COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – The decision to disinvite China from a massive multinational naval exercise in the Pacific is an acknowledgment of its destabilizing activity in the South China Sea, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Wednesday.
The Pentagon announced the move earlier in the day citing evidence that Beijing has moved anti-ship missiles, surface-to-air missile systems, and electronic jammers into the Spratly Islands. A spokesman said Wednesday the Chinese navy is no longer welcome this year at the biennial Rim of the Pacific exercise, which is billed as the largest maritime exercise in the world. 27 nations are slated to take part in the exercise.
Mattis denied the disinvite will escalate tensions with China but said it must be confronted over the activity. Beijing has been creating artificial islands in the South China Sea for years that the U.S. and allies worry could be used to project military force and dominate busy international sea lanes.
“We are not ratcheting up anything. In fact, we believe firmly in a stable Pacific,” Mattis told the Washington Examiner, which is traveling with him in Colorado. “What we are doing is we are cooperating with China wherever we can, and we are going to have to also confront them when we believe that the rule of law or that matters that can destabilize the region are being pursued.”
China has claimed the artificial islands are for benign purposes, including bases for search and rescue operations and fisheries protection, but the placement of the weapons is “only for military use,” according to the statement today by Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Logan.
“Our military operations are transparent out there, but so long as China continues to militarize features in the South China Sea and what is traditionally, historically international waters and militarizing them with weapons that just a few years ago they said they would not be putting there, then we have to acknowledge that reality,” Mattis said.
