U.S. airpower is our main deterrence against China, according to Stephen Bryen, Senior Fellow, Center for Security Policy.
“So if we commit airpower, then we have a real good chance to stabilize any unfolding situation in that region. If we don’t commit airpower, then it becomes very much more difficult,” he added.
Step Up Support to Taiwan
In order to effectively push back China, the expert said that the United States should “build up our presence in the region, [and] restore some of our capabilities in Okinawa, in Japan.”Bryen further called for enhancing support to Taiwan, especially Taiwan’s Air Force, which he said “is a critical part of this equation.”
He urged the United States to provide better training for Taiwan, “Taiwanese could benefit a great deal from the U.S. help.”
Strategic Responsibilities
The expert said that the United States should be “careful about our strategic responsibilities.”In his opinion, Ukraine is not a strategic issue for the United States, but China is.
He shared the viewpoint offered by a Wall Street Journal report that the U.S. weapons industry is unprepared for a China conflict partly due to its extensive military spending on the Ukraine war.
“The consumption of shells and ammunition [there] is tremendous,” he noted as they routinely just fired them off in very large numbers.
“We can’t support that. We don’t have an industrial base and a defense industrial base that’s geared up to surge and produce supplies,” Bryen said, echoing the CSIS report.
He pointed to the growing aggression of China towards Taiwan, Japan, and Korea and said that America should focus on the East Asia region.
“The threat to Taiwan is real and something we have to really deal with. I would hope that we reorient our foreign policy and our outlook in our domestic policies, and [in] particular, [our] defense policy to recognize that and to implement programs that really make a difference in terms of our security,” he said.
“[We should take] a tough line with China so that we don’t get ourselves in trouble, then get the world in trouble,” Bryen said.