On November 9th, 2011, Bill Gertz reported for the Washington Times how the Pentagon has revealed a new battle concept that is aimed at countering Chinese military efforts to deny access near its territory and cyberspace. Named "Air Sea Battle", the concept takes a very Cold War style military posture towards China. One Obama administration official went so far as to say "Air Sea Battle is to China was the maritime strategy was to the Soviet Union." Air Sea Battle has many facets focused on defeating China's anti-access area denial weapons; I'm just going to mention the cyber component. Specifically, the plan calls for the launching of joint Navy and Air Force cyberattacks on Chinese anti-access forces. The Army is going to join the concept in the near future, using cyberwarfare initiatives to again counter Chinese anti-access weapons.
Pentagon press secretary George Little said “This office will help guide meaningful integration of our air and naval combat capabilities, strengthening our military deterrent power, and maintaining U.S. advantage against the proliferation of advanced military technologies and capabilities.”
John Tkacik, a former State Department China specialist, cited Air Sea Battle as "evidence that Washington is finally facing up to the real threat that China has become an adversarial military, naval and nuclear power in Asia, and that the only way to balance China is to lend the weight of U.S. air and naval forces to our Asia-Pacific allies’ ground forces.”
The source article can be found here.
Leave a Reply