[Road_Warrior]

Originally Posted by My poor XF

As far as im concerned the balance of power locally has already swung to the Chinese. They aren't that far from having a force projection capability to match the US (carrier battle groups).

Yet they haven't built one carrier. Politically, they have been throwing a lot of money around in places like Africa, the Solomon Islands and Indonesia, but they still lack a true blue water navy that would allow them to project force and won't for a few years yet. And then of course you have to consider the impact of having strong US forces in the region - USAF strategic bomber squadrons stationed on Guam, a permanently deployed carrier battle group in Japan, F22 fighter wings stationed in Alaska and Japan, as well as the rise of India as well adding to the mix (don't forget these guys have a carrier and nukes as well), and all of a sudden China's sure bet for regional dominance doesn't look that crash hot - for now at least.

Current projections state that the PLA-N wants to have "multiple carriers" by 2020. I believe they will have at least one on the water by then. However, having a carrier and operating it effectively for offensive operations are two different things. The USN are the masters of carrier aviation, because they have had nearly 90 years and several major wars as experience to get it right, something that China simply doesn't have.

Originally Posted by Jim Goose

Lets look at it this way.... how many countries has China invaded in the past 200yrs?

How many countries have England invaded in the same time?

The USA?

This "scare mongering" is just one of those things which journos do.... 30yrs ago it was the USSR our "enemy".... then more recently Indonesia, then boat people, now its China!

That's probably a good way of looking at it too.