Beware of RIMPAC being used to advance US Indo-Pacific strategic and political conspiracy

Source
China Military Online
Editor
Li Jiayao
Time
2022-07-01 17:37:22

By Qian Jingyi

The world's largest multinational maritime joint military exercise the Rim of the Pacific 2022 (RIMPAC 2022) is scheduled to be held in the waters near Hawaii of the US at the end of June. Compared with last year, the RIMPAC 2022 featured with larger scale, more troops, and more complete equipment. It reflects the sinister intention of the US to use the exercise to form gangs and engage in "major power competition", as well as its political intention to advance the Indo-Pacific strategy.

The RIMPAC military exercise is coordinated by the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and is organized and implemented by the US Third Fleet. After labeling China as its strategic competitor in 2017, the US took this military exercise as an important tool to isolate China and safeguard regional hegemony and made it clear that "deal with the China challenge" was an important purpose of the exercise.

According to the news released by the US Third Fleet, the RIMPAC 2022 has a total of 25,000 troops from 26 countries, 38 surface ships, four submarines and more than 170 fighter jets. Behind such a big presence, it is the deep political consideration of the US to use the exercise as a tool to advance its Indo-Pacific strategy.

On the one hand, it aims to show the "leadership" of the US in the Indo-Pacific and even the world. On February 11, the Biden administration released the report of US Indo-Pacific Strategy, saying that it will increase resource investment in the Indo-Pacific region and strengthen the US's leading role in the Indo-Pacific region. However, the sudden Russia-Ukraine conflict involved a lot of energy from the Biden administration. Although the Biden administration claimed to be capable of dealing with two competitors of China and Russia, its ability to advance the Indo-Pacific strategy has been widely questioned. The US invited 13 Asian countries and 12 countries outside of the region to participate in this military exercise to show its determination to anchor the Indo-Pacific so that it can dispel the doubts of its allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific and demonstrate its regional and global influence.

On the other hand, it aims to test the "loyalty" of its Indo-Pacific allies. Many Asian allies of the US have made special arrangements for this military exercise to support the US. The Philippine Navy sent the newly commissioned Antonio Luna guided missile frigate and an AW-109 helicopter. The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force sent the Izumo-class helicopter carrier to participate in the exercise for the first time. The ROK Navy sent four ships including the flagship, ROKS Marado amphibious assault ship and over 1,000 troops. It is the largest troops since ROK first participated in the exercise in 1990.

More importantly, the smell of gunpowder smoke in this exercise is obviously stronger and the trend of aiming to deal with "major power competition" is more obvious.

According to the US, this year's exercise has a series of subjects with a high level of actual combat, including "high-end" warfare courses such as mine clearance, anti-submarine, live ammunition, maritime air defense, and amphibious landings. The complexity of the exercise scenarios has also increased. In addition, because it involves multiple tactical fields, the exercise has higher requirements for the cooperative combat capabilities of all participating parties in sensitive fields such as intelligence information sharing and tactical confidential communication.

At the same time, new equipment and combat forces will also be tested in the exercise. According to reports, the US Navy will send four unmanned surface ships of a highly classified project and they were previously only used in internal exercises. Furthermore, the First Marine Littoral Regiment formed in March this year will make a public appearance in the exercise and test its capability to coordinate operations with allied forces and conduct "high-end" warfare.

It is not difficult to see that the RIMPAC military exercise is becoming an important training ground for the US to deal with the so-called "major power competition" and that will have a serious negative impact on regional peace and stability.

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