China’s Air Force Could ‘Control the Skies,’ Senators Warn

The U.S. must act quickly to win the fight for aerial superiority, Republicans have warned, as China increases its military capabilities.
“China is on the cusp of world-changing air capabilities,” Roger Wicker and Eric Schmitt wrote in a Sunday column for The Wall Street Journal. “If conflict erupts, China may be able to bracket off the Western Pacific, striking our bases with salvos of missiles and using state-of-the-art air-defense batteries to keep our aircraft at bay.”
The two Republican senators, who represent Mississippi and Missouri respectively, said that the U.S. Air Force has taken its “air superiority for granted” since the Second World War, and that continuing to do so risks falling prey to Beijing’s rapidly developing arsenal.
“This year Mr. Xi [Jinping] announced a 7.2 percent increase in defense spending,” the pair wrote. “He has likely doubled production rates for several tactical fighter programs, such as fourth- and fifth-generation J-16 and J-20 warplanes and has built one of the most sophisticated and continually improving air-defense systems.”
However, they said that America may still be able to retain its dominance in the air.
“China’s new capabilities are formidable, but there is no reason for America to cede the skies,” Wicker and Schmitt said. “For the future to echo our past air superiority, we should execute a full-scale rebuilding of the shrinking U.S. Air Force.”
To do so, they said, would mean investing more heavily in the Next Generation Air Dominance initiative (NGAD), a family of state-of-the-art air systems comprised primarily of manned aircraft.
However, they said that these “vital programs” have been stalled by U.S. military leadership, amid concerns over the cost and necessity of the project.
“We’re taking a pause there,” U.S. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said at a conference in July, adding that officials would take a few months to “figure out whether we’ve got the right design and make sure we’re on the right course.”
However, Wicker and Schmitt said that Beijing’s growing “ambition to take Taiwan” gives the project increased salience.
On Monday, China launched a series of large-scale military exercises around the Island, in what Beijing called a “stern warning” against growing calls for the country’s independence.
Last week, Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te gave a speech in which he said that China had no right to “represent Taiwan,” and called upon the country to resist any efforts at “annexation” by the PRC.
The U.S. has already responded to China’s military drills in the Taiwan Strait, which have encircled the country with warships and fighter jets.
“The United States is seriously concerned by the People’s Liberation Army joint military drills in the Taiwan Strait and around Taiwan,” State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Sunday. “The PRC response with military provocations to a routine annual speech is unwarranted and risks escalation.”
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