By now, won't we admit that we aren't frightening the Chinese military into passivity in the face of our awesome awesomeness?
If more evidence is needed of American dismissiveness mixed with a dose of hubris, consider the decision to invite China to the world’s largest international maritime warfare exercise, known as RIMPAC, in Hawaii in 2014 and 2016.
The People’s Liberation Army was invited despite well-understood intelligence risks (try ‘acoustic signatures’ for starters), and apparently in the belief that exposure to US awesomeness would convince China to behave. An invitation to China for RIMPAC 2018 is apparently still open.
Face it, the Chinese aren't learning what we keep trying to teach them:
We hope to teach them the big picture--don't mess with us; but the Chinese are just interested in learning how to do their job--fighting us--so they focus on details.
Face it, in a vacuum of information the Chinese will fear their own imagination about what our military can do more than from the Chinese seeing the reality of it.
Respect the Chinese navy enough to admit that the Chinese might use what we show them to hurt us and not go back home scared witless of our military.
