China's military is deploying a new anti-ship ballistic missile that can sink U.S. aircraft carriers, a weapon that specialists say gives Beijing new power-projection capabilities that will affect U.S. support for its Pacific allies.
Full story.
"Wallace "Chip" Gregson, assistant defense secretary for Asian and Pacific security affairs, said in a speech earlier this month that China's new anti-access and area-denial weapons, including the DF-21D, 'threaten our primary means of projecting power: our bases, our sea and air assets, and the networks that support them.'"
As he says, this is a major issue for projecting power in all of Southeast Asia, and we don't seem to be doing anything to counter a more aggressive Chinese government.
This about sums it up pretty well in my opinion:
Clearly, China's communist leadership is not impressed by the administration's ending of F-22 production, its retirement of the Navy's nuclear cruise missile, START Treaty reductions in U.S. missile warheads, and its refusal to consider U.S. space warfare capabilities. Such weakness is the surest way to invite military adventurism from China.
It must also be noted here that Chinese weapons have a way of ending up in Iranian hands as well. I am not saying this system will be one of those in any form in the near future, but imagine a world in which the United States is denied access to the Persian Gulf and large areas of Southeast Asia... that is clearly a troubling scenario.