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Earlier, Evan Medeiros, a China policymaker on the National Security Council staff, disclosed that the U.S. government recently asked China not to impose the new zone over the South China Sea. He said doing so would prompt the U.S. military to increase its forces in Asia.
“We oppose China’s establishment of an ADIZ in other areas, including the South China Sea,” Mr. Medeiros told Japan’s Kyodo News agency Jan. 30. “We have been very clear with the Chinese that we would see that as a provocative and destabilizing development that would result in changes in our presence and military posture in the region.”
An even milder rebuke was issued by Daniel Russel, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs. Mr. Russel told a congressional hearing last week that there are “growing concerns” over Chinese maritime claims that he suggested are illegal under international law.
Mr. Russel said China’s “pattern of behavior” — diplomatic code for aggressive maritime bullying — appeared part of an “incremental effort” by Beijing to assert control over international waters.
A U.S. official summed up the tensions in a comment to The Nelson Report’s Chris Nelson: “What we need to think our way through is how China’s salami-slicing tactics (and they will continue whether with an ADIZ in the [South China Sea] or elsewhere) will play against U.S. credibility.
“If all we have are diplomatic response[s] when China is creating new facts on the ground/in the sea/air, this will continue to erode U.S. credibility with allies and partners; and, if, God forbid, we fail to honor alliance commitments, especially on the Senkakus, we soon will have no allies/partners/standing in the region.”
IRAN THREAT ON THE HORIZON
U.S. officials say Iran’s threat to deploy warships near U.S. coasts so far has not materialized.
“Right now we don’t see any signs of Iranian warships in the Atlantic,” a Navy official told Inside the Ring. “We are continuing to monitor the situation.”
Another official said the U.S. intelligence community is gearing up for the prospect of Iranian incursions near the East Coast, especially Virginia’s Norfolk naval base and the strategic submarine pen at Kings Bay, Ga.
U.S. intelligence sensors, including satellites, aircraft and spy ships, are being readied for any Iranian incursions close to U.S. coasts.
One concern is that Iran in the past has conducted a flight test of a mobile ballistic missile from the deck of a freighter.
The Navy official said ships flagged by many nations sail in the Atlantic and few worries are expected as long as the Iranians observe customary “rules of the road” for naval deployments.
Iran’s state-run news outlets said at least two ships, the helicopter-carrying Kharg and the destroyer Sabalan, would make the 15,500-mile trip across the Atlantic in three months. The deployment is meant to counter U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf.
Iran said its ships had entered the Atlantic near the southernmost coast of South Africa.
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