Steven Collins
August 24, 2007
The August 20, 2007 Washington Times National Weekly Edition had a short article in Bill Gertz’s “Inside the Ring” section on page 16 which is vitally important. However, it was ignored by the national media.
The article states that “the senior Air Force commander [General Paul Hester] in the Pacific last week threw cold water on a Chinese proposal to divide up the Pacific Ocean into US and Chinese spheres of influence.” The Chinese proposal would have yielded the eastern Pacific Region to the USA while allowing China dominance in the western Pacific. General Hester stated that “our policy is not to cede space to anyone.” This proposal was apparently also made to the commander of the US Navy’s Pacific Fleet, Admiral Tom Keating, “during a recent visit to China.”
This proposal reveals China’s true intentions. Since it is building a large, modern navy as quickly as it can, the Chinese proposal was also an implicit threat to push the USA out of the Western Pacific by force if the USA does not leave voluntarily. China’s warlike intentions vis a vis the USA and the West are now obvious. The Chinese are planning on building aircraft carriers, but that will take years. Indeed, China doesn’t need carriers to wage a naval war against the USA. China is already deploying surface vessels and submarines with cruise missiles which can be fired at US carriers in large volleys. Remember that the US Navy was “caught with its pants down” not long ago when a Chinese submarine surfaced undetected within an easy “kill” range of a US carrier in the Pacific Ocean. China’s new cruise missiles can also be launched against US ships from either land bases or Chinese aircraft. Since China years ago experimented with placing weaponry on Chinese civilian merchant vessels, the US Navy also needs to consider the numerous Chinese merchant ships on the oceans as potential platforms for launching surprise cruise missile attacks on US vessels in any future conflict.
The USA already dominates all the Pacific Ocean so accepting the offer would be a massive surrender of much of the world’s largest ocean to China. It would also all but guarantee a Chinese war with Taiwan and would surrender Japan and the “young tiger” nations of the western Pacific Rim to China’s domination. Accepting the Chinese offer would also all but guarantee that Japan would decide to become a major nuclear-armed power within months. Were the Chinese also demanding that the USA surrender Australia and New Zealand too? Both of those nations are in the Western Pacific Ocean.
The Washington Times article cited an unnamed Pentagon source as saying accepting China’s offer “would be tantamount to giving China complete hegemony in the western Pacific, a move that would severely undermine US alliances in Asia and threaten the neutrality of vital sea lanes.” I’m glad someone is still capable of lucid thinking in Washington, DC.
Because China’s offer was made to a senior US general and a senior US admiral, China is clearly thinking about a military dominance of the western Pacific Ocean. China’s offer was an effort to “bully” the USA into surrendering much of its influence in the world. China has duped the leaders of the western world into locating much of the West’s industrial capacity in China and China had also duped the USA into borrowing unpayable sums from Chinese lenders. The USA’s political and economic leaders in recent years have made some decisions which are exceptionally dangerous to US interests and security. Perhaps China’s “offer” will become an ultimatum sometime after the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. Proverbs 22:7 states an eternal economic reality: “borrowers are servants to lenders.” China is the lender and the USA is the borrower. Therefore, China increasingly expects US Presidents and Congresses to “knuckle under” to its demands because they see the USA as a nation which should now accept “servant” status to China. China may eventually “tell” the USA to pull its fleets out of the Western Pacific Ocean or China will collapse US financial markets by suddenly selling hundreds of billions of dollars on the world market. There is major trouble coming in future years from China.
Only a fool would have accepted China’s offer from any military, strategic or political viewpoint. However, China has the USA by a very sensitive part of the body politic from an economic perspective. When will US leaders acknowledge the fact that they have been deceived by China and that China is a militarily hostile nation? When will US leaders ever find their backbones on this issue? We’ll see.
The article also had this quote: “Some pro-China officials in the US government, including in the US intelligence community, are said to favor the Chinese proposal.” In other words, they favor a policy of American surrender to China. Why are these unnamed US officials working against American interests and in favor of China’s strategic interests? Ponder that question for awhile.
This is one of the most important stories of the year, but what do we hear from the “establishment” press? Silence. Thanks to the Washington Times for breaking the story!
