Key Points
- Top military officers warn: China becoming ‘Extraordinarily powerful.’
- Gen. Mark Milley says U.S. military needs to make a change – and fast.
- The Biden Administration has been notoriously soft on Chinese aggression.
China has been executing military exercises uncomfortably close to Taiwan recently – even running four straight days of “mass air force incursions” into Taiwanese airspace.
They also tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile in August that circled the globe, catching U.S. Intelligence communities by surprise.
Ma Xiaoguang, a spokesperson for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, says the military exercises are just a move to protect peace and stability. He must have forgotten that Chinese/Taiwanese relations are at the worst they’ve been in 40 years.
That context is important – people are scared. And according to new statements from Gen. Mark Milley, they have every right to be.
During an event at the Aspen Security Forum, Milley expounded on an incontrovertible truth: China is becoming extraordinarily powerful, and the U.S. needs to be ready.
“They want to challenge the so-called liberal rules-based order that went into effect in 1945 at the end of World War II, they want to revise it,” Milley said. “So we have a case here of a country that is becoming extraordinarily powerful, that wants to revise the international order to their advantage. That’s going to be a real challenge over the coming years. In the next 10-20 years, that’s going to be really significant for the United States.”
Milley also spoke specifically about the hyper-sonic missile test and China’s tech explosion.
“I would argue that the nature of that particular test, taken as part of a whole, if you look at, again, 40 years ago, they had 0 satellites, look at what they’ve got today,” Milley said. “They had no ICBMs, look at what they’ve got today. They had no nuclear weapons, look what they got today. They have no fourth or fifth generation fighters or even more advanced fighters back then, look what they got today. They had no navy, look what they have today. They had no sub force, look what they have today. So if you look at the totality, this test that occurred a couple weeks ago, is only one of a much, much broader picture of a military capability with respect to the Chinese, that is very, very significant.”
The Biden administration has been blasted for going incredibly light on an increasingly-aggressive China. Consequences are few and far between on cyberattacks and military aggressions, “peaceful exercises” or no.
“If the United States military doesn’t do a fundamental change to ourselves in the coming 10-15-20 years, then we’re going to be on the wrong side of a conflict,” Milley added.
We might not even have that long.
