Generational Dynamics World View

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 18-Aug-18 World View -- New Pentagon military assessment details China's preparations for war

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• New Pentagon military assessment details China's preparations for war
  
• China's 'low-intensity coercion' in the South China Sea
  
• People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM)
  
• China's preparations for war with Taiwan
  
• The growing military threat from China
  

****
**** New Pentagon military assessment details China's preparations for war
****


China's Maritime Militia consisting of thousands of fishing vessels are trained by China's military for military action, giving deniability to Beijing (China Defense Blog)

The new edition of the Pentagon's annual report on China documents
major advances in a number of areas where China's military is
aggressively preparing for war against the United States and its
allies.

As we've been reporting for years, China has been developing numerous
intercontinental ballistic missile systems that have no military
purpose other than to target American cities, American bases, and
American aircraft carriers.

According to the new report, these capabilities are now being extended
to bombers:

<QUOTE>"The PLA (China's "People's Liberation Army") has long
been developing air strike capabilities to engage targets as far
away from China as possible. Over the last three years, the PLA
has rapidly expanded its overwater bomber operating areas, gaining
experience in critical maritime regions and likely training for
strikes against U.S. and allied targets. The PLA may continue to
extend its operations beyond the first island chain, demonstrating
the capability to strike U.S. and allied forces and military bases
in the western Pacific Ocean, including Guam. Such flights could
potentially be used as a strategic signal to regional states,
although the PLA has thus far has not been clear what messages
such flights communicate beyond a demonstration of improved
capabilities."<END QUOTE>

Whereas a fleet of bombers is of great concern to Americans, China's
neighbors are probably more concerned about China's activities in the
South China Sea. The report says that China has largely completed its
operation to create artificial islands, but continues to build
infrastructure on the islands it's created, in order to support
possible military operations in the future.

According to the report, China plans "floating nuclear power
stations":

<QUOTE>"China’s plans to power these islands may add a
nuclear element to the territorial dispute. In 2017, China
indicated development plans may be underway to power islands and
reefs in the typhoon-prone South China Sea with floating nuclear
power stations; development reportedly is to begin prior to
2020."<END QUOTE>

It's well-known that China's activities in the South China Sea were
declared illegal in 2016 by the United Nations Permanent Court of
Arbitration in the Hague, which ruled that all of China's activities
in the South China Sea are illegal and in violation of international law.
China claims it has the
right to violate international law any time, although it laughably
invokes international law when it's on their side. AFP and Dept. of Defense (PDF)

****
**** China's 'low-intensity coercion' in the South China Sea
****

The report documents the means by which China uses military threats to
enforce its claims to the South China Sea, referring to the techniques
as "low-intensity coercion." According to the report:

<QUOTE>"China continues to exercise low-intensity coercion to
advance its claims in the East and South China Seas. During
periods of tension, official statements and state media seek to
portray China as reactive. China uses an opportunistically timed
progression of incremental but intensifying steps to attempt to
increase effective control over disputed areas and avoid
escalation to military conflict. China also uses economic
incentives and punitive trade policies to deter opposition to
China’s actions in the region. In 2017, China extended economic
cooperation to the Philippines in exchange for taking steps to
shelve territorial and maritime disputes. Conversely, a Chinese
survey ship lingered around Benham Rise in the spring after the
Philippines refused several requests from China to survey the
area. Later in the spring, CCG boats reportedly fired warning
shots over Philippine fishing boats near Union Bank. In August
2017, China used PLAN, CCG, and PAFMM ships to patrol around Thitu
Island and planted a flag on Sandy Cay, a sandbar within 12 nm of
Subi Reef and Thitu Island, possibly in response to Manila’s
reported plans to upgrade its runway on Thitu Island. China
probably used coercion to pressure Vietnam to suspend joint
Vietnam-Spain drilling operations in a disputed oil block in the
South China Sea over the summer of 2017."<END QUOTE>

The South China Sea is international waters according to international
law. When American Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOs) are
performed by American warships passing through the SCS, they're
invariably met with harsh threats and demands to leave.

Ever since Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte took office in 2006,
he's sided with China in the South China Sea, saying essentially that
he has no choice since China could crush the Philippines militarily.
However, this position has always been contentious domestically. When
Duterte first announced this position, I pointed out at the time that
polls showed that polls showed an approval rating around 90% for
Americans, but only around 50% for Chinese.

Duterte's policy is wearing thin. In the last week, there was an
incident where a Philippines plane was flying in the South China Sea,
and received a radio warning from the Chinese:

<QUOTE>"Philippine military aircraft, I’m warning you
again. Leave immediately or you will bear responsibility for all
the consequences!"<END QUOTE>

This implied threat of an attack by China's military is an example of
"low-intensity coercion." In response, Duterte on Friday criticized
China for using "nasty words" to its pilots:

<QUOTE>"You know very well that we will not attack.... We’re
not prepared to go to war with you so why do you have to say those
nasty words?"<END QUOTE>

I think it's safe to say that this whiny pleading by Duterte will not
have any effect on the Chinese. ABS-CBN (Philippines)

****
**** People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM)
****

An important part of China's coercion technique is the use of the
People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM).

The PAFMM is the only government-sanctioned maritime militia in the
world. In the past, the vessels in the PAFMM were from companies or
ordinary fishermen. What's changed now, according to the report, is
that China is building a large state-owned fishing fleet. These are
like vigilante boats that harass and block fishing boats from other
nations, and perform other functions in conjunction with the PLA.
According to the report:

<QUOTE>"In the South China Sea, the PAFMM plays a major role
in coercive activities to achieve China’s political goals without
fighting, part of broader PRC military doctrine stating
confrontational operations short of war can be an effective means
of accomplishing political objectives. The militia has played
significant roles in a number of military campaigns and coercive
incidents over the years, including the 2009 harassment of the
USNS IMPECCABLE conducting normal operations, the 2012 Scarborough
Reef standoff, the 2014 Haiyang Shiyou-981 oil rig standoff, and a
large surge of ships in waters near the Senkakus in
2016."<END QUOTE>

The PAFMM unit operating in the South China Sea is paid salaries
independent of any clear commercial fishing responsibilities, and
recruited from recently separated veterans.

This appears to be similar to China's practice of establishing large
communities of Chinese students or workers in other countries, keeping
them under the control of Beijing's international coercive propaganda
agency, the "United Front Work Department" (UFWD). As I've described in the past,
there is almost a
form of mind control involved in these communities, which the Chinese
describe as "Magic Weapons." On command from the UFWD, these students
and workers demonstrate, complain or riot to implement Chinese policy.
China Defense Blog (30-Jun-2016)

****
**** China's preparations for war with Taiwan
****

The report says that "One of the overarching goals of the structural
reforms now reshaping the PLA is to construct a military capable of
conducting complex joint operations, including those that would be
involved in a Taiwan contingency."

The report lists several "courses of action" that China's military
could take to invade Taiwan:

• Air and Maritime Blockade. PLA writings describe a Joint
  Blockade Campaign in which China would employ kinetic blockades of
  maritime and air traffic, including a cut-off of Taiwan’s vital
  imports, to force Taiwan’s capitulation.
  
  
• Limited Force or Coercive Options. China might use a variety
  of disruptive, punitive, or lethal military actions in a limited
  campaign against Taiwan, probably in conjunction with overt and
  clandestine economic and political activities. Such a campaign
  could include computer network or limited kinetic attacks against
  Taiwan’s political, military, and economic infrastructure to
  induce fear in Taiwan and to degrade the Taiwan population’s
  confidence in their leaders.
  
  
• Air and Missile Campaign. China could use missile attacks and
  precision air strikes against air defense systems, including air
  bases, radar sites, missiles, space assets, and communications
  facilities to degrade Taiwan’s defenses, neutralize Taiwan’s
  leadership, or break the Taiwan people’s resolve.
  
  
• Invasion of Taiwan. Publicly available Chinese writings
  describe different operational concepts for an amphibious invasion
  of Taiwan. The most prominent of these, the Joint Island Landing
  Campaign, envisions a complex operation relying on coordinated,
  interlocking campaigns for logistics, air, and naval support, and
  EW. The objective would be to break through or circumvent shore
  defenses, establish and build a beachhead, transport personnel and
  materiel to designated landing sites in the north or south of
  Taiwan’s western coastline, and launch attacks to seize and to
  occupy key targets or the entire island.

If the United States should intervene in the takeover of Taiwan, China
would try to delay effective intervention and seek victory in a
high-intensity, limited war of short duration.

****
**** The growing military threat from China
****

In a sense there's nothing particularly new in this report, since it's
just the next annual iteration of China's preparations for a
pre-emptive attack on the United States at a place and time of its
choosing, which I've been writing about for well over a decade.

As I've mentioned before, people my age have never understood how it
was possible for Adolf Hitler to so thoroughly fooled the British
government in 1938. The Nazis were spending enormous amounts of money
building an army, navy and air force whose only real purpose was to
attack the British Isles, but it was completely ignored by the British
public except, famously, for Sir Winston Churchill, who warned of the
approaching attack, but was scorned and ridiculed for doing so.

Today, few people want to contemplate the possibility of a pre-emptive
attack by China, even though it's just as certain as the Nazi attacks
that started World War II. But there are differences today. The
Pentagon has been aware for years of the military buildup by the
Chinese, and has been producing the annual reports for years as well.

China's activities in the South China Sea have repeated Nazi
activities by annexing regions belonging to other nations. These
activities have been so blatant and obvious that anyone with even the
slightest knowledge of what's going on in the world is aware of it.

But even before the South China Sea became an issue, Taiwan was an
issue. China has been preparing for a full-scale invasion of Taiwan
at least since the 1990s, and the US has been preparing to defend
Taiwan militarily for at least as long.

So the Pentagon and the United States military have been preparing
militarily for war with China at least since the 1990s.

The presidency of Donald Trump has brought a new urgency to the danger
from China.

As I've written many times, everything that the Trump administration
has done in foreign policy since Donald Trump took office makes
complete sense to me, because everything he does is consistent with
the Generational Dynamics analyses that I've been posting for years.
Trump understands these analyses because he was educated by his former
principal advisor Steve Bannon, whom I've worked with for years, and
who is an expert on both military history and Generational Dynamics.
The mainstream press and mainstream analysts are always completely and
totally baffled by the administration's foreign policy, which is one
of the reasons that few analysts and journalists have any idea of the
danger from China.

As regular readers know, Generational Dynamics predicts that there is
an approaching Clash of Civilizations world war, pitting the "axis" of
China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries against the "allies,"
the US, India, Russia and Iran. Part of it will be a major new war
between Jews and Arabs, re-fighting the bloody the war of 1948-49 that
followed the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state
of Israel. The war between Jews and Arabs will be part of a major
regional war, pitting Sunnis versus Shias, Jews versus Arabs, and
various ethnic groups against each other. The Trump administration is
generally aware of all this, even if the mainstream media are not.

Related Articles:

• Philippine President Duterte reverses position, says he would go to war with China over South China Sea (30-May-2018)
  
  
• Australia passes foreign influence laws, targeting China (29-Jun-2018)
  
  
• Iran's protesters blame bad economy on Supreme Leader, not on US sanctions (08-Aug-2018)
  
  
• China says Pentagon report on China military 'severely damages' relations (16-May-2016)
  
  
• China expresses 'strong dissatisfaction' with the Pentagon's report (29-Aug-2011)
  
  
• New Pentagon report details China's preparations for war (24-May-2006)
  
  
  
  KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Peoples Liberation Army, PLA,
  South China Sea, Freedom of Navigation Operations, FONOs,
  Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte,
  People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia, PAFMM,
  United Front Work Department, UFWD, Magic Weapons,
  Adolf Hitler, Sir Winston Churchill, Taiwan
  
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  John J. Xenakis
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