Sunday, November 23, 2008

Israeli missiles target US Aircraft Carriers


This is not as misleading as it may at first sound. I will in fact prove that this is true. But first you must understand that the country that is aiming these missiles at US Aircraft Carriers is China. But the missiles are in fact Israeli designed cruise missiles. And in fact the Israelis got their designs from the US, so these are actually US designed cruise missiles that are being aimed at US Aircraft Carriers. Got that? Your tax dollars are being used to enable China to target US Aircraft Carriers. Now that you understand the big picture, let's break it down and provide the proof that this is true.

So let's start from the end of the story and work our way backwards. I came across this article recently while doing one of my routine Google News searches on China - "China Missile Deployment Targets U.S. Aircraft Carriers". Here's a few quotes.

China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is deploying anti-ship YJ-62A missiles along its southeast coast, with a range that can cover the entire area of Taiwan.
[...]
Shih [editor of Taiwan’s Defense International magazine] also points out that if the United States supports Taiwan with aircraft carriers if there is an outbreak of military tension in the Taiwan Strait, the YJ-62A missiles—also known as “aircraft carrier killers”—will become an important weapon in the PLA’s strategy.

Sun Kauo-hwa, national security consultant of the Taiwan National Policy Foundation, also believes that mainland China is mainly targeting U.S. aircraft carriers, rather than Taiwan. “There are quadrangular relations between the United States, China, Taiwan and Japan in the Pacific,” Sun said, “the biggest target for mainland China’s naval deployment in the Pacific is the U.S. Pacific Fleet, especially their aircraft carrier battle group.
So now we have established that China has deployed missiles along its coast that are capable of hitting any ship that happens to cross through the Taiwan Strait, and that the most likely target is the U.S. Pacific Fleet. And even more specifically the nuclear US Aircraft Carrier George Washington which is now permanently stationed in Yokosuka, Japan.

But you say, well the source of these reports are Taiwanese who have an interest in raising alarms about Chinese threats to Taiwan. What proof do they have that these missiles are targeting ships rather than targets in Taiwan itself? Well maybe this article will help - "YJ-62 Anti-Ship Cruise Missile".
The YJ-62 ASCM outperforms most Western and Russian anti-ship missiles in terms of range and warhead mass, thought it is not clear whether the missile possesses the same accuracy and anti-jamming capabilities. Nevertheless, it demonstrates China’s capability to design and develop a world-class advanced anti-ship missile.
What do you know, this is not just any ordinary missile. This is a cruise missile and it is described as a "anti-ship" cruise missile. It is also described as carrying a significantly large warhead. The kind you might need to take out a large vessel like an Aircraft Carrier. And finally I note that this sophisticated piece of military hardware was designed by China rather than having been purchased from Russia for example.

So where is the Israeli connection? Well that's coming next. Here's a rather old article from 2003 - "China's Missile Imports and Assistance From Israel".
In addition to the alleged Patriot technology transfer, Israel has allegedly supplied China with cruise missile technology, including sensitive US technology. Specifically, Israel is allegedly assisting China with the development of its YF-12A, YJ-62, and YJ-92 cruise missiles.
[...]
On 2 January 2003, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher stated that Israeli military exports to China were of concern to the United States. The following day, Israel announced that it would comply with U.S. demands and halt all contracts on the export of arms and security equipment to China. [...] According to the Associate Press, China issued a written statement in response to the Israeli announcement. In the statement, it states that, "It is China's consistent position that the development of normal military trade cooperation with Israel is a matter between the two countries."
By now you probably recognized the YJ-62 cruise missile as being the one that the Taiwanese are saying that China is using to target US Aircraft carriers. So actually this is an Israeli design, and the Israelis got their design from the US. There's also Patriot Missile technology that was transferred. No wonder that in the case of the latest anti-missile technology that is being installed on Israeli soil, the US military won't let any Israeli even touch it. But don't let that make you come to the conclusion that the US has learned its lesson with regards to our "special friend" in the Middle East. The US continues to do "joint development" with Israel. And Israel continues to engage in military trade with China. In fact in 2005 Israel was China's second largest arms supplier - second only to Russia. And in case it wasn't obvious from the quote in the article above, the Chinese attitude is that this is none of Uncle Sam's business - even if it does involve the illegal transfer of US technology to China.

And in addition to using Israel to steal US military secrets China has been stealing directly from the US as in the case of Shu Quan-Sheng, the physicist and corporate executive from Virginia arrested in September for selling American space technology to Beijing. He is now facing 25 years in prison.

Lucky for us that China doesn't have any aircraft carriers of its own to challenge the US Navy, right? Well it may not be long before that situation changes. According to this article China will have its first aircraft carrier in just 2 years - "Chinese aircraft carrier?".
In March last year, a Beijing-backed Hong Kong newspaper reported that China could have its first aircraft carrier by 2010. The Pentagon said this year that China was actively engaged in aircraft carrier research and would be able to start building one by the end of this decade.
[...]
An effective Chinese carrier could have serious implications for any conflict involving Taiwan by strengthening the mainland's ability to counter the island's air force and control its sea lanes.
[...]
Taiwanese separatism is the 'biggest threat' China currently faces, said Maj-Gen Qian [director of the Foreign Affairs Office at the Chinese Ministry of National Defence], who insisted on US dropping military support for the island.
So what's the US response to the Chinese building one or more aircraft carriers? The answer is found at the end of the article I quoted above.
Admiral Timothy Keating, head of the US Pacific Command, said in Beijing last year that China's development of a carrier should not be the cause of any unnecessary tension, and that the US would even be willing to lend a helping hand.
Why not? We already supplied them with cruise missiles to sink our carriers, why not help China to build carriers of their own? This will help with the plan to split the Pacific fifty-fifty between China and the US. With the current US budget deficit we just can't afford to patrol the whole Pacific on our own - it's a BIG ocean. Why not get China to help out? This at least is the plan proposed by the Chinese military to the US military according to this article - "US aircraft carrier keeps tabs on China".
In spring this year, a congressional hearing in the US revealed that the Chinese military had approached high-ranking US military officers with the idea of “dividing the Pacific into two spheres of influence” between Beijing and Washington, with China taking charge of the seas off Hawaii and westward.
Hey I have a better idea. We split the world into three regions called Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia. Wait. Didn't George Orwell write a book about that called Nineteen Eighty-Four?

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Chinese are not the threat, they are essentially non-religious, relatively peaceful and drifting (albeit slowly) towards democracy. The real scandal is that the US has supplied its military technology to nutty religious dictatorships such as the one found in Saudi Arabia!

Frank Hope said...

The head of China's Parliament, Wu Guangbao, recently declared that the communist party has no intention of giving up its hold on power by allowing other political parties and is strictly opposed to democracy. China is a growing military threat to the US which we cannot ignore. Recent events such as the shooting down of a satellite and harassing a US Navy ship are testament to this.

I agree that the US military alliance with Saudi Arabia is problematic, although I object to the term "nutty". I suppose you would also agree that there is a problem with the US relationship with another Middle Eastern country where a significant percentage of the population has a radical religious perspective - I'm speaking of course of Israel.