Chinese 'hiding military build-up'

[str8thinker]

AUSTRALIA'S intelligence agencies believe China is hiding the extent of a massive military build-up that goes beyond national defence and threatens regional stability.

A strategic assessment by the agencies found that China's military spending for 2006 was $90 billion - double the $45 billion budget publicly announced by Beijing.

Australia's peak intelligence agency, the Office of National Assessments; the Defence Intelligence Organisation; and the Defence and Foreign Affairs departments concluded that China was building a military capability well beyond its priorities of defence and the prevention of Taiwanese independence. ''China's longer-term agenda is to develop 'comprehensive national power', including a strong military, that is in keeping with its view of itself as a great power,'' according to a copy of the secret assessment provided by Foreign Affairs officials to the US embassy in Canberra.

''We agree that the trend of China's military modernisation is beyond the scope of what would be required for a conflict over Taiwan. Arguably China already poses a credible threat to modern militaries operating in the region and will present an even more formidable challenge as its modernisation continues.''

Details of the 2006 Australian intelligence assessment are contained in a US embassy cable obtained by WikiLeaks and provided exclusively to The Age.

For full article, see
http://www.theage.com.au/national/chinese-hiding-military-buildup-20110106-19hjc.html

So much for David Wilcock and "China's October Surprise (http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?8928)". Comes as no surprise to me.

[Icecold]

Oh dear, I have written about this on other forums and have done a degree of research on this topic. Unfortunately I agree with the conclusion you have posted. It is my belief that China's naval assets will equal those of the USN in a very short time. China's navy has been invited into the Mediterranean by the Italians. Their sphere of influence is large.


From Zanesville Timerecorder.com


The Chinese navy is going blue water
By XIAOXIONG YI
November 4, 2009
Harvard historian Paul Kenned, in his "The Rise and Fall of Navies," wrote, "Those
faster-growing economies can afford both guns and butter." China's tremendous
economic growth has been accompanied by a quantum leap in China's naval build-up.
Today, more than 1,000 Chinese commercial ships and oil tankers are sailing through
troubled waters every day, and China's commercial sea-borne trade volumes have
escalated dramatically. China's commercial maritime interests exceeded $800 billion by
the end of 2008, and more than 60 percent of its oil imports transported by sea.
As Chinese cargo ships and oil tankers are becoming all the time more vulnerable on the
high seas, Beijing sees it as vital to safeguard China's sea-lanes. Last week, the Chinese
government vowed to make "all-out efforts" to rescue De Xin Hai, the Chinese ship
hijacked by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean northeast of the Seychelles.
What is perhaps more important, however, is Beijing's political-strategic ambitions.
Chinese rulers are good students of the late Chairman Mao, who once said, "Power of
government comes out of the barrel of gun." As Chinese rulers are becoming more
confident and assertive, to modernize China's People's Liberation Army (PLA),
especially the PLA Navy (PLAN), has become one of Beijing's top priorities.
China's defense spending has increased by an average of 16.2 percent a year since 1999.
It now is the second-highest in the world. The PLA's official military budget for 2009 is
at $70 billion, but the U.S. published estimates show that China's military spending as
high as $150 billion. In its first annual report to Congress under the Obama
administration, the Pentagon has charged China with hiding its real military spending and
expressed concern over why China would increase its military expenditure with no
apparent external threats. "China's failure to be transparent about its rapidly growing
military capabilities," according to the report, "has created uncertainty and risks of
miscalculation. Much uncertainty surrounds China's future course, particularly regarding
how its expanding military power might be used."
A major factor that contributes to China's rapidly growing military expenditure is
Beijing's long-harbored ambition of possessing a blue-water navy, not only to safeguard
China's commercial sea-lanes, but also to advance China's off-shore territorial claims.
Such considerations have ensured the PLAN to receive top priority in China's military
modernization, with a generous budgetary allocation estimated at more than 30 percent of
the PLA's total defense budget.
To build a blue water navy, no expense has been spared. Earlier this year, Chinese
defense minister Liang Guanglie confirmed Beijing's plan to build a new generation of
large destroyers and aircraft carrier. From the Yellow Sea to the South China Sea,
Chinese shipyards are running flat out. According to the U.S. Congressional Research
Service, "By 2010 China's submarine force will be nearly double the size of the U.S., and
the entire Chinese naval fleet is projected to surpass the size of the U.S. fleet by 2015."
Strategically, China's leaders have long been saying that the Indian Ocean is not India's
Ocean. Beijing's new "Pearl Necklace Strategy" is designed to put Chinese naval bases
along the shores of the Indian Ocean, and the maritime routes to Malacca: Marao in the
Maldives, Coco Island in Burma, Chittagong in Bangladesh and Gwadar in Pakistan.
China also is creating coastal bases in Africa, now widely open to Chinese investment.
Beijing sees the Pacific to be the next major strategic contending field in coming decades.
Here, China foresees two rivals: Japan and the United States. Beijing has already tested
Tokyo's readiness by repeated submarine incursions. PLAN vessels also are confronting
U.S. Navy ships in the Pacific. The Chinese ships jostled with a U.S. Navy surveillance
ship in the recent South China Sea confrontation sends a strong signal to countries in the
region that they may no longer be able to depend on the U.S. in a conflict with China in
the Pacific theater.
One hundred fifteen years ago, Qing Dynasty China's shiny new armada, North Sea Fleet,
was crushed by the Japanese Imperial Navy in the Battle of Yalu. The humiliating defeat
accelerated the decline of China. Today, China is flexing its new naval muscle at sea. The
Chinese naval build-up still is in its early stages, and it may be years before Beijing has a
navy to match that of the U.S., but the trend is clear: Beijing is determined to challenge
American hegemony on the high seas and to re-address the postwar balance of power in
the Pacific and Indian Ocean.
Dr. Xiaoxiong Yi is a professor at Marietta College and director of the China
Program.

Unfortunately, I had no link for this doc, else I would have used it.

[ThePythonicCow]

Unfortunately, I had no link for this doc, else I would have used it.
This article was posted by Dr. Xiaoxiong Yi himself on his Wordpress blog at The Chinese navy is going blue water (http://xiaoxiongyi.wordpress.com/2009/11/05/the-chinese-navy-is-going-blue-water-november-4-2009-zanesville-times-recorder-copyrightt-%C2%A92009/).


From Zanesville Timerecorder.comThe article was apparently published and copyright by the Zanesville Times Recorder, from which numerous other websites obtained it. However the Zanesville Times Recorder apparently no longer has the article on-line.

The document can also be found in pdf format at http://www.marietta.edu/News/newspdfs/ZTR-110409.pdf. This is on the website of Marietta College, where Dr. Xiaoxiong Yi is a professor.

[trenairio]

I don't think this war will ever ensue.