{"id":5467,"date":"2013-04-15T13:18:47","date_gmt":"2013-04-15T04:18:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=5467"},"modified":"2013-04-18T15:14:57","modified_gmt":"2013-04-18T06:14:57","slug":"australia-and-airsea-battle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/australia-and-airsea-battle\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia and AirSea Battle"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Photo<\/a>Today, ASPI released my report \u2018Planning the unthinkable war: \u2018AirSea Battle\u2019 and its implications for Australia\u2019<\/a>\u00a0[view our interview with Ben Schreer on his paper here<\/a>]. When China’s military modernisation hit its stride over the last decade, America\u2019s Asian allies and partners began to wonder how the US plans to respond to the PLA\u2019s growing \u2018anti-access\/ area-denial\u2019 (A2\/AD) capabilities<\/a>. The Pentagon\u2019s ‘AirSea Battle’ concept aims at providing a credible US warfighting doctrine as a major part of the military component of Washington\u2019s \u2018pivot\u2019 to Asia.<\/p>\n

Allies and partners are expected to play a major role in implementing the concept. Indeed, Australia is to play a central role<\/a> according to a leading US think tank. The \u2018China dimension\u2019 thus makes it imperative for us to think through the implications of AirSea Battle (ASB). It\u2019s too easy to dismiss the concept as yet another technological \u2018fancy\u2019 of Pentagon planners to finance expensive weapons platforms. Indeed, my study shows that it’s likely that the US will incrementally move towards implementation. Further, while the Australian debate has either fully embraced<\/a> or dismissed<\/a> AirSea Battle, a middle position which identifies both strengths and weaknesses is more fruitful.<\/p>\n

The ASB initiative should be welcomed as an attempt by the US to strengthen its conventional deterrence, thus balancing China’s increasing hard power by signalling both the intention and the capability to operate in maritime zones increasingly contested by the PLA. Some analysts have argued<\/a> that AirSea Battle is only a military-technological concept which enables a new degree of joint operations between US air and naval forces in an A2\/AD environment. But while the concept has certainly a technological dimension to it, it’s the political message that matters most. Any Chinese leader would need to calculate the possibility and nature of a US reaction in response to a major military action designed to change the status quo in the Western Pacific.<\/p>\n

This deterrence dynamic is particularly important in East Asia, where Taiwan and Japan in particular are deeply concerned about China\u2019s increased military pressure. Not surprisingly, these two countries are the most welcoming when it comes to AirSea Battle, given that they are \u2018front line\u2019 states in the emerging US-Sino strategic competition.<\/p>\n

The concept plays to the strength of the US military when it comes to high-intensity warfare. Indeed, the US Navy and Air Force are already working on effective counter-measures<\/a> against much-hyped PLA capability developments such as its \u2018carrier killer\u2019 DF-21 anti-ship ballistic missile<\/a>. ASB could thus make a critical contribution to regional stability by promoting deterrence in Sino-US strategic affairs.<\/p>\n

However, the concept is optimised for deterring a high\u2010intensity conventional war between China and the US and its allies\u2014extreme cases such as PLA attacks on Taiwan, Japan or forward deployed US forces. Because it’s a ‘big stick’, it will probably be far less effective against small scale Chinese aggression, like coercive military actions in maritime territorial disputes where the stakes are small enough to (probably) avoid high levels of escalation. \u00a0The US is still in search of a credible deterrence strategy<\/a> for such cases, especially in the South China Sea. That’s why Southeast Asian allies and partners are much more ambivalent when it comes to ASB, and the US would be ill advised to take their participation for granted.<\/p>\n

Moreover, it isn\u2019t clear how AirSea Battle fits within a broader US grand strategic framework to deal with China\u2019s military rise. Many analysts, including ASPI\u2019s Peter Jennings<\/a>, have called for the development of a grand strategic framework to guide American Asia\u2010Pacific defence strategy. Left unaddressed, ASB will continue to suffer from an image problem, and be seen as being designed to militarily ‘contain’ China. The US thus needs to do more to explain the concept\u2019s rationale to its allies. And it needs to explain it to China as well\u2014the emergence of a military strategy designed to counter China’s growing strength hasn’t gone unnoticed in Beijing. So to minimise the risk of major power war, ASB should also feature in the upcoming Sino-US high-level military talks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is important because ASB carries the risk of Sino-US nuclear escalation. A central element of the concept is the deep penetration of Chinese territory to destroy and disrupt PLA command and control nodes used for conventional operations. But that ignores the nuclear calculus\u2014Beijing might perceive such attacks as American attempts to disarm China\u2019s nuclear deterrent and could thus be tempted to nuclear pre\u2010emption.<\/p>\n

We need to be an active participant in the future evolution of ASB. When Australian officials sit down to talk with their American counterparts,\u00a0 they should also raise alternatives to ASB such as \u2018offshore control\u2019<\/a> which refrains from direct strikes against the Chinese mainland while still retaining the capability to deny China freedom of military action in its maritime approaches. ASB has its place in a suite of operational concepts, but relying on it as a ‘one size fits all’ strategy is unwise.<\/p>\n

Benjamin Schreer is a senior analyst at ASPI.\u00a0Image courtesy of US Navy.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today, ASPI released my report \u2018Planning the unthinkable war: \u2018AirSea Battle\u2019 and its implications for Australia\u2019\u00a0[view our interview with Ben Schreer on his paper here]. When China’s military modernisation hit its stride over the last …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":5469,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAustralia and AirSea Battle | The Strategist<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/australia-and-airsea-battle\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Australia and AirSea Battle | The Strategist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Today, ASPI released my report \u2018Planning the unthinkable war: \u2018AirSea Battle\u2019 and its implications for Australia\u2019\u00a0[view our interview with Ben Schreer on his paper here]. 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