By Liu Xuanzun
Following the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine deal, a senior US official reportedly said recently that the US would consider providing Australia with B-21 bombers, the in-development successor to the B-2 stealth bomber that experts said on Wednesday would enable Australia to launch long-range strikes against China, thus posing serious threats to China.
US Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall made the remark at a media briefing after meeting with newly minted Royal Australian Air Force chief Air Marshal Robert Chipman on August 22 in Canberra, The Strategist, a website affiliated with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, reported on Tuesday.
Kendall again hyped the "China threat" theory, claiming the US and its allies were "concerned about Chinese behavior" in the South China Sea as well as China's military modernization program.
"We are in what I consider to be a race for military technological superiority with the Chinese," Kendall said.
Chipman underscored the importance of AUKUS, "where we work together to collaboratively develop and research and engineer new technologies so that we can stay abreast and competitive."
The US has been for years reluctant to equip its allies with the most cutting-edge military technologies and weapons of strategic significance, including strategic bombers, nuclear-powered submarines and the F-22 stealth fighter jets, but a deal under the framework of AUKUS would see Australia receiving nuclear-powered submarines, setting a dangerous precedent for such transfers, observers said.
While the B-21 can carry both nuclear and conventional munitions, the US could equip Australia with a version only capable of conventional strikes and make it an exportable, tactical weapon, Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert and TV commentator, told the Global Times on Wednesday.
Since the B-21 is a long-range stealth bomber capable of intercontinental flight, it could pose serious threats to China, Song said. If Australia obtains the B-21, the country would essentially become an overseas bomber base of the US, he said.
But as long as China modernizes its military step by step according to schedule, such threats can be dealt with, Song said.
This could include enhanced anti-stealth and air defense capabilities, asymmetric weapons such as missiles that could reach Australian bomber bases, as well as China's strategic stealth bomber of its own, analysts said.
By selling extra B-21s to Australia, the US can not only lower the overall production cost of the aircraft, but also make money for its arms dealers, Song said.
The US Air Force is expected to eventually operate at least 100 B-21s, at an average unit procurement cost of $550 million, according to the website of the US Air Force. The first aircraft is scheduled to become operational in the mid-2020s.
Any moment now I am expecting John Cleese (a veteran of Monty Python) to jump out of the bushes and announce the creation of the Ministry of Silly Wars, with Donald Trump as the deranged leader. For you youngsters out there, Monty Python’s skit, The Ministry of Silly Walks, helped make the members of MP legends. I had to reference Monty Python because the line of bullshit the Trump administration is feeding the American people and the world about the amazing, obliterating US attack on Iranian nuclear sites on Sunday morning, is more ridiculous that all of the silly walks pictured in the following video:
My hopes that Donald Trump would finally act like a responsible adult are dashed. He’s a dangerous buffoon. While the team around him are working frantically to maintain the fiction that Trump has a vision and is calling the shots on the foreign policy front, he is careening around the globe like an out-of-control cue ball on a billiards table. It started a week ago… first, he claimed...
Tuesday marks the third anniversary of the launch of the Fujian, China's first aircraft carrier equipped with electromagnetic catapults. Official media said China is about to enter a three-aircraft-carrier era, with the Fujian expected to enter service by 2025.
After the launch of the Fujian on June 17, 2022, it carried out its first sea trial from May 1 to 8 in 2024. Since then, the Fujian has completed multiple sea trials, accumulating more than 100 days of sea trial, China Central Television (CCTV) News reported on Tuesday.
Wei Dongxu, a Chinese military affairs commentator, said that the aircraft carrier Fujian has been making steady progress in sea trials, and is expected to be commissioned within this year, CCTV News reported.
With a full displacement of more than 80,000 tons, the Fujian is the world's first conventionally powered aircraft carrier to feature electromagnetic catapult technologies, according to CCTV News. The report noted that it will carry a wide variety of carrier-borne...
Chinese President Xi Jinping said Tuesday that China and Central Asian countries have explored and formed the China-Central Asia Spirit, which features mutual respect, mutual trust, mutual benefit, mutual assistance, and the pursuit of common modernization through high-quality development.
Xi made the remarks in his speech at the second China-Central Asia Summit in the Kazakh capital of Astana.
Xi said that the Chinese side has decided to establish three cooperation centers and a trade facilitation platform within the China-Central Asia cooperation mechanism.
When addressing the summit, Xi said these institutions include the China-Central Asia poverty reduction cooperation center, the China-Central Asia education exchange cooperation center, the China-Central Asia desertification control cooperation center, as well as the China-Central Asia trade facilitation cooperation....more below
