Dialog: Focus on US Global Military Deployment

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, June 16, 2003

Dialog: Focus on US Global Military Deployment

HIGHLIGHTS: *Since World War II, the United States has gradually set up a global military "base network" backed by locally based military bases in order to push its global strategy, and has formed an overseas base layout featuring the "combination of points with lines and multi-level disposition, the control of main strategic points and vital passages on the sea".

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HIGHLIGHTS: Since World War II, the United States has gradually set up a global military "base network" backed by locally based military bases in order to push its global strategy, and has formed an overseas base layout featuring the "combination of points with lines and multi-level disposition, the control of main strategic points and vital passages on the sea".

Since the "September 11" incident in 2001, especially since the Iraq war, US overseas military deployment has begun a new round of strategic adjustments along with the strategic adjustments of US national security and the development and change in the international situation.

Despite the numerous US overseas military bases, there exist many problems as revealed by recent local wars.

People's Viewpoint: Please first say something about the general situation regarding the US global military deployment.

Int'l Weekly: Since WWII, the United States has gradually set up a global military "base network" backed by locally based military bases in order to push its global strategy, the total number of such military bases (facilities), big and small, exceeded 5,000 in peak time, half of which are located overseas with troops surpassing 610,000. It has also formed an overseas base layout featuring the "combination of points with lines and multi-level disposition, the control of main strategic points and vital passages on the sea". After the Cold War, due to the limitation of its national defense expenses and the opposition of the people in the countries concerned, the United States had repeatedly reduced its troops stationed overseas, as a result, the number of its overseas bases has been on a downward tendency. At present, the scale of US troops abroad has shrunk to 247,000 people.

US maintenance of huge overseas troops has four-faceted major strategic significance to the country:

First, maintaining its military presence in the forward position is a military deterrent to the countries concerned and is aimed to realize its national and regional strategic goals;

Second, taking military actions when deterrence proved ineffective so as to effectively cope with regional crises;

Third, providing a reliable military backing for the United States to exert political, cultural and economic influences through its overseas military presence; and

Fourth, intensifying its strategic ties with its allies.

People's Viewpoint: What adjustments has the United States made to its overseas military deployment along with the strategic adjustments of its national security and development and change in the international situation since the "September 11" terrorist attacks in 2001, especially since the Iraq war?

Int'l Weekly: It makes use of war to expand its overseas bases again. Before the end of the Iraq war, the US Army announced its plan to set up four military bases in Iraq, up to now it still has more than 100,000 troops stationed in Iraq and it will keep a considerable scale of forces there for a long time to come.

Moving troops to be concentrated on the "unstable arc-shaped region". After the "September 11" event, the United States looked upon terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction as the greatest threat to its national security, thinking that the main threat comes from the "unstable arc-shaped region" encompassing the coastal areas of the Caribbean Sea, Africa, Caucasus, Central Asia, the Middle East, South Asia and the Korean Peninsula. For this reason, the US Defense Department drastically adjusted the disposition of its overseas troops around this "unstable arc-shaped region", in order to effectively cope with a "preventive" war.

Attaching importance to advance disposition, and establishing "mobile" presence. Advance disposition means positioning in advance a considerable number of weapons and equipment in some overseas bases, doing the defense and garrison work with very small forces, when a crisis occurs, the US forces will adopt a quick transport method to send personnel to the crisis region and, by relying on the advance installed weapons and equipment, quickly form combat effectiveness in the crisis region and carry out the operational task. Currently the US forces have deployed equipment and materials for two army divisions in Europe and four marine expeditionary brigades each respectively in Norway, Guam, Diego Garcia and the Atlantic. In addition, the US forces have 12 mobile advance-storage ships in the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean regions.

Reconstructing and expanding key bases. In recent years, the United States has notably increased its input in key bases to constantly rebuild and expand its core bases. First of all, the Guam Base. The US forces first transferred part of the facilities originally positioned in the Subic Base to Guam, and built the US forces' largest ammunition storing facility in the Far East, at the same time disposed the US forces' strategic bombers and strategic missile nuclear submarines. Secondly, the US navy's Northeast Asian bases group centered on Yokosuka has been strengthened without cease. Thirdly, the Diego Garcia Base, after expanded, now serves as an area for the take-off and landing of B-2 strategic bombers.

Building marine movable bases. In recent years, the US forces have drafted a plan for constructing a marine "chinampa of floating island" plan, one formula of which is to construct a joint movable ocean base (JMOB). The JMOB can furnish supplies for naval base-warship-destination within the war zone outside the majority of attacking limits. The JMOB can reduce existing army units' dependence on the bases and can reduce onshore military logistic facilities to the minimum. It can also selectively provide assistance to shore army units. JMOB can also provide all-directional joint operational platform for the expeditionary troops. Under the circumstance of no combat task, the different modules of the JMOB can be used separately. In the unstable and constantly changing security environment, its separate parts can provide low-risk yet very strong mobile capacity for US troops.

Enhancing the elasticity of the base defense. Judged from the plan for the adjustment of the disposition of forces recently released by the US Defense Department, US overseas military presence has witnessed the trend of development in the direction from the "forward-leaning presence" to the "in-depth presence" or to the "elasticity presence". For example, after the eruption of the Korean nuclear crisis, the United States began to reconsider the question of stationing troops in Northeast Asia. Currently, the United States has 37,000 troops stationed in the Republic of Korea (ROK), the majority of which are deployed in the vicinity of the non-military area to the north of Seoul, all coming within the long-range artillery attacking scope of the Korean army. In order to maintain defense elasticity and reduce possible losses, the US army has planned to move its ground force out of the non-military area and Seoul of the ROK and further cut down the scale of the entire US troops in the ROK.

People's Viewpoint: At present, what are the main problems existing in US overseas military bases?

Int'l Weekly: Despite the numerous US overseas military bases, there exist many problems as revealed by the recent local wars.

Forward-position bases have difficulty meeting war needs. After the Cold War, the reduction in the number of US bases has directly affected US forces' ability to take military actions overseas. Usually, the long distance of these military bases from the battlefield has adversely affected the attacking result of US troops. For example, in the Iraq war, the standard bomb-carrying volume of US B-52 bomber reached 26 tons, because the journey from Britain to Iraq reached 5,000 km, US aircraft, when set out, could not but "carry more oil and less bombs", it could carry only about 10 tons of accurate guidance ammunition, thus affecting the attacking efficiency. Generally, the limited guarantee capacity of frontier bases makes it hard to undertake the repair and maintenance of some hi-tech weapons, thus bringing a rise in the non-war damage rate for US troops.

Target is fixed, security-related hidden troubles are many. The target of the military base is fixed and is generally connected to the residential area, so the defense capability is limited. Especially US military bases, set up in countries where the people have a deep sentiment of hatred for the United States, where the state power is unstable or terrorist activities are rampant, are faced with great danger of being subjected to terrorist attacks, the Qaeda network attacked global US targets on the excuse of the presence of US troops on the holy land of Muslims. Since the end of the Afghanistan war, US bases in the country have sustained dozens of attacks and suffered great losses.

Bases are obtained at high costs. In order to gain the base-use right in some countries, the US government often satisfies the relevant countries' demands at high costs. For instance, in order to guarantee the smooth implementation of the operations against Taliban, the United States made the promises of aid worth tens of billions of US dollars to some countries before starting the war. Each year, the United States earmarks nearly 10 billion US dollars for aid and for maintaining the presence of military bases worldwide. The expense provided for the stationing of troops in Germany reached US$4.5 billion. When war breaks out, some countries often take advantage of the opportunity to make extra demands, this undoubtedly increases the cost for the United States to obtain bases.

Strong political sensitivity, use placed under restriction. Since US overseas bases are mostly set up on the territories of other countries, their use is subjected to many restrictions, the normal use of bases can hardly be guaranteed even in the lands of US allies. In the Afghanistan war, the Arab countries represented by Saudi Arabia had all along maintained an attitude of reservation toward US troops' use of the bases in their territories, The US troops could not but have misgivings about the sentiment of the Muslim world, so they made less or no use of these bases. During the Iraq war, because the Turkish government's proposal on providing US troops with the use right was vetoed down by the Parliament, the US troops were forced to change their pre-war deployment, they moved the 4th division in the direction toward Kuwait, thus finding themselves in a passive position in the early stage of the war.

Endless frictions with the local people. In recent years, a number of cases of frictions have occurred between soldiers from US bases in the ROK and Japan and the local people. As a result of the poor style and discipline on the part of some US soldiers, incidents such as rape, unbridled drinking, fight and homicide have often occurred, but US troops handled these cases with leniency, thus sparking the strong resentment of local residents. At the same time, the drill of US troops has caused pollution to the local ecological environment, mammoth demonstrations have been staged time and again by people in the ROK and Japan, demanding the withdrawal of US troops from their countries. In addition, people of some countries regard the stationing of foreign troops as a symbol of the colonialist times, with the growing of nationalism, the people of some countries put pressure on their governments, calling for an end to the existence of US bases. This has exerted adverse influence on the overseas presence of US troops.

By People's Daily Online

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