Panel: US can’t win wars with China, Russia
WASHINGTON: The US is facing a “national security and military crisis” and “could lose in a war against China or Russia”, a bipartisan congressional panel warned in a report on Wednesday.
Congress had tasked the National Defense Strategy Commission to look at US President Donald Trump’s sweeping National Defense Strategy (NDS), which highlights a new era of “Great Power competition” with Moscow and Beijing.
The panel, run by a dozen former top Democratic and Republican officials, found that just as the US military faced budget cuts and diminishing military advantages, authoritarian nations like China and Russia are pursuing build-ups aimed “at neutralising US strengths”.
“America’s military superiority - the hard-power backbone of its global influence and national security - has eroded to a dangerous degree,” the commission said.
In their report, the panel found America’s focus on counter-insurgency operations this century resulted in it slipping in other areas such as missile defence, cyber and space operations, and anti-surface and antisubmarine warfare.
“Many of the skills necessary to plan for and conduct military operations against capable adversaries - especially China and Russia - have atrophied,” the report says.
It lambasts “political dysfunc- tion and decisions made by both major political parties”, especially budget control measures implemented in 2011.
The commission found, “The US might struggle to win, or perhaps lose, a war against China or Russia. The US is particularly at risk of being overwhelmed should its military be forced to fight on two or more fronts simultaneously.”
PENCE: DON’T WANT TO CONTROL INDO-PACIFIC
The US has an enduring commitment to the Indo-pacific region but wants cooperation, not control, US vice-president Mike Pence said on Thursday during a Southeast Asian summit that carried a swipe at China’s growing influence.
At the summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Singapore, Pence told his fellow leaders that “empire and aggression have no place” in the region.
He said, “We seek an Indo-pacific in which all nations can prosper and thrive.”