{"id":9787,"date":"2021-06-04T14:27:13","date_gmt":"2021-06-04T06:27:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=9787"},"modified":"2021-06-04T14:27:15","modified_gmt":"2021-06-04T06:27:15","slug":"us-condemns-escalatory-chinese-military-flights-off-malaysia-taiwan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/?p=9787","title":{"rendered":"US condemns \u2018escalatory\u2019 Chinese military flights off Malaysia, Taiwan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The US Air Force\u2019s Pacific commander condemned Chinese military flights off Malaysia and Taiwan, describing them on Friday as \u201cescalatory\u201d and \u201cdestabilising\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This week, 16 Chinese military aircraft flew over hotly contested waters off of Borneo prompting the air force to scramble its jets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

General Kenneth Wilsbach said these activities and an increased number of incursions into Taiwan\u2019s air defence zone \u201cadds to the list\u201d of Chinese \u201cdestabilising activities and also escalatory activities\u201d in the region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe set ourselves up for miscalculations around the region when we have some of these activities when we\u2019re getting into people\u2019s airspace that we shouldn\u2019t,\u201d said Wilsbach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"military\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Beijing claims Taiwan as part of China and has said the aircraft that appeared off Borneo over the South China Sea were on routine training and did not enter Malaysia\u2019s territorial airspace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beijing has ignored a 2016 international tribunal decision that declared its historical claim over nearly all of the South China Sea to be without basis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is growing concern in the West that China\u2019s ever-more-powerful military may try to retake Taiwan by force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In recent months, the tempo of Chinese flights across the strait has increased dramatically, straining Taiwan\u2019s air defence capabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI believe this is a strategy by China to invoke cost for the Taiwan airforce,\u201d Wilsbach said, by forcing the Taiwanese airforce to react each time an incursion occurs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Faced with dramatically improved Chinese military capabilities, Wilsbach also said the US Air Force was looking to cycle assets around the region and away from large bases, to make them more difficult to target.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve pretty much looked at every piece of concrete in the region and we\u2019ve analysed it and assessed it for possible use as a place to operate to and a place to operate from,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have a significant database of information about every single airfield, a lot of them are not suitable for our needs, but a lot of them are.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AFP<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The US Air Force\u2019s Pacific commander condemned Chinese military flights off Malaysia and Taiwan, describing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9788,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[524],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nation"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",1024,569,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1-300x167.jpg",300,167,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1-768x427.jpg",640,356,true],"large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",640,356,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",1024,569,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",1024,569,false],"newsium-slider-full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",1024,569,false],"newsium-featured":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",1024,569,false],"newsium-medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/pesawat-china-1.jpg",720,400,false]},"author_info":{"info":["Editor"]},"category_info":"Nation<\/a>","tag_info":"Nation","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9787"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9789,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9787\/revisions\/9789"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}