China’s ability to project its naval power in the Indian Ocean as well as the continued buildup of its nuclear arsenal is of great concern to the United States, two top U.S. military officials said during recent congressional hearings.
The Beijing regime’s naval capability now includes a facility at its modernized base in Djibouti on the Horn of Africa that’s capable of supporting the country’s growing aircraft carrier force, according to Gen. Stephen Townsend, head of the U.S. Africa Command.
The presence of so many different military bases is due to Djibouti’s strategic location—it sits next to the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait, which separates the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea; the latter is the gateway to the Suez Canal. About 12 percent of world trade passes through the Suez Canal every day.
Currently, China has two aircraft carriers—the Liaoning and the newer Shandong—and is building a third one. In January, China’s state-run media reported that the construction of the third carrier is expected to be completed before the end of the year.
Chinese military officials have publicly denied that its Djibouti base was intended for “military expansion” and claimed that the base was needed to support anti-piracy and humanitarian relief missions.
The Chinese regime has other ambitions in Africa. Townsend told the committee that China “very much ha[s] the intent to establish additional overseas bases in Africa, whether that be on the Atlantic coast of Africa or the Indian Ocean coast of Africa.”
“China is of great concern. They are literally everywhere on the continent. They are placing a lot of bets down. They are spending a lot of money,” Townsend said.
As for how fast China is developing its nuclear capabilities, Richard told the committee: “I can’t get through a week right now without finding out something we didn’t know about China.”
Richard pointed to China’s advancement in developing fast breeder reactors (a type of nuclear reactor) as an example of “how rapidly China is changing, or at least how rapidly we’re figuring it out.”
“With a fast breeder reactor, you now have a very large source of weapons-grade plutonium available to you. That will change the upper bounds of what China could choose to do, if they wanted, in terms of further expansion of their nuclear capabilities,” Richard said.