“China’s armed forces are the biggest around, which gives them a consistent edge over its Asia-Pacific neighbors and also the US forces stationed in the West Pacific,” Vasili Kashin said.
He added that even though technologically it still trails behind the US and Russia, China has done a lot of catching up in recent years and in some types of weapons is now on par with the United States, Western Europe and Russia.
“The Chinese are now building fourth-generation fighter planes bristling with the most advanced radar systems, air-to-air missiles, along with modern air-defense missile systems, high-precision ballistic and cruise missiles,” Kashin noted, adding that China’s artillery systems, such as the PLZ-05 155 mm howitzers and A100 heavy multiple rocket launchers, win tenders leaving their Russian and Western competition empty-handed.
In addition to this, China is developing a whole family of liquid- and solid-fuel ICBMs with multiple independently targetable reentry warheads.
According to US intelligence, the Chinese already have a quartet of nuclear submarines armed with intercontinental ballistic missiles now in active service.
Simultaneously, China is building up its naval might to guard its military and political interests in Africa and the Middle East with a number of US-like nuclear aircraft carriers already in the pipeline.
“All this means that China is building a war machine commensurate with the status of a superpower and meant to solve tasks well outside the Asia-Pacific region,” Kashin said in conclusion.
