The U.S. Navy’s Second Fleet has been reactivated to full-operational capability to meet challenges, such as China’s increasing activity in the Arctic.

The Navy’s Second Fleet was responsible for protecting American interests from the northernmost point of the Earth to the Caribbean, with about 126 ships, 4,500 aircraft, and 90,000 sailors.

China Sent Warships to Alaska and threatened the US. China sent advanced warships to waters near the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, reportedly in retaliation to the U.S. naval presence in the South China Sea. This could also be a display of the new force of the Chinese navy. Four Chinese warships, including one of its most advanced destroyers and a missile cruiser, were spotted sailing in the waters off Alaska in late August.

The China-US conflict has increased sharply in the past few months, with experts saying there is a risk of an all-out war. What is behind this hostility, and what kind of world order is Beijing aiming for? DW analyzes.

At the 19th convention of the Communist Party in October 2017, Chinese President Xi Jinping said that a "new era" had dawned for China and that the People's Republic was "getting closer to the center of the world every day." But how does China imagine a world order in which it is at the center-stage?

Read more: 'The Chinese Dream' and Xi Jinping's power politics

"My understanding is that the political forces in Beijing do not know exactly what they want. They're experimenting with Deng Xiaoping," Gu Xuewu, a Bonn-based political scientist, told DW, referring to the Chinese politician who initiated economic reforms in the 1980s. Deng's famous motto was "crossing the river by feeling the stones."

China's indecision is also reflected in complex debates about its role in the world, according to Volker Stanzel, a China expert and former German ambassador to Beijing. The debates deal as much with Beijing's acceptance of the prevailing global order as with the idea that China – chosen by fate – must lead the world.

As varied and complex these discussions appear to be, the Communist Party of China (CPC) has the final say in all matters, which are not necessarily about world order, according to Stanzel. "It is only a question about China being able to function in a way that the ideas of the CPC can be implemented, and which can help it stay in power."

Core elements of the 'Chinese world order'

Despite these ambiguities, Gu says that some key elements of the "Chinese order" can still be identified. "China wants a world order that is politically multipolar, functionally multilateral and ideologically pluralistic."

The expert explained China's ideals as follows:

Multipolar: A world dominated by several power centers – China, the US, Europe, Russia and maybe India.

Multilateral: A world in which no country alone determines the global agenda; it must be negotiated between all power centers.

Pluralistic: The world must accept different forms of governance and not just liberal democracy.

"We already live in a multipolar world," Gu said. Many political scientists agree that the short phase of American hegemony following the collapse of the Soviet Union no longer exists.

In China, multilateralism has been linked to Xi's catchphrase, "the community of common destiny." In 2019, Xi rejected isolationism and positioned China as a supporter of multilateralism in a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

But Stanzel is skeptical.

"Common destiny is empty talk; it needs to be defined. How do you want to organize the world? With more international laws and stronger global institutions? But I don't think that either China or the US are interested in this," Stanzel said.

Both China and the US, however, give little value to international laws, said Gu. "They accept them only if they suit their own interests. They reject them if they conflict with their interests."

Read more: China unveils plans to step up military power

Image-building campaigns and the Silk Road

Beijing wants to improve its global image, with Confucius institutes promoting Chinese language and culture across the world. At the same time, Chinese investors are buying media companies in an attempt to alter China's global perception.

China is also actively participating in the United Nations. "China chairs four international institutions – twice as many as the US – and uses its position to include its political expression in UN documents," Stanzel said.

However, the success of Chinese measures is uneven in different parts of the world. "The narrative is successful in Africa, more so in states that are economically tied to China," Stanzel added.

In Germany and other industrialized countries, China's image has been dented due to its somewhat aggressive diplomacy. The detention and reeducation of hundreds of thousands of Uighurs in Xinjiang and the massive curbs on the freedom of Hong Kong citizens have further damaged China's reputation in Europe and the US.

The new Silk Road (Belt and Road Initiative, BRI), which was initially hailed as the world's largest infrastructure project, has also turned out to be a double-edged sword for many countries. Some critics say the project is making economically weak countries dependent on China. Sri Lanka, for instance, had to lease a deep seaport in Hambantota to a Chinese company for 99 years after failing to pay back loans.

Dominance in Asia

Gu believes that Chinese ambitions are significantly overestimated. "Anyone who wants to lead the world must be able to make general goods available free of charge and have a certain altruistic zeal to implement certain ideas globally," he said, adding that China lacks that. "China actually does not want to replace the US. It is even wary of taking on these tasks."

But even if China does not strive for global hegemony, its supreme status in Asia is beyond any doubt.

President Xi talked about "Asia for the Asians" in a 2014 speech. But what does the "Asia for the Asians" mean in the context of the Chinese order? A 2010 statement to the Association of the Southeast Nations (ASEAN) by then Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi can help us understand the dynamics: "China is a big country and other countries are small. It is simply a fact."

Nowhere in Asia is China's hegemonic claim more obvious than in the South China Sea. China is not only trying to force the US out of the region, it is also bringing key shipping routes and raw materials of the neighboring countries under its control. The consequences for "peripheral states" are instability and the growing pressure to choose between China and the US. There is also an increasing danger of an all-out military confrontation.

The Solomon Islands on Friday defended plans to sign a security deal with Beijing that could allow China to boost its military presence in the South Pacific island nation. A document, leaked on social media, revealed details of the pact, raising alarm bells in Australia, amid concerns China could try to establish a military base on the islands. The document says the Solomon Islands may "request China to send police, armed police, military personnel and other law enforcement and armed forces." It said Beijing could also send ships for stopovers and to replenish supplies. The draft also allows China to have the final say on any public information released about the new pact. The leak is believed to be part of wider security arrangements after the Solomons on Thursday agreed on a policing cooperation pact with China following anti-government protests in November that turned into riots. A Solomon Islands official told Reuters news agency that the agreement would be sent to the cabinet for consideration. Australia and New Zealand have for decades seen the Pacific islands as their "backyard" and any security pact with Beijing is a threat to their position in the region. Washington and Canberra have long been concerned about the potential for China to build a naval base in the South Pacific, allowing its navy to project power far beyond East Asia. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Australia and New Zealand were part of the "Pacific family" and had a history of providing security support and responding to crises. "There are others who may seek to pretend to influence and may seek to get some sort of hold in the region and we are very conscious of that," he told reporters. Former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told ABC Radio the proposed pact was "one of the most significant security developments that we have seen in decades and it's one that is adverse to Australia's national security interests." Australian Defense Minister Peter Dutton said any move to establish a Chinese military base in the Solomon Islands would be concerning. "We want peace and stability in the region. We don't want unsettling influences and we don't want pressure and coercion that we are seeing from China," Dutton told Channel Nine TV. New Zealand said Friday it would raise the issue with both the Solomon Islands and China. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin on Friday called on relevant parties to look at the security pact "objectively and calmly and not over-interpret it." About the security arrangement with Beijing, the Solomon Islands government said in a statement it was "diversifying the country's security partnership including with China." It added that "broadening partnerships is needed to improve the quality of lives of our people and address soft and hard security threats facing the country.” The government said the security arrangement with Australia, signed in 2017, would be unaffected.

 

A SURPLUS BOEING 747 CAN BE CONVERTED AS A DRONE WITH AN ARSENAL OF MISSILES PATROLING AT A DISTANCE OF MORE THAN A 1000 MILES FROM ENEMY TARGET

War Preparation by US Against

Russia and China:Marines Seek  Anti Ship HIMARS

The LRSO represents just part of the Air Force’s nuclear modernization efforts. The Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent, being developed by Northrop Grumman, is scheduled to have its first flight in 2023. The GBSD is expected to achieve initial operational capability in 2029 and full operational capability with 400 missiles seven years later in 2036. A renewed buildup of Russian troops near the Ukrainian border has raised concern among some officials in the United States and Europe who are tracking what they consider irregular movements of equipment and personnel on Russia’s western flank. At the same time USS Mount Whitney, the flagship of the United States Sixth Fleet, is heading for the #BlackSea. Analysts say the deployment of the warship to show support for #Ukraine. See the full story in the video.

The Air Force awarded a $2 billion contract to Raytheon Missiles and Defense to engineer and develop the Long Range Standoff (LRSO) weapon system, the service’s next-generation air-launched nuclear missile.

The deal, announced July 1, is for the engineering and manufacturing development phase, which is set to last through February 2027 as Raytheon will continue to develop the cruise missiles, with a goal of demonstrating full production readiness. The contract was the result of a sole-source acquisition.

“The team’s extensive work—with a major focus on digital engineering—and close collaboration with the Air Force throughout the technology maturation and risk reduction phase, has guided us to an EMD contract award,” said Paul Ferraro, vice president of Air Power at Raytheon Missiles & Defense, in a statement to Air Force Magazine. “Transitioning to the EMD phase is a big step toward delivering this critical capability to the Air Force to strengthen our nation’s deterrence posture.”

The announcement comes just a few months after the Air Force announced in April that the service was proceeding with Raytheon as the highly classified program’s “sole source contractor” on the technology, maturation, and risk reduction (TMRR) phase, removing competitor Lockheed Martin.

Raytheon’s TMRR deal was worth $900 million and was expected to run through 2022. The Air Force said at the time that it had “high confidence” in choosing the Raytheon missile design due to the success of the program.

The LRSO is slated to replace the nuclear AGM-86B Air-Launched Cruise Missile beginning in about 2030, equipping the B-52 and B-21 bombers as one-third of the nuclear triad. Its range is expected to be in excess of 1,500 miles, and first flight could come in 2022.

The Air Force’s 2022 budget request included $609 million for the program. The Congressional Budget Office estimated in 2017 that the LRSO will cost $10 billion to produce 1,000 missiles, for a unit cost of $10 million apiece, but the Arms Control Association has estimated the cost could be closer to $20 billion.

The LRSO represents just part of the Air Force’s nuclear modernization efforts. The Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent, being developed by Northrop Grumman, is scheduled to have its first flight in 2023. The GBSD is expected to achieve initial operational capability in 2029 and full operational capability with 400 missiles seven years later in 2036.

The Air Force is now arming its fleet of B-52 Bombers with prototype nuclear-armed cruise missiles to prepare the aircraft for the possibility of launching the Long Range Stand Off (LRSO) weapon.

A Marine Corps HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System)

For the first time since December 1941, when Wake Island’s shore gunners sank the invading destroyer Hayate, Marine Corps artillery wants to kill ships. That could be a big boost for the Navy, which confronts ever more powerful Russian and Chinese fleets.

Army artillery is also exploring anti-ship missiles, and the Marines may buy the same one. The difference is that it’s the Marines who work most closely with the Navy and who land in hostile territory to seize forward bases to support the fleet. That role makes Marines the first choice for the first wave, while the larger but slower Army provides backup.

Imperial Japanese Navy destroyer Hayate, destroyed by Marine Corps shore batteries off Wake Island in 1941.

It also means the Marines need a highly mobile system that can come ashore with the grunts and keep moving to evade retaliatory fire while staying connected to Navy fire control networks. That’s a much more demanding mission than static coastal defense, the role of most anti-ship missile batteries around the world from Norway to Japan.

While the Marines haven’t committed to buying anything yet, they have requested information papers from industry, due on Nov. 30th, exploring a wide range of options. It might be the Army’s ATACMs, the Norwegian Naval Strike Missile, or something else. Based on interviews with four Marine officials, however, it’s clear they’d prefer a missile that can be fired from their existing HIMARS launcher, the truck-based High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System. Why? Because even if the Marines buy the minimum of new equipment for this new mission, it’s going to be “incredibly expensive” and tactically challenging.

For a small service like the Marine Corps, anti-ship missiles are “incredibly expensive,” said Kevin McConnell, deputy director of fires and maneuver on the Marine’s Combat Development & Integration staff. “Even if you consider (doing) a coordinated procurement with the Navy, it still becomes something far larger….than anything we’ve ever undertaken for ground (forces).”

Army ATACMS missile launch.

A missile meant to find and a hit moving target, like a ship, is much more costly than one that just has to strike static GPS coordinates. Prices depend on variant and production run, but reported costs for the standard Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System (GMLRS) missile, used by both the Marines and Army, range from about $100,000 to $200,000 a shot. The larger Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), fired from the same HIMARS and MLRS launchers, costs roughly $750,000 to $820,000. In contrast, McConnell told me, “your bottom-basement going rate on a Harpoon missile or a Naval Strike Missile is somewhere around $1.5 million.”

But buying the missile is just the start. You need to integrate it with a launcher, a fire control network and a supply chain. Don’t forget training and wargames and staff planning.

“This type of mission is well beyond anything Marine artillery currently does, so, in some regards, in my opinion, finding the right piece of ordnance is the easy part,” said Pete Dowsett, the senior analyst for HIMARS in the Fires program at Marine Corps Systems Command. “The more complicated part is the logistics tail… the training…how do those fire missions come from a sensor that we’re not normally linked to…. It’s a pretty complex problem.”

Above all, the Marines told me, their new anti-ship mission must work with and for the Navy. That requires “integration into the naval cooperative engagement network,” McConnell said. “I can’t fathom trying to locate and shoot at ships without the Navy running that show.”

A notional future naval battle (CSBA graphic)

Serving the Navy

For decades, the Navy has helped Marines land and fight ashore — as far inland as Afghanistan. Now the Marine Corps wants to return the favor by helping clear the seas.

Oshkosh Expects Lower Defense Revenue As JLTV Buying Slows

Even 10 years ago, the Navy didn’t need the help. Now it does. Regional powers like Iran threaten coastal waters with shore-based missiles and short-ranged but high-speed patrol boats. Near-peers like Russia and China boost their ocean-going battle fleets with submarines, destroyers, and even aircraft carriers.

“For the past 70 years, the US Navy has had undisputed sea control when it wanted. That’s no longer the case,” said Art Corbett, who works in the concepts division of the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory. For the Marines, he said, “the last time we fought for sea control with the Navy was the Solomons campaign” in 1942.

US and Russian warships

The two services’ joint concept for Littoral Operations in a Contested Environment (LOCE, pronounced “Loki”) is reviving this concept of Marines supporting the fleet. “Any time Marines are going to be pointing missiles seaward, we’re going to be doing this, probably, at the direction of and in coordination with the Navy,” Corbett said. “This is… a naval, networked capability.”

Sharing targeting data with the fleet, Marine Corps anti-ship missiles would be in many ways an extension of the Navy’s Distributed Lethality concept. Distributed Lethality seeks to upgun every possible platform at sea — “if it floats, it fights” — including lightweight Littoral Combat Ships and even currently unarmed auxiliaries, to multiply both the Navy’s options and an enemy’s problems.

The Marines would provide additional “distributed” firepower from Expeditionary Advance Bases. Carved out of hostile territory by landing forces, kept small and camouflaged to avoid enemy fire, EABs would support F-35B jump jets, V-22 tiltrotors, and drones, as well as anti-ship missiles for the fleet. It’s a high-tech version of Henderson Field on Guadalcanal (part of the Solomons) in 1942. Like Henderson Field, the EABs would provide a permanent presence ashore, inside the contested zone, to support Navy ships as they move in and out to raid and withdraw. The forces ashore are the anvil; the fleet is the hammer.

Shore-based anti-ship missiles wouldn’t be as mobile as ones on ships. But they might be more survivable. Islands don’t sink, after all. Plus, especially in jungle, mountainous, or urban terrain, the land provides far more hiding spaces for a truck-sized HIMARS than the open sea provides for a 400-foot-long ship. Once you launch a rocket, however, the enemy can see your location on radar and infra-red, so the missile batteries must practice “shoot and scoot” tactics: move to a firing point, launch, and move again to a hiding place before enemy retaliation rains down.

Executing such operations in practice, however, requires specialized and costly technology.

Land-based missiles fired from Expeditionary Advance Bases (EABs) could form a virtual wall against Chinese aggression (CSBA graphic)

Technology & Its Limitations



The good news is that lots of friendly countries already have shore-based anti-ship missiles. The bad news is they may not fit with how the Marine Corps wants to operate: mobile, flexible, and aggressive.

The Marine Corps Request For Information asks for the state of the art because “we know many nations around the Pacific, many in Europe…have all had this kind of capability for decades,” McConnell said. “We would like to make sure it aligns with the Marine Corps concepts of being expeditionary, being able to move at will and being transportable by a variety of means. That was the subject of the RFI.”

“Several nations…. have created this standalone capability,” McConnell said (emphasis ours). “They command and control the missile, the radars, the sensors, in a unit that (only) does that kind of mission, that is permanently oriented on — to use an old term — coastal defense.”

“That kind of exquisite solution” — tailored for a single mission — is probably too expensive and too inflexible for the Marines, McConnell continued. Neither the Marines nor the Army can create a whole new type of unit for “a niche capability,” he said. Instead, the goal is to add anti-ship capability to existing rocket artillery without taking away any of its current capabilities to strike targets ashore.

There are two ways to do this, said Joe McPherson, deputy program manager for fires (i.e. artillery) at Marine Corps Systems Command: “One is modifying our existing missiles and the other would be trying to attempt to bring in missiles that already do this mission.”



The LCS Coronado test-fires a new anti-ship missile from Norway’s Kongsberg.

Preferably, any new missile would be able to fire from the existing Army and Marine Corps launchers, the wheeled HIMARS and tracked MLRS. “I wouldn’t at this point exclude something like Raytheon-Kongsberg Naval Strike Missile,” said McConnell. “There is a potential that it’s capable of being modified to fire from a HIMARS.”

The Kongsberg NSM is competing for the Navy’s Over-The Horizon (OTH) weapon, which will go on the Littoral Combat Ship and future frigates. The Marines are working closely with the Navy, McPherson told me, and the specifications they’ve set are sufficiently close to the Marine Corps’ needs that “whatever missile they pick” is worth considering for a joint buy, which would significantly reduce costs.

Another potential joint buy is with the Army. In the short term, the Army and the Pentagon’s Strategic Capabilities Office are upgrading the ATACMS, the biggest missile the HIMARS and MLRS can launch, with a range of roughly 187 miles. The long-term solution might be the Army’s Long-Range Precision Fires (LRPF) missile, supposed to be be half the size with 67 percent more range.

However, the Marine Corps RFI only asks for “ranges of 80 miles or greater,” which means they are at least considering lighter, cheaper missiles that a unit could carry more of, trading range for staying power. The Marines are also willing to consider a less sophisticated and therefore less expensive warhead: one good enough to destroy small craft, like missile boats, and damage larger vessels, but probably unable to penetrate the defenses of a full-size warship with sufficient precision to deliver a killing blow.


Bryan Clark

“That might be the capability we end up with,” McConnell told me. “That might be enough.” (Especially, I might add, if Army units fire longer-ranged ATACMS or LRPF missiles from further back).

Would an 80-mile missile be useful? Absolutely, said Bryan Clark, a retired Navy commander now with the Center for Strategic & Budgetary Assessments. “The 80 (nautical mile) minimum range could be relevant in scenarios in the Persian Gulf, Mediterranean, and possibly the South China Sea,” all relatively narrow waterways, he said. “That would be enough to threaten ships beyond realistic ranges for enemy helicopters and assault craft to attack the EAB (in retaliation).”

The downside is that even an 80-mile missile would need a relatively large launcher, like the HIMARS, and despite having “High Mobility” in its name, Clark is not sure the 12-ton truck is mobile enough for Expeditionary Advance Base operations. (The tracked MLRS is more mobile over rough terrain but weighs 22 tons). “I hope responses to the RFI will address mobility of the fires launcher,” he said.

“The main thing we’re looking for is really what’s in the realm of the possible, both near-term solutions and far-term,” McPherson said of the RFI. Once the data comes back in December, the Marine officials said, they’ll look at their options and start work on an official requirement.

The Key to Success in War with Russia and China Could Be Missiles

For the foreseeable future, the United States and China are locked in a security competition. 

Here's What You Need to Know: Land-based missile batteries can threaten ships dozens or even hundreds of miles away.

Is There A War Brewing In The South China Sea?

Tensions in the South China Sea have been percolating for years now. Even in relatively calm times when the battling claimants of the contested waters manage to stay out of the headlines, the reality out on the sea is rarely tranquil. In fact, a recent report from the South China Morning Post has revealed that Chinese boats have been harassing Civilian vessels in the Malaysian and Vietnamese portions of the South China Sea “on a daily basis” for years.

Extending from Singapore and the Strait of Malacca in the southwest to the Strait of Taiwan in the northeast, the South China Sea is a geopolitical hotspot as one of the most important trade routes in the world, not to mention the home of valuable oil and gas reserves as well as lucrative fishing grounds. The United States Energy Information Agency (EIA) estimates that the South China Sea “contains approximately 11 billion barrels of oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in proved and probable reserves.”

Huge, overlapping sections of the Sea are currently subject to claims by Brunei, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam. China has staked the largest claims to the South China Sea (at more than 85% of the total area) and has been the most aggressive in defending these claims, with a huge show of military might and navy vessels patrolling the waters. Last year, during another flare-up of tensions, the Asia Times reported that China’s most recent rash of aggressions was a bid to shut down Vietnamese resource development projects “as Beijing aims to force all foreign oil companies out of the South China Sea, leaving itself as the only potential joint development partner for rival sea claimants.”

Vietnam is far from Beijing’s only victim, however. Indonesian drilling has also been targeted in the so-called “Tuna Block” in the Natuna Sea, in the same waters where these two nations have clashed in the past over fishing rights. And now, according to the recent reports from the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, Malaysia has been bearing the brunt of Chinese bullying on a daily basis for the past two years. The Malaysian state-owned oil company Petronas has been developing several oil and gas fields in the Luconia Shoals, where Chinese vessels have been reportedly driving dangerously and erratically with the intention of dissuading civilians to take contracts in the area.

“Beijing’s competing claimants to territory in the South China Sea have long accused it of using a paramilitary maritime militia, consisting of hundreds of civilian fishing boats, to help enforce its claims,” The South China Morning Post reported this week. The Chinese government claims that these swaths of civilian fishing boats are not dispatched by the military, but that they join of their own accord, although many other governing bodies (including the United States) believe that the vessels are directly under the command of the People’s Liberation Army Navy.

An all-out oil war in the South China Sea would be extremely costly for China, and ultimately may not be in the country’s best interest. Invading another nation is costly, and in this region, the battle could easily turn into another kind of ‘forever war.” And then there’s the fact that China risks destruction in the very waters that it wants to claim, imperiling valuable infrastructure. There are a lot of reasons why China should not and likely will not push its competing claimants hard enough to start a war, and many more reasons that much lesser military powers like Malaysia and Indonesia should just grin and bear the abuse, but Beijing’s behavior over the past few years has shown that China is more than willing to test those boundaries.

Pentagon rattled by Chinese military push on multiple fronts

China’s growing military muscle and its drive to end America predominance in the Asia-Pacific is rattling the U.S. defense establishment. American officials see trouble quickly accumulating on multiple fronts — Beijing’s expanding nuclear arsenal, its advances in space, cyber and missile technologies, and threats to Taiwan.

“The pace at which China is moving is stunning,” says Gen. John Hyten, the No. 2-ranking U.S. military officer, who previously commanded U.S. nuclear forces and oversaw Air Force space operations.

At stake is a potential shift in the global balance of power that has favored the United States for decades. A realignment more favorable to China does not pose a direct threat to the United States but could complicate U.S. alliances in Asia. New signs of how the Pentagon intends to deal with the China challenge may emerge in coming weeks from Biden administration policy reviews on nuclear weapons, global troop basing and overall defense strategy.

For now, officials marvel at how Beijing is marshaling the resources, technology and political will to make rapid gains — so rapid that the Biden administration is attempting to reorient all aspects of U.S. foreign and defense policy.

The latest example of surprising speed was China’s test of a hypersonic weapon capable of partially orbiting Earth before reentering the atmosphere and gliding on a maneuverable path to its target. The weapon system’s design is meant to evade U.S. missile defenses, and although Beijing insisted it was testing a reusable space vehicle, not a missile, the test appeared to have startled U.S. officials.

What war with China could look like

Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the test was “very close” to being a Sputnik moment, akin to the 1957 launching by the Soviet Union of the world’s first space satellite, which caught the world by surprise and fed fears the United States had fallen behind technologically. What followed was a nuclear arms and space race that ultimately bankrupted the Soviet Union.

Milley and other U.S. officials have declined to discuss details of the Chinese test, saying they are secret. He called it “very concerning” for the United States but added that problems posed by China’s military modernization run far deeper.

“That’s just one weapon system,” he said in a Bloomberg Television interview. “The Chinese military capabilities are much greater than that. They’re expanding rapidly in space, in cyber and then in the traditional domains of land, sea and air.”

On the nuclear front, private satellite imagery in recent months has revealed large additions of launch silos that suggest the possibility that China plans to increase its fleet of land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, or ICBMs.

Hans Kristensen, a nuclear weapons expert at the Federation of American Scientists, says China appears to have about 250 ICBM silos under construction, which he says is more than 10 times the number in operation today. The U.S. military, by comparison, has 400 active ICBM silos and 50 in reserve.

Pentagon officials and defense hawks on Capitol Hill point to China’s modernization as a key justification for rebuilding the U.S. nuclear arsenal, a project expected to cost more than $1 billion over 30 years, including sustainment costs.

Fiona Cunningham, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania and a specialist in Chinese military strategy, says a key driver of Beijing’s nuclear push is its concerns about U.S. intentions.

“I don’t think China’s nuclear modernization is giving it a capability to pre-emptively strike the U.S. nuclear arsenal, and that was a really important generator of competition during the Cold War,” Cunningham said in an online forum sponsored by Georgetown University. “But what it does do is to limit the effectiveness of U.S. attempts to pre-emptively strike the Chinese arsenal.”

Some analysts fear Washington will worry its way into an arms race with Beijing, frustrated at being unable to draw the Chinese into security talks. Congress also is increasingly focused on China and supports a spending boost for space and cyber operations and hypersonic technologies. There is a push, for example, to put money in the next defense budget to arm guided-missile submarines with hypersonic weapons, a plan initiated by the Trump administration.

For decades, the United States tracked China’s increased defense investment and worried that Beijing was aiming to become a global power. But for at least the last 20 years, Washington was focused more on countering al-Qaida and other terrorist threats in Iraq and Afghanistan. That began to change during the Trump administration, which in 2018 formally elevated China to the top of the list of defense priorities, along with Russia, replacing terrorism as the No. 1 threat.

Combined Russian and Chinese military power will approach, but not exceed US: report

For now, Russia remains a bigger strategic threat to the United States because its nuclear arsenal far outnumbers China’s. But Milley and others say Beijing is a bigger long-term worry because its economic strength far exceeds that of Russia, and it is rapidly pouring resources into military modernization.

At the current pace of China’s military investment and achievement, Beijing “will surpass Russia and the United States” in overall military power in coming years “if we don’t do something to change it,” said Hyten, who is retiring in November after two years as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “It will happen.”

The Biden administration says it is determined to compete effectively with China, banking on a network of allies in Asia and beyond that are a potential source of strength that Beijing cannot match. That was central to the reasoning behind a Biden decision to share highly sensitive nuclear propulsion technologies with Australia, enabling it to acquire a fleet of conventionally armed submarines to counter China. Although this was a boost for Australia, it was a devastating blow to Washington’s oldest ally, France, which saw its $66 billion submarine sale to Australia scuttled in the process.

Taiwan is another big worry. Senior U.S. military officers have been warning this year that China is probably accelerating its timetable for capturing control of Taiwan, the island democracy widely seen as the most likely trigger for a potentially catastrophic U.S.-China war.

The United States has long pledged to help Taiwan defend itself, but it has deliberately left unclear how far it would go in response to a Chinese attack. President Joe Biden appeared to abandon that ambiguity when he said Oct. 21 that America would come to Taiwan’s defense if it were attacked by China.

DARPA is going to keep working on its Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC) missile, even though the program for which it’s meant to be a technology pathfinder is already in source selection. A HAWC demonstrator flew successfully this month.

The new program is known as MoHAWC, but DARPA was not able to immediately explain the new acronym. An agency spokesperson referred to a line item in the fiscal 2023 budget request for continued Air Force/DARPA funding of $60 million for MoHAWC. The next phase of the program would “develop, integrate, and demonstrate technologies to increase effectiveness and producibility of an air-launched hypersonic cruise missile,” according to the budget request. HAWC is a joint effort of the Air Force and DARPA.

“These technologies include advancing hydrocarbon scramjet-powered propulsion operation, shrinking navigation components, upgrading aircraft integration algorithms, and improving manufacturing approaches,” according to the request. Continued flight tests would “expand the operational envelope.” DARPA would continue to collaborate with the Navy and Air Force on “efforts to meet future technology insertion dates for service programs of record.”

However, a Pentagon official said MoHAWC is “probably … moot” because the Air Force intends to make a choice between Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Raytheon for the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile before the end of the fiscal year in September, and HAWC was intended to be a technology pathfinder for HACM.

“The main aspects of that [missile] are pretty much already locked down,” the official said. “It’s in source selection … so they’re not going to be changing anything at this stage.”

A former defense official noted that DARPA has continued working on its Tactical Boost Glide (TBG) program long after the Air Force decided to pursue the similar AGM-183A Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon (ARRW). DARPA is asking for $30 million to keep working on TBG and do a test shot in fiscal 2023.

“There could be some value in continuing to work on these projects after the programs they were meant to feed get going,” he said, “in the sense of, it gives you some diversity of approaches.” However, he acknowledged that the HAWC contractors—Lockheed Martin and Raytheon—are two of the three competitors for HACM, so little diversity would be achieved.

DARPA announced the “successful test flight” July 18. The vehicle that flew was one of two types of HAWC demonstrators DARPA is working on: the version made by Raytheon Technologies and Northrop Grumman, which built the vehicle and the scramjet engine, respectively. It was the second successful test flight for the Raytheon/Northrop vehicle, which first flew in September 2021. The other version, made by Lockheed Martin (vehicle) and Aerojet Rocketdyne (engine) made a successful test flight in mid-March.

The July test of the Raytheon version of HAWC “leveraged data collected during the 2021 flight,” DARPA said.

“After release from the aircraft, the first stage boosted the vehicle to the expected scramjet ignition envelope,” according to the agency. “From there, the missile’s Northrop Grumman scramjet engine fired up and propelled the cruiser to speeds greater than Mach 5 … for more than 300 nautical miles and reaching altitudes of greater than 60,000 feet.”

A DARPA spokesperson was not able to say how much of that 300 seconds was under power of the scramjet or how much was under power of the booster, which accelerates the vehicle to hypersonic speeds, considered to be Mach 5 or greater. As a rule of thumb, travel at Mach 5 equates to one mile per second, so the missile could have flown up to 300 seconds under scramjet power.

“The most recent test allowed exploration of more of the flight and scramjet engine operating envelopes,” DARPA’s HAWC program manager Andrew Knoedler said in a press release.

“DARPA demonstrations are always about learning, whether it’s in the interest of feasibility or practicality, and this time we certainly got new information that will further improve performance.” He added that the Navy and Air Force “will have access to the data we’ve collected, as they make development decisions for future high-speed weapons.”

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall has voiced dissatisfaction with the progress of ARRW, which recently made a successful test flight, and he has said hypersonics, while important, should not be USAF’s top priority. He has said that while hypersonics are key to China’s strategy of denial of operations, the Air Force should not attempt to “mirror” that strategy and instead should concentrate on developing penetrating systems that can deter China.

“We have a commitment to do that,” Biden said. The White House later said he was not changing U.S. policy, which does not support Taiwanese independence but is committed to providing defensive arms.