China Watching

Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Michele Fluornoy is in Beijing this week holding talks with her Chinese counterparts. Those discussions "have been going in a very positive direction," Navy Captain John Kirby, deputy assistant secretary of defense for media operations, said at a Pentagon briefing this afternoon.

"This is a country that we have been trying very hard to develop a good, constructive military relationship with," Kirby said, adding: "We're taking steps in the right direction, and it is moving in the right direction."

Inside the Pentagon reports this morning about a new high-level document in which Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey warns that the U.S. armed services must achieve unprecedented synergy to ensure access to contested waters, skies, land, space and networks in the face of emerging weapons.

Dempsey's admonition comes in the Defense Department's new Joint Operational Access Concept, which names no adversary but focuses on "anti-access" and "area-denial" threats -- terms that DOD associates closely with China. The threats include advanced long-range weapons designed to keep forces away and short-range arms designed to limit freedom of action. ITP further reports:

Inside the Pentagon obtained an unsigned copy of version 1.0 of the 75-page concept document, dated Nov. 22, which was recently blessed by senior military leaders and is due to be signed by Dempsey.

The concept casts the access problem as global, underscoring the growing importance of the Pentagon's AirSea Battle initiative, which aims to counter anti-access and area-denial threats. The proliferation of these weapons, changes in the U.S. overseas defense posture and the emergence of space and cyberspace as contested domains will drive "future enemies, both states and nonstates," to favor using anti-access and area-denial strategies against the United States, the document states.

Inside the Army reported last month that the service has turned to its red-teaming experts at Training and Doctrine Command to kick off what could turn into an existential debate about the Army's role in dealing with China and its reported arsenal of capabilities for keeping U.S. influence in the region at bay, according to officials. ITA further reports:

The request to study the issue comes as the Obama administration is putting in place a wholesale reorientation of its defense posture toward China and its environs following the planned drawdown of forces from Iraq and Afghanistan. Depending on who is asked in defense circles, the reason for the new focus is a either an intricate line of arguments concerning so-called "anti-access, area-denial" capabilities and the need to operate freely in the "global commons," or it's fears about Chinese military prowess that could curtail U.S. ambitions.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said in October that the future of U.S. national security in this century will be determined largely in the Asia-Pacific region, where the American military must maintain its presence despite China's development of new weapons that threaten U.S. power projection capabilities. As InsideDefense.com reported:

In what was billed by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars as Panetta's first policy speech since taking office in July, the defense secretary called for a greater focus on the region to remain competitive with a rising China, echoing a key theme from his recent classified planning guidance.

"And then we must contend with rising powers, and rapidly modernizing militaries, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region -- where the security and economic future of our nation will largely rest in the 21st century," Panetta said. "The rise of China will continue to shape the international system, and we will have to stay competitive and reassure our allies in the region. That means continuing to project our power and maintaining forward-deployed forces in the Asia-Pacific region."

Left unsaid by Panetta but stated in the prepared version of his speech was a reference to long-range weapons that could challenge U.S. power-projection capabilities in the Western Pacific: "Yet our traditional approach to power projection, in that region and elsewhere, is being threatened by the spread of new military capabilities that would deny military forces freedom of action."

Inside the Pentagon reported Sept. 29 that the Defense Department would likely boost investment in Air Force and Navy capabilities associated with countering China in accordance with the classified Defense Planning Guidance that Panetta signed in late August. DOD's latest annual report to Congress on the Chinese military warns that China is "pursuing a variety of air, sea, undersea, space counterspace, information warfare systems and operational concepts" to achieve anti-access and area-denial capabilities. The Air Force and Navy are developing an AirSea Battle concept to address that challenge. The Navy also recently launched a review to identify warfighting investments that could counter Chinese military methods for disrupting key battlefield information systems.