By Sigrid Weidenweber
On Monday, March 4, 2019, I found an article in the Wall Street Journal that took me profoundly aback. In this excellent opinion piece, Mark Halperin laid out and connected facts that have troubled me for a long time. Beginning, he states that Washington is focusing too much attention on North Korea. Moreover, he believes that the government is dealing with the Koreans one way, and another way with China but that both are a joined entity. Instead of being distracted by chimeras, attention should be payed to our diminishing military Power.
Halperin boldly states that, “the U.S. is ceding the Pacific to China.” I considered that a very probable possibility since I first heard of the Chinese Island building activity, turning atolls into military stations. I also had reports that China is keeping during most times, six atomic U-Boats in the Taiwan Straits, ever ready for an attack on the island nation. Furthermore, China is establishing ports for its merchant and military ships in many parts of Asia and Africa.
Halperin states that China, as a dictatorship, is planning for the future in “which the chief objective is a favorable correlation of forces over time and the most important measure is capacity.”
China can spend enormous amounts on is military, even when its home economy suffers and contracts during economic downturns, while America is divided into patriots, and those who would gladly throw the country open to invasion of any kind. For that reason, our military might has been decimated. The Navy for example is only half the size it was under President Reagan.
The U. S. has virtually no power to contain either China’s weaponizing nor North Korea’s atomic militarizing, except to alter the balance of military forces in the Western Pacific, and thereby confront the inexorable expansion of China’s arsenals.
Military evaluation has shown that if it came to a military, and or nuclear, confrontation, China has the capability to, in one knock-out blow, destroy our military bases in South Korea, Japan and Guam, inciting long drawn out warfare, which the U.S. with its present arsenal cannot do successfully.
In a broad-based scenario, Mr. Halperin sketches how the Chinese military could use its new bases and harbors situated in nations all over the world that owe massive amounts of money to China. He believably convinces us that a ruthless Mr. Xi Jinping could have America involved in a global confrontation.
I strongly recommend that you read the article in the Wall Street Journal yourself, and I hope that someone at the Pentagon would also read it and lecture our Congress on the ramifications of a weak military.
In closing, I would like to remark on emerging details, exposing Chinese hackers targeting more than two dozen universities in the U.S. and around the globe, in an elaborate plan to steal maritime and military research and technology.
U.S. cyber security experts and former U.S. officials confirm the attacks. In a Wall Street Journal report, Dustin Volz mentions the University of Hawaii, the University of Washington and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the U.S. among more than 27 universities in the U. S., Canada, and Southeast Asia that have been victimized according to iDefense, a cyber security intelligence unit of Accenture Security. More than ever, China attempts and succeeds in stealing U. S. military and economic secrets. iDefense identified targeted universities, observing that their networks were pinging servers in China, controlled by a Chinese hacking group. This research was verified by the U.S. cyber security firm Fire Eye. Furthermore, a Massachusetts oceanographic institute was likely to be compromised because of faculty with extensive knowledge in relevant fields. It has been established that the hacking group Temp. Periscope is linked to Beijing, for Beijing has, of course, a heightened interest in submarine missile plans and ship maintenance.
When questioned, the Navy avers that it recognizes the seriousness of cyber threats but does not comment.
In summation: America is facing an enormously dangerous enemy on the outside while being simultaneously attacked and weakened from the inside.
Sigrid Weidenweber grew up in communist East Berlin, escaping it using a French passport. Ms. Weidenweber holds a degree in medical technology as well as psychology and has course work in Anthropology. She is co-founder of Aid for Afghans. Weidenweber has traveled the world and lived with Pakistani Muslims, learning about the culture and religion. She is a published author and lecturer. You can find her books on Amazon.com
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