DescentBB

Last April, China's ships surrounded Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea. By July, the Chinese had erected a barrier to the reef's entrance, denying access to all but their own vessels. The swift action was taken despite mutual promises by Beijing and Manila to leave the area, which up until then had been controlled by the Philippines. Chinese state media gloated over the deception.

After gobbling up Scarborough, Chinese vessels and aircraft stepped up their intrusion into Japanese territorial waters and airspace around the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, in an effort to wrest them from Tokyo. In a display of massive force, eight Chinese ships entered the waters around the uninhabited outcroppings on the 23rd of this month. On Friday, China's Foreign Ministry said the islands were a "core interest," meaning that Beijing will not stop until it has taken control of them. Some analysts think China will try to land forces on the Senkakus soon.

Beijing's aggression on the seas is being matched by its aggression on land. During the night of April 15, a Chinese platoon-strength force advanced 10 kilometers south of the Line of Actual Control, the de facto border between China and India in the Himalayas, and established a tented camp in the Daulat Beg Oldi sector of eastern Ladakh. In recent days, Chinese troops advanced another 10 kilometers into India, one more bold attempt to take ground from a neighboring country.

China is a belligerent state that seeks to seize territory from an arc of nations: from India in the south, to South Korea in the north. At the same time, we are hearing war talk from the Chinese capital—from civilians, such as new leader Xi Jinping, to China's senior military officers. Washington has yet to understand the fundamental challenge China's militant nationalism poses to America and to the international community.

In early 2010 China’s flag officers and senior colonels made a point of publicly talking about fighting a war — a “hand-to-hand fight with the U.S.” as one put it — in the near future. China, as Robert Sutter of George Washington University points out, is the only major power actively planning to kill Americans, and, judging from public comments, China’s senior officers are relishing the prospect of doing so.

Top Gun wrote:And you know this because...you've talked to them all or something?

ThunderBunny wrote:It's a larger nation making outlandish claims to territory that was never theirs.

Jeff250 wrote:These are islands whose ownership have been in dispute for a very long time. China has too many domestic problems to have the stability to go to war over this.

Jeff250 wrote:These are islands whose ownership have been in dispute for a very long time. China has too many domestic problems to have the stability to go to war over this.

tunnelcat wrote:

Jeff250 wrote:These are islands whose ownership have been in dispute for a very long time. China has too many domestic problems to have the stability to go to war over this.

Yep. They're poisoning a lot their working people with all those polluting factories that sell loads of stuff to us, so they're essentially culling their people's army by slow attrition. I guess the U.S. will prevail when all is said and done.

Top Gun wrote:China's already essentially completely capitalist from an economic standpoint.

Jeff250 wrote:I wouldn't want to start a business there. A lot of industries like banking are still state owned in China, and the state still picks winners--even if you are comfortable with them blocking google for not playing censorship ball, their redirecting of google's traffic to baidu seems questionable at best.

flip wrote:......I'm not so sure our current administration will go toe to toe for Japan. Maybe the last guy would have, or the next one will, but not this one, and the ball will already be rolling.

'Appalling irresponsibility': Senior scientists attack Chinese researchers for creating new strains of influenza virus in veterinary laboratory

Experts warn of danger that the new viral strains created by mixing bird-flu virus with human influenza could escape from the laboratory to cause a global pandemic killing millions of people.

Matthew 24:6 wrote:You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come.

ThunderBunny wrote:Irresponsible or creating a bio weapon?

Spidey wrote:I think we could actually walk away from the mess in the middle east and kiss it goodbye, but China is a different animal.

flip wrote:EDIT: Did they tell you that they took over Scarborough Shoals, or that their submarines are laying deep water mines in the South China sea?

flip wrote:Land grabs are not bluffs.

EDIT: Aside from securing the regions natural resources, it also bases strong Chinese military presence all along major shipping lanes and strongly discourages the US if they decided to increase presence again. Check.