China is developing its military might at a rapid pace to prepare for war with the United States, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall warned on Monday.
“Our job is to deter that war and to be ready to win if it occurs,” Kendall said in an address at the Air and Space Forces Association Warfighter Symposium at National Harbor, Maryland.
“China has been building a military capability specifically designed to achieve their national goals and to do so if opposed by the United States,” he said.
Kendall pointed out that China has created two new military branches: a force designed to counter aircraft carriers, airfields and other critical assets; and a strategic support service that works to achieve information dominance in the space and cyber domains.
Geostrategy-Direct.com reported in its Sept. 12 issue that military researchers in China have made significant advances in developing and testing strategic electromagnetic pulse (EMP) weapons.
U.S. critical infrastructure, including the electric grid, could be vulnerable to Chinese EMP arms, resulting in catastrophic losses, according to a new report on the threat.
“China‘s rapid advancements in the field of EMP weaponry have emerged as a significant concern for the strategic landscape of global security,” according to the report titled “There’s Darkness in the Distance: The Rising Threat of China‘s EMP Weapons to U.S. Defenses and Critical Infrastructure.”
The EMP weapons under development in China would be capable of disabling electronics on U.S. warplanes and even entire military bases, the report said.
The communist regime in Beijing is also developing EMP countermeasures, an indication that the military thinks the use of electromagnetic weapons will be an element of future warfare.
The report urges the U.S. military and government to rapidly develop strategies and countermeasures to meet the Chinese EMP threat.
Kendall said that China “has been re-optimizing its forces for great power competition and to prevail against the U.S. in the Western Pacific for over 20 years.”
“We’re all talking about the fact that the Air and Space Forces must change, or we could fail to prevent and might even lose a war,” he added.
As U.S.-China relations continue to deteriorate under a Biden administration that is viewed by the communist regime in Beijing as weak, military analysts have warned the the Xi Jinping regime has set its sights on taking Taiwan by force.
Joe Biden has repeatedly said the U.S. would send troops to help defend Taiwan in such a scenario. Washington maintains informal ties with Taiwan and has provided advanced weaponry to the nation.
“The Air Force and Space Force are incredibly capable, but we need to re-optimize the department for greater power projection and for great power competition,” Kendall said.
“The war we need to be most ready for, if we want to optimize our readiness to deter or respond to the pacing challenge, is not the type of conflict we have been focused on for many years,” he added. “If our power projection capability and capacity are not adequate to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan or elsewhere, war could occur. If it does, and we cannot prevail, the results could cast a long shadow.”
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