The Chinese military is using mock-ups of US aircraft carriers at a weapons-testing range in a remote western desert, new satellite imagery shows, indicating that the People’s Liberation Army is focused on neutralizing a key tool of US power.
Satellite images depict targets in the shape of a carrier and two Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers at a testing facility in the Taklamakan desert in Xinjiang, the news Web site of the US Naval Institute reported.
Both types of vessels are deployed by the US 7th Fleet, which patrols the Western Pacific, including the waters around Taiwan.
Photo: AP
The images were taken last month by Maxar Technologies Inc, a US firm with more than 80 company-built satellites in orbit.
The facility also has two rectangular targets about 75m long that are mounted on rails, Maxar said in a statement e-mailed to Bloomberg News yesterday.
The site is clear to satellites, a sign that Beijing is trying to show Washington what its missile forces can do.
In August last year, the Chinese military executed a coordinated test launch of the “carrier killer” DF-21D missiles into the South China Sea, an action that the former head of the US Indo-Pacific Command US Admiral Phil Davidson later told a Senate panel was intended as an “unmistakable message.”
The DF-21D is central to China’s strategy of deterring military action off its eastern coast by threatening to destroy the major sources of US power projection in the region, its carrier battle groups.
The then-head of Naval Intelligence Vice Admiral Jack Dorsett told reporters in January 2011 that the Pentagon had underestimated the speed at which China developed and was fielding the DF-21D.
China-US ties have been quietly improving in the past few months, but the two nations are sparring over Taiwan and alarm has been growing in Washington over Beijing’s nuclear arsenal.
In a sign of how heated the rhetoric over Taiwan has become, Chinese state media last week had to tame online speculation over a possible war.
The Pentagon has voiced concern that China is expanding its nuclear weapons capabilities more rapidly than previously believed. Many in the US military establishment are also concerned about China’s investments in advanced missile technology, with US General Mark Milley, the top uniformed military officer, on Oct. 27 calling China’s reported hypersonic weapons system tests “very concerning.”
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese