Odds of US conflict with China ‘are very high’
WASHINGTON: A top Republican in the US Congress on Sunday said the odds of conflict with China over Taiwan “are very high”, after a general caused consternation with a memo that warned that the United States would fight China in the next two years.
In a memo dated Feb 1 but released on Friday, Gen Mike Minihan, who heads the Air Mobility Command, wrote to the leadership of its roughly 110,000 members, saying: “My gut tells me we will fight in 2025.”
“I hope he is wrong . ... I think he is right though,” Mike McCaul, the new chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told Fox News Sunday.
His views do not represent the Pentagon but show concern at the highest levels of the US military over a possible attempt by China to exert control over Taiwan.
The US and Taiwan will hold polls next year, potentially creating an opportunity for China to take military action, Gen Minihan wrote.
Mr McCaul said that if China failed to take control of Taiwan bloodlessly then “they are going to look at a military invasion in my judgment. We have to be prepared for this”.
He accused President Joe Biden, a Democrat, of projecting weakness after the bungled pullout from Afghanistan that could make war with China more likely.
“The odds are very high that we could see a conflict with China and Taiwan and the Indo Pacific,” he said.
Rep Adam Smith, top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, said he disagreed with Gen Minihan’s assessment.
Mr Smith told Fox News Sunday that war with China is “not only not inevitable, it is highly unlikely. We have a very dangerous situation in China. But I think generals need to be very cautious about saying we’re going to war, it’s inevitable”.
He said the US needs to be in a position to deter China from military action against Taiwan, “but I’m fully confident we can avoid that conflict if we take the right approach”.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin earlier this month said he seriously doubted that ramped-up Chinese military activities near the Taiwan Strait were a sign of an imminent invasion of the island by Beijing.
A Pentagon official on Saturday said the general’s comments were “not representative of the department’s view on China”.