The Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group entered the South China Sea this week to conduct routine operations, despite Chinese protests on previous ocassions.
This is the second time the Carrier Strike Group has entered the South China Sea during its 2021 deployment to the region.
“It is great to be back in the South China Sea to reassure our allies and partners that we remain committed to freedom of the seas,” said Rear Adm. Doug Verissimo, commander, Carrier Strike Group Nine.
“Over the course of the strike group’s deployment, we have demonstrated our commitment to the rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific region by operating with our friends from Australia, India, Japan, Malaysia and South Korea. We look forward to continuing to sail together with all those that embrace our collective vision of security and stability in one of the most important regions in the world.”
The U.S. Navy say here that while in the South China Sea, the strike group will conduct fixed and rotary-wing flight operations, maritime strike exercises, anti-submarine operations, coordinated tactical training, and more.
You can read more about the Carrier Strike Group here.
China has repeatedly complained about U.S. Navy ships getting close to Chinese-occupied islands in the South China Sea, where Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei and Taiwan all have competing claims.
China? Complain? Well I never!
Good. The sooner the west stands up to China and breaks free of the economic dependence/subservience the better.
China…. When you look back at how China has been treated over the Centuries …. it might well explain their future ambitions.
It does, Captain. But we live now and into the future, of course The past is for leaning how best to accomplish that requirement. Lord knows! we were imperialists to our socks; as were, and evidently still are, the Chinese. Different times both instigated and eventually rectified during those eras, initially by a few ‘influencers’ tapping a nascent seam. But that’s gone from here, thankfully. Others need to do the same. Apart from it being plain fatuous, we have little to criticize past people’s for from where we stand. In fact degrees of righteous intolerance – was there ever any other sort? are very much in evidence today and will be looked upon askance in the future. And that from a modern perspective that ought to know better.
Cheers, Skip.
Mate, I see how China looks at us all now…. I see how they have got their sweet revenge… I see how we all buy their Cheap stuff and I see how our manufacturing has been decimated as a result……”We” are just waking up to the next episode truth be known.
In fairness to China, it’s our fault we decided to do away with vast tracts of manufacturing and buy from China.
what I find fascinating is how AI, robotics, 3D printing and micro manufacturing takes away china’s key competitive advantage – cheap Labour.
britain is uniquely positioned to finally leverage our key competitive advantage which is our innovation and ingenuity. If we can start commercialising our inventions, and we need government to help with this, then we can really take some massive steps forward.
in 10 years time, if Boris sorts out the basics of cheap power (unpressurised nuclear), 5G+, and business financing we can compete with anyone.
Of some interest, perhaps. I was chatting about the cheap stuff with a British tradesman last year who stated he’d visited China on two or three occasions. Said the Chinese consumer would not accept many of the products they made for UK importers as they were contractually specified to be designed down to a standard – that presumably maximized the western profit margin. Clearly, I cannot verify, but it would not surprise me.
Our manufacturing is still high. it’s just that it’s a smaller part of a larger wider economy.
PwC point out that UK manufacturing was an all time high in 2007. Even allowing for inflation
50% increase in productivity between 1997 and 2007.
The backwoods of China is still primitive.
This is probably why when covid is over that services will leap up as spending is waiting to happen and the economy will get a big boost.
You can go as have a good laugh at all those stand up comedian concerts you are missing.
I suggest you go take a visit to Felixstowe….
TH.
TH?? Not THE TH though….!
Agree
Second that
Good point
It is key, repeat key, to denying China ownership of the South China Sea that the west has a much greater rapprochement with Vietnam. Separate Vietnam from the Chinese and their ambitions in SE Asia are over. Now Vietnam, whilst being a one party state is economically more or less a free market economy. All of the Chinese ‘new build’ island bases would be completely surrounded if we manage to get the Vietnamese to realise that the free market ‘tiger’ economies of SE Asia are better partners than China.
Vietnam has a lot of recent history with China, including two border wars. Where China got its arse handed to it in the first one and reached stalemate in the second (primarily due to the number of Chinese involved).
Vietnam are on much better relations with the West and the US in particular. Although they still have a lot of support from Russia. They are starting to undercut the Chinese, with a number of recent textile manufacturers jumping ship from China and setting up in Vietnam. Which has been blamed on the Chinese treatment of the Uyghurs.
Yes, as good an example as any of a country ‘moving on’?
China only claims the South China sea so that its fishing fleets and continue over fishing the region uninterrupted and to drill for oil and gas if they are not doing this already.
The fact is if they where to start drilling no one will do a thing about it even if they are steeling the resources that rightfully belong to Vietnam and the Philippines.
The SCS grab is also part of the strategy to isolate Taiwan from USN support. I hope the west & regional allies will leave the PRC in no doubt we’d fully support Taiwan in any attempt by PRC to invade.
Lol, you mean Communist Vietnam?
Communist Vietnam that claims 90% of the South China Sea as it’s own? Maybe check a map.
Vietnam is tricky. I knew a former Vietnamese soldier – fought in Cambodia vs Khmer Rouge back in the early mid eighties. Very tough people who as vets have done it hard ever since – no free health care there – psy up or die at hospitals – but i digress. The Vietnamese are very patriotic and anti-Chinese but the hierachy is still influenced/infiltrated by China i suspect. So getting them onside won’t be easy. And Vietnam is still a very authoritarian state – even if a bit obviously less so compared to Chins.
https://thehackernews.com/2021/04/hackers-from-china-target-vietnamese.html
New article from today, that I’m sure will only distance Vietnam more than it already is from China.
Good spot. If we could just nudge Vietnam into SEATO the Chinese ambitions in the region would be put back decades.
Nudge Vietnam into something that hasn’t existed since the 1970s? How will that help?
as if any competent hacker can’t hide where they are hacking from
All I can see is… Sunglasses ! ….
Meanwhile China Joe removes most of the trade tariffs put on the Chicoms and tells companies it’s good to manufacture your goods once again in China. Ugh.
If i could attach files in the comments I’ll upload the Dan UKDJ bingo card I’m creating. China Joe, Sleepy Joe, Merkel, Carrier group etc lol
Dan must you resort to Fox News/Trump style terminology, Chinaaa Joe (I can hear Trump’s pronunciation now) etc, it seems a tad unbecoming.
How do F18s compare against Chinese fighters ? Not that I want them to get to Friendly.🤔
Wondering if 49 jets and 590 missile silos is enough in that strike group ;P
Fortunately, multipolar has replaced unipolar in the 21st century distribution of power, reducing the possibility of mistakes that could occur from a misguided U.S. foreign policy. In the past, external situation dictates U.S. foreign policy; however, at present the Axis especially Japan has interfered in U.S. domestic politics, directing U.S. foreign policy towards Japan’s military objectives.