The US Navy has deployed a small armada to the disputed islands in the South China Sea, according to The Navy Times.
America’s USS John C. Stennis aircraft carrier, destroyers Chung-Hoon and Stockdale, cruisers Antietam and Mobile Bay, and Japan’s Blue Ridge were deployed after China installed HQ-9 surface-to-air missiles on Woody Island, one of the most central swathes of land in the disputed waters.
“China is clearly militarizing the South China Sea, and you’d have to believe in the flat Earth to think otherwise,” US PACOM Commander Harry Harris recently warned.
“Our ships and aircraft operate routinely throughout the Western Pacific — including the South China Sea — and have for decades,” US Navy Cmdr. Clay Doss said in a statement.
“In 2015 alone, Pacific Fleet ships sailed about 700 combined days in the South China Sea.”
But carrier strike group’s presence in the disputed waters speaks for itself.
“Clearly the Navy is demonstrating its full commitment to freedom of navigation in the region,” said Jerry Hendrix, a retired Navy captain.
Additionally, US Secretary of Defence Ash Carter said that the US is willing to spend $425 million on joint military exercises with nations in the Pacific who feel threatened by China’s militarization of the major trade route.
China denied militarizing the region and went as far as to blame the US instead, warning that the US was committing a “miscalculation of the situation.”
The US has made it clear that it will deploy 70 per cent of its navy to the Asia-Pacific region under its strategy of pivoting to Asia. The US has stepped up military moves with its alliances and its military presence in the Asia-Pacific region. Currently, China has created islands with military-grade runways and missile defence hardware on islands claimed by Japan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei. (Associated Press)