UPDATE on the recent Air Confrontation between US / Chinese aircraft! “The U.S. accusations against China are totally unfounded. It is large-scale, high-frequency close-proximity surveillance by the United States that endangers Chinese-U.S. maritime and aviation safety, and that is the root cause behind any accidents,” claims Chinese Peoples Liberation Army spokesperson Col. Yang. Chinas repeated denials of wrongdoing do give a window on their motivations; a former Chinese general commented this action was a form of admonishment for US spying (some evidence suggests US planes may have been monitoring a Chinese nuclear submarine). As long as the U.S. continues to undertake this kind of unfriendly action, China will continue to issue this kind of warning. Given the common knowledge of mutual spying between the nations, one might hope that China would react less aggressively to observation by unarmed surveillance aircraft in international airspace. Some have even argued these are actions by rogue fliers who are acting without authorization from superiors yet, if that is so, why havent the superiors taken action to stop this after the first or second incident? Struggling to explain the behavior, a senior U.S. official commented Somethings out of whack. Something does seem to be out of whack but what exactly isnt entirely clear. Are Chinese officials covering for rogue pilots, is China about to declare an air defense zone in the South China Sea similarly to the air defense zone that the US objected to in the East China Sea, or is it some other reason we arent aware of? It could be any or all of those… only time will tell.
Posted on: Tue, 26 Aug 2014 00:35:58 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015