plan for a variety of contingencies and different operations, but we do not comment on future operations,” said US Navy Captain William Kafka, spokesman for Indo-Pacific Command.
Pacific Fleet spokesman Lieutenant Commander Tim Gorman declined to comment.
The proposal focuses on operations in the Pacific, but the CNN report said that they could stretch as far as the western coast of South America, where China is expanding investments and diplomatic relationships.
If the initial proposal is approved, the missions could be expanded close to Russian territory, it said.
“There is less positive ‘ballast’ in the relationship now than at any other time since 1989, and probably much earlier,” Lowy Institute senior fellow Euan Graham said. “We are in a phase of open, full-spectrum peer competition. Adversarial behavior, on both sides, will increasingly characterize that.”
In Taiwan, the government was reluctant to comment on the CNN report.
When asked for comment, the Ministry of National Defense said it was not aware of such plans.
A high-level national security official also declined to comment, saying that the question of whether there are such plans should be answered by the US.
Additional reporting by Su Yung-yao and Aaron Tu
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary