Monday, November 19, 2018

U.S. Admiral: China Has Built ‘Great Wall Of SAMs’ In Pacific

China’s new airstrip built over Fiery Cross Reef in the South China Sea (CSIS image)

Breaking Defense: China Has Built ‘Great Wall of SAMs’ In Pacific: US Adm. Davidson

From militarized atolls in the South China Sea to a growing Chinese navy looking increasingly aggressive, the head of the Indo-Pacom command lays out his needs and concerns.

HALIFAX: By turning reefs and atolls in the disputed South China Sea into fortified artificial islands, complete with anti-aircraft Surface-to-Air Missiles, China has transformed “what was a great wall of sand just three years ago [into] a great wall of SAMs,” the US commander in the Pacific said here today.

The militarization of the vital waterway for commercial shipping has been a major concern of Washington and its Asian neighbors for the past several years. But China’s increasingly aggressive challenges of American naval vessels operating in what the US and its allies consider international waters — including a near collision of two ships in September — raises the specter of a deadly accident that might escalate into war. And if a war breaks out, the island bases become a strategic southward extension of China’s land-based defense against US ships and planes, known in the trade as Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD).

Read more ....

WNU Editor: This Chinese missile build-up has been ongoing for a long time .... China's missiles in the South China Sea put the United States and Australia in a difficult position (Anne Barker, ABC News Online).

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Now that Washington DC is actually confronting China directly and across all levers of power, diplomatic, economic and military, Asian nations are starting to stand up against China's brash bully or predatory behaviors. These static missile batteries will be matched by others buying longer range strike missiles to take these islands down. Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam and Australia will be shopping for these new weapons.

Hence the reason for the USA to withdraw from the INF treaty.

manstien said...

Looks like the Maginot line.

Anonymous said...

SAMS on small islands with known locations will have electronic-warfare operators drooling!

Roger Smith said...


Who would want to invade China, anyway? I'd go for their merchant marine and cut off the chinese male's supply of rhino horn powder. Immediate and nation-wide psychological ED. {erectile disfunction]. Women AND men P.O'ed. End of Xi. As Ollie told Stan..."Now why didn't I think of that"

That's Oliver Hardy and Stan Laurel to you youngsters.

Once again I submit "Linebacker, The Untold Story of the Air Raids Over North Vietnam". Karl J. Eschmann.