A THOUSAND FEET ABOVE TINIAN ISLAND, Northern Mariana Islands: US Air Force Capt. Brenden “Biggie” Small looks out the window of a C-130 as approximately a dozen aircraft parachute in carrying supplies to a small group of troops gathered below.
The mission is part of a training exercise involving 70 aircraft and more than 3,000 airmen from seven countries, the largest training exercise in Air Mobility Command history.
“At this scale,” it’s “really unprecedented,” says Small.
For the first time, the exercise, called Mobility Guardian, focuses on the Pacific as the United States prepares for a possible conflict with China.
For two weeks, airmen from the US and its allies are practicing resupply, aerial resupply and medical evacuation missions at bases in Hawaii, Guam, Australia and Japan.
“I don’t think conflict is inevitable. I don’t think it’s inevitable,” he said. General Mike Minihan, the head of command. “But I also think that being ready now is the most important thing. So ready now is the deterrence base. And ready now is also the basis of the decisive victory.”
Minihan made headlines in January when he wrote a controversial memo warning his commanders that the United States could be at war with China within two years. The memo instructed all Air Mobility Command personnel to prepare for a potential fight with China and to practice their marksmanship: “fire a magazine at a 7-meter target with the full understanding that unrepentant lethality is paramount.”
“Aim for the head,” Minihan added.
In an interview at the US Pacific Air Force Headquarters in Hawaii, Minihan said he supports the memo.
“I’m not trying to be provocative. I’m not trying to be coy,” Minihan said. “I’m trying to give my team the tools and the action and the priority to win.”
In recent months, the Chinese and US militaries have had two close encounters in the western Pacific.
The Defense Department says a Chinese fighter jet flew dangerously close to a US military surveillance plane over the South China Sea on May 30. Days later, a Chinese naval ship came within 150 yards of a US destroyer in the Taiwan Strait, cutting off her bow. . China rejected the Pentagon’s description and blamed the United States for both incidents.
The close encounters reinforce growing concerns that the two superpowers could stumble into unwanted conflict. China’s military might has grown considerably in the past decade, and Taiwan remains a flashpoint.
Other experts warn that while tensions are high, an armed conflict between the US and China is unlikely given how closely interconnected the two countries’ economies have become. They say that talk of war is exaggerated and that it worsens the divisions between Washington and Beijing.
With US-China relations under strain, Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with President Xi Jinping in June in an attempt to de-escalate tensions.
“We are under no illusions about the challenges of managing this relationship. There are many issues on which we disagree deeply, even vehemently,” Blinken said at a news conference after the meeting.
But “it is the responsibility of both countries to find a way forward, and it is in our interest and the interest of the world that we do so,” he added.
All three of Mobility Guardian’s previous exercises have been conducted in the continental US. But with the growing threat of a potential conflict with China and the logistical challenge of getting people and supplies across the ocean, the Pentagon decided to move the training exercise to the region where it was held. most likely it will develop.
“We are here in the Pacific and we enjoy all the tyrannies of geography,” Minihan said. “So, specifically, the distance and the water. We challenge ourselves and our teams to maneuver this theater with the relevance it takes to win. And so far, very good. It goes very well.
Joining the US in the exercises are airmen from Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and France.
“The US military is ready to deliver power,” Minihan said.
But he said it is not up to him if a war breaks out with China in the next few years.
“Regardless of the schedule, my job is to be ready now,” Minihan said. “And my obligation as commander of Air Mobility Command is to be ready now to deliver that deterrence and to be ready to deliver that decisive victory.”
