Yet we can't be chased from the Western Pacific even as we don't want to risk our best Navy ships dangling that close to China. I've long wanted our presence in the western Pacific to routinely be composed of ships we can afford to lose rather than a burning carrier that will not look good on our evening news.
It looks like the Navy is going to do that:
The U.S. Navy said it would station several new coastal combat ships in Singapore and perhaps in the Philippines in coming years, moves likely to fuel China's fears of being encircled and pressured in the South China Sea dispute.
The new ships will be our smaller Littoral Combat Ships. These are new and would look good in show-the-flag deployments as well as providing a nice trip wire and screen in the South China Sea whose loss would not cripple our fleet in a worst case scenario.
It isn't "running away" to preserve our assets against a surprise first strike by pulling our most capable and expensive assets back a bit. And it helps to have a screen forward that China would have to go through if they choose war. Remember, in December 1941, Hawaii was too far forward.
