CNA and Staff Reporter
Want China Times
Want China Times
The Liaoning docked at its home port of Qingdao. (Photo/CNS)
China’s first aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, should be deployed in the South China Sea to strengthen the country’s claim to the region, a Chinese military expert has argued.
“The South China Sea would be the best place for the Liaoning battle group to show its prowess,” Song Zhongping was quoted as saying in an article in the Wednesday edition of the Hong Kong Chinese-language daily Wen Wei Po, a pro-Beijing newspaper.
Song said China needs to deploy an aircraft carrier in the South China Sea because it is facing many severe challenges in the region, including the occupation by several other countries of many islets, reefs or shoals in the sprawling region.
China claims the South China Sea as its territory, but other claimant countries such as the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei that are geographically closer to the disputed islands see China as a belligerent bully.
Taiwan also has claims in the region and controls the Pratas (Dongsha) islands and Taiping, the biggest of the Spratly islands.
As some of the islands are located far away from the Chinese mainland, China has to deploy an aircraft carrier battle group in the region to defend its sovereignty claims, Song said.
The James Shoal in the southernmost part of the South China Sea just off the coast of East Malaysia, for instance, is 2,500 kilometers away from China, Song noted.
While Beijing’s land-based warplanes can reach the remote islet, they can only stay airborne for relatively short periods of time, making it hard to gain air supremacy, Song said.
“If China can effectively deploy an aircraft carrier in the South China Sea, it will be able to extend its military presence in the region,” Song said.
In another action seen as an attempt by Beijing to unilaterally push its contested sovereignty claims, China recently demarcated an East China Sea air defense identification zone (ADIZ) early this month that extended to the disputed Diaoyutai (Senkaku or Diaoyu) islands, about 330 kilometers away from the Chinese coast.
The islands have been under Japan’s administrative control since 1972, but are also claimed by Taiwan and China. The move thus increased tensions with Japan, but Song said China would do the same in the South China Sea and could use the aircraft carrier group to defend it.
“China set up an ADIZ in the East China Sea, and when it sets up one in the South China Sea in the future, all of the airspace needs to be visible and controllable,” Song said.
Deploying the aircraft carrier group in the region would be an important step to achieving the goal, he said, because fighter jets would have trouble covering such a big area and long distances.
Escorted by four warships, the Liaoning is currently on its first-ever long-distance test and training mission in the South China Sea.
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