Originally Posted by
havoc
China envoy warns US against sailing warships through Taiwan Strait | Al Arabiya EnglishChina called on the US to refrain from sailing naval vessels through the Taiwan Strait, saying Beijing would take further action in the wake of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taipei.
China’s ambassador to Washington, Qin Gang, said on Tuesday that China viewed such Taiwan transits as an escalation by the US and an effort to support the “separatist government” in Taipei. He delivered the warning after Senator Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, wrapped up the second trip to the island in less than two weeks by a US congressional delegation.
“The US side has done too much and going too far in this region,” Qin said in response to a question about potential naval patrols. “I do call on our American colleagues to refrain, to exercise restraint, not to do anything to escalate the tension. So if there’s any moves damaging China’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, so China will respond. China will respond.”...
...Qin also downplayed the threat of an imminent Chinese attack on Taiwan, saying he wasn’t aware of a specific timeline.
“People are over-nervous about it,” he said, adding that speculation China had moved up the timeline for an invasion was “baseless.”
Thats an interesting denial of the UNCLOS... Presumably PRCians know the consequences of asking the US not to conduct freedom of the seas exercises. It is pretty much like China asking the USA not to use the I-95 in LAX as it is too close to ChinaTown in SFO. Spoken for the domestic market presumably, if they assume the US would take heed of such a reach they really are living the dream. Can they interdict the USN? sure!; as an act of war...
I'm more nervous of the crumbling of the Chinese economy that continues unabated, and in fact, appears to have been accelerated by PRC manglement interventions in recent months. If they want to crash the economy, they are on the right road. The consequences of the overt belligerence however masked and their own trashing of their economy may lead to redistribution of production and logistic structure that leave the PRC dependent on their own internal market. The internal economy has rather grown since my first visit in 86, where there was one store in Beijing for foreigners and precious little else beside from frozen spittoons in the forbidden city, however, the reliance on foreign trade and the bizarre domestic property market and questionable international programs seem to add a large rod to their backs. The PRC govt made great strides towards resource security by sidling up to various countries in the world, and providing cash for carry, however, that is all well and good so long as they were not belligerent, at which point there may be some buyers remorse and return to sender on the largesse that was provided, with strings.
China is a fantastic country, and could so easily have been a miracle, had the govt of the people, been for the people, and by the people, etc... Seems to be a lot of that going around, and even the shining city on the hill seems to be having some identity crisis issues, as they appear to toy with whether the experiment in democracy should be taken over by a failed, criminal shyster who has an apparent cult following. So much for the party of law 'n order....
We live in interesting times, Chinese proverbs seem to maintain relevancy.