I've long worried that pivoting to the Pacific invites disaster if we simply pack forces into bases within easy range of Chinese strike assets. Say ... how about all those PLA missiles?
This is what I'm talking about:
American warships and bases in the Pacific are within reach of an increasingly worrying threat, a daunting missile force unlike any the US has faced in combat before. ...
The "dramatic expansion" of the Chinese missile arsenal, especially MRBMs and IRBMs, is designed to threaten US forces and allies across the Indo-Pacific region, Thomas Shugart, an adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security and a retired US Navy submarine officer, said.Packing our best assets into the few bases we have for a theater-wide Pearl Harbor is stupid. It's not like we can build a new fleet as we started to do on the eve of the actual Pearl Harbor. Heck, repairing damaged ships is unlikely.
Hopefully we can build up air defenses to hold off the Chinese, but I don't count on it.
The key is to survive the initial blows with minimal forces dangled in front of the Chinese tempting them to attack, gather forces from safer--not safe--bases and marshal logistics, and counter-attack with our allies.
And we do have our own growing anti-ship arsenal to pen the Chinese into their ports.
We have enough allies in the western Pacific--who can't go anywhere--who are already vulnerable to Chinese strikes without deploying robust air defenses. Why should we add to the Chinese kill count by essentially sinking our ships for them?
UPDATE: Good!
Department of Defense representatives met Republic of Palau leaders and residents May 13-15 to discuss the proposed facility on the island of Peleliu[.]
It's about time we got on the ball in the Pacific.
NOTE: TDR Winter War of 2022 coverage continues here.
NOTE: I'm adding updates on the Last Hamas War in this post.