U.S. PACOM Chief Opposes Selling F-22 to Japan
So much for APA's predictions .....
By JOHN T. BENNETT (Defense News article)
The top U.S. military official in the Pacific region is opposed to the notion of selling the Pentagon’s prized F-22A Raptor to Japan, America’s closest ally in the area.
A new U.S. “capabilities assessment group” -— composed of Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, Office of the Secretary of Defense and industry officials -— has launched a comprehensive review of Japan’s fighter requirements. That group will deliver a formal recommendation to Defense Secretary Robert Gates and eventually President George W. Bush on which American-made war plane Washington should pitch to Tokyo.
Adm. Timothy Keating, commander, U.S. Pacific Command, said he has passed his recommendation that the Raptor not be sold to Japan to that study team. His comments came during a July 24 briefing at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
As the Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) continues seeking a replacement for its aging fighter fleet, Tokyo over the past several years has expressed a keen interest in the F-22A, which is loaded with top secret technologies.
*One key hurdle to a potential sale of F-22As to Japan is the “Obey amendment,” a provision tacked onto the 1998 Defense Appropriations Act by Rep. David Obey, D-Wis. It prohibits F-22A exports to any nation. Last year, conferees working on a final defense spending bill turned back a House-approved move to nix the provision.*
The Japan Air Self-Defense Force has four kinds of fighters: F-15s, F-2s, F-1s, and F-4s, the latter introduced in 1973 and slated for retirement in the next decade. *Japanese officials have said they at least want to purchase a “fourth-and-a-half generation jet,” and ideally, a “fifth-generation” plane. That would exclude even the most-enhanced U.S.-made F-16s and F-15s, but would leave on the Japanese list upgraded F/A-18s, F-35 Joint Strike Fighters and the Raptor.*
Keating sees positive changes in the Pacific realm today compared with the mid-1980s, when he was a young officer there. He also sees Beijing as a potential military peer that PACOM should monitor, but not a threat it should lose sleep over.
“We’re watching them and we’re interested” in their secretive activities, Keating said of China. “And they’re watching us — it makes sense [for both nations to do so].”
But just how closely PACOM, other American agencies and U.S. allies can monitor Chinese military moves appears limited. The Pentagon’s May report on China, delivered annually to Congress, pans Beijing for making many moves behind a thick veil of secrecy.
U.S. military and intelligence agencies believe China is pushing ahead many air, ground and naval weapons, including updating long-range ballistic missiles, testing new nuclear-powered submarines, developing multirole Su-27SMK/Flanker (F-11A) fighter with partner Russia, and deploying freshly produced tanks and amphibious vehicles, according to the Pentagon report.
Keating said PACOM officials are “concerned about” Chinese moves and motives, but stressed that “it’s not something we worry about.”
During recent meetings with Chinese officials, Keating said the two sides agreed to a continuation of Washington’s “somewhat ambiguous policy” that calls for America to defend Taiwan in response to a Chinese attack on the island. Those same officials, however, were “less eager” to discuss Beijing’s January anti-satellite test that saw China destroy one of its own aging weather orbiters, he said.
Chinese officials, when pressed about the ASAT test by Keating and his delegation, called it a “scientific experiment, Keating told reporters. American officials responded, he said, by stressing Washington does not feel such a test is consistent with China’s rhetoric of a “peaceful rise.”
Keating also said Chinese officials confirmed a claim made in the May Pentagon report about Beijing’s desire to build a new aircraft carrier.
Chinese officials, he said, made clear they see an “aircraft carrier moving into a foreign port” as the most muscular sign that a nation is a true global power. American officials responded to their counterparts’ carrier desires, Keating said, by stressing the difficulty of such a complex shipbuilding project.
Essentially, the Americans told them, “Knock yourselves out.” Some Chinese naval officials have been aboard U.S. ships, including the aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman, he said. “So they know, [that is] the price of admission,” he said of the many complex systems and engineering challenges that go into building such a massive ship.
Keating’s optimism also extended into the future, with the PACOM chief telling the CSIS audience that if American-Chinese relations improve over the next 15 years, he could see China one day being part of the U.S. Navy’s envisioned “1,000-ship Navy,” which would be composed of American and other coalition vessels.
The four-star said he is “not wildly optimistic … but cautiously optimistic” that American forces could one day work with “more complexity and more frequency” with the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), especially for things like joint exercises and humanitarian relief efforts.
“Overall, the pendulum has swung dramatically … things are better,” said Keating. In every nation he has visited since taking over in Hawaii earlier this year, including China, “peace and stability are the watchwords,” he added.
Despite the list of potentially contentious issues facing the region — China’s military build-up and views on Taiwan, possible Japanese militarization, North Korea’s nuclear program and potential Japanese-South Korean tensions — nothing keeps the PACOM chief “up at night,” said Keating, an admitted “optimist by nature.”
The PACOM commander is in Washington for high-level talks between Gates and his top brass from around the world. Keating said the senior officials will spend time discussing the ongoing war in Iraq, as well other items, such as “information sharing with our partners,” space issues and other items.
While the conflict in Iraq is taking up a considerable amount of Gates’ time, Keating said he does not feel his boss is too preoccupied with the Middle East that developments in the Pacific and elsewhere are being ignored. “Do I feel like my bosses are ignoring me?” Keating said in response to a question from the audience, followed by a sternly delivered response: “No.”
