All week I've wanted to write about the protests that occurred outside Beijing Zoo, however, I've given up that idea because it's practically impossible to write about protests in China without sounding cliched. Instead, I'll write about the article that appeared in The Washington Times this week, which alleged that a Chinese Song class submarine 'stalked' a US aircraft carrier battle group last month. As soon as I read this article, I knew that the Chinese media would pick it up and run it with a few variations. I guessed that the variations would be something like:
a) This report by the Western media is an attempt to exaggerate the China threat theory.
b) This report shows that the gap between Western countries and China is narrowing.
Chinese news portal Netease picked up the article the following day and pretty much translated it word for word, except for an extra bit about how the timing of the report purposely coincided with the Commander of the US Navy's Pacific Fleet, Admiral Gary Roughead's visit to China. At first, I dismissed these claims as tripe, however, after reading Richard Spencer's post on the matter, I've thought more about the allegations of the report.
According to Richard, The Washington Times has traditionally been a right-of-centre publication. The report definitely seems to emphasise that China is a threat to the US, so perhaps it's more than a coincidence that the report coincides with Roughead's visit. Maybe someone in the Pentagon leaked this information to the newspaper in order to stir up trouble.
Following the report, Chief of US Forces in the Pacific, Admiral William Fallon confirmed the incident with The Washington Post. He claimed that the battle group was not looking for submarines, so it did not pick up the Chinese sub until it came within firing distance.
The US obviously isn't sure about what motivated the Chinese Navy to 'stalk' the aircraft carrier. (In his comments to The Washington Post, Fallon said that the word 'stalked' was an exaggeration and I agree.) Military blog Defense Tech questioned whether the Chinese Navy purposely timed the exercise to coincide one month before the visit of Roughead. This doesn't seem right because I reckon the Chinese would love to hide every single capability from the Americans and continue to build 'friendly' ties.
I've started to believe that war between the US and China is inevitable. That's not to say that I don't encourage Fallon and the US building friendly ties with China, but I feel that China wants Taiwan and its patch of sea and the US won't easily let go. | 