>>February 29, 2000
China threatens U.S.
with missile strike
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
China stepped up its war of words over Taiwan
yesterday, bluntly threatening to fire long-range
nuclear missiles at the United States if it defends the
island.
The warning, published in the official People's
Liberation Army newspaper, comes as a U.S.
aircraft carrier and two cruise-missile destroyers
recently began exercises off Japan. Defense officials
said the warships could be sent to the Taiwan Strait
in a crisis.
The official military newspaper, Liberation Army
Daily, stated in a commentary made public in Beijing
that U.S. intervention in a conflict between China and
Taiwan would result in "serious damage" to U.S.
security interests in Asia.
The military then warned that China could resort
to long-range missile attacks on the United States
during a regional conflict.
"China is neither Iraq nor Yugoslavia but a very
special country," the newspaper stated.
While China is a permanent member of the
Security Council of the United Nations, "on the other
hand, it is a country that has certain abilities of
launching strategic counterattack and the capacity of
launching a long-distance strike," the article said.
"It is not a wise move to be at war with a country
such as China, a point which the U.S. policy-makers
know fairly well also," the newspaper said.
"The U.S. military will even be forced to [make] a
complete withdrawal from the East Asian region, as
they were forced to withdraw from southern Vietnam
in those days," the paper said.
The article was unusually harsh, according to
Pentagon officials familiar with the translation, and
echoed a private warning made in 1995 by Chinese
Lt. Gen. Xiong Guangkai.
Gen. Xiong, the PLA's top intelligence and
foreign policy official, told a former Pentagon official
at that time that Washington would not help defend
Taiwan because it cared more about Los Angeles
than Taiwan. The remark was reported to the White
House as a threat to use nuclear weapons.
China's nuclear arsenal currently includes about
24 CSS-4 long-range missiles that are capable of
hitting most of the United States with warheads of up
to 5 megatons ? the equivalent of 5 million tons of
TNT. It is building two other road-mobile ICBMs
and a new class of strategic missile submarines.
One U.S. official said PLA threats appeared to
be a response to statements made last week by
Walter Slocombe, undersecretary of defense for
policy. Mr. Slocombe told reporters China would
suffer "incalculable consequences" if it attacked the
island.
Mr. Slocombe's statement also brought a
complaint from some pro-China officials at the White
House and State Department who objected to the
Pentagon's tough stance.
Meanwhile, several ships from the carrier battle
group led by the USS Kitty Hawk began conducting
exercises in the Pacific on Wednesday ? two days
after Beijing issued an ominous written warning that it
will use force against Taiwan if the island continues to
delay reunification with the mainland.
Pentagon officials said privately the carrier
deployment is part of U.S. diplomatic efforts to
discourage China from conducting threatening war
games, as occurred in 1996 around the time of
Taiwan's first presidential elections.<<
Excerpt from an article in today's Washington Times:
washingtontimes.com |
