By Zachary Keck
The U.S. and China remain at an impasse over America’s surveillance flights near China’s coasts.
The U.S. and China continue to trade barbs over U.S. surveillance near Chinese coasts.
As The Diplomat has covered closely, the U.S. and China have been in a spat ever since a Chinese pilot conducted what the U.S. characterized as a “dangerous intercept” of a P-8 surveillance plane that was flying in international airspace around 100 miles off the coast of China. China denied that a “dangerous intercept” occurred, insisting that its pilot acted professionally. Beijing blamed America’s surveillance near China’s coasts for any close calls that might take place. It used this opportunity to once again demand that the U.S. significantly scale back or altogether halt its surveillance activities. Following China’s denial, U.S. officials told reporters off the record that there have been a number of similar near misses between U.S. and Chinese aircraft this year, all around the same area above the South China Sea. Both sides also announced that Chinese military officials would visit Washington at the end of last month to discuss the situation with their American counterparts.
Those talks do not appear to have helped much, as the U.S. and China continued to trade barbs over the surveillance flights. On Monday, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jonathan Greenert spoke about the U.S. Navy’s posture in Asia at the Carnegie Endowment of International Peace in Washington, DC. According to Breaking Defense, Greenert devoted his opening remarks to the importance of strengthening maritime partnerships throughout Asia, including with China. He did not mention the near collision with the PLAAF pilot during his prepared remarks.
However, during the Q&A session that followed, multiple reporters from Chinese state media outlets asked the admiral about the recent incidents, the“dangerous intercepts” of U.S. Navy spy planes. Greenert expressed concern that similar incidents will happen in the future; however, he also emphasized that the U.S. has no plans to reduce or stop its surveillance flights near China, as Beijing has demanded.
Read the full story at The Diplomat