Power in the Pacific: Stronger Chinese Navy Worries Neighbors and US
China and the US seem to be on a collision course in the Pacific. Beijing is significantly bolstering its navy, and Washington is shifting its military focus to the Asia-Pacific Region. Many fear it could alter the balance of power in a region rich in oil and crucial for global trade.
The best view of China’s new flagship, which inspires fear in its enemies, could recently be had from a window on the fourth floor of an IKEA store in Dalian, a port city in northeastern China. Here, someone had scratched out a viewing hole in the opaque film masking the window, providing a view of the pier across the way — and of the Varyag.
This ship, whose keel was originally built by the Soviets, is now being put into service by the China’s People’s Liberation Army Navy. Shipyard employees spent years working on the colossal ship, drilling and welding. Then the Varyag disappeared a total of 10 times for sea trials, leaving geostrategists and naval experts from Tokyo to Washington endlessly speculating about where the ship might be at any given moment and with what kinds of weapons and airplanes China would decide to outfit it.
Since late August, the ship has once again been docked in Dalian. On the morning of September 2, observers noticed a team of painters at work and, by the afternoon of the next day, the result of their work could be seen: an enormous number “16” emblazoned on the gray hull of the ship. This, it seems, will be the identification number of the first aircraft carrier put into service by China’s naval forces, a number said to have been chosen in honor of Admiral Liu Huaqing, father of the modern Chinese navy, who was born in 1916.
One day later, on Tuesday of last week, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton paid a visit to Beijing. This was the third stop on Clinton’s trip, which began in the Cook Islands, in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean, and would then take her to Indonesia, China, East Timor and Brunei along the way to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Vladivostok, Russia. Clinton represents a government that is paying particular attention to the actions of the Chinese navy. One of the main reasons for Clinton’s trip was to remind the US’ allies in the region that America is the hegemonic force in the West Pacific — and intends to remain so.