according to him, chinas a threat because their increasing military technology yet he wont build more F22's
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.a2e736d334e760c3afc9d72bbc9a211c.bb1&show_article=1
China's increasingly advanced weaponry could undermine US military
power in the Pacific, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Wednesday.
Echoing US intelligence guidelines released on Tuesday that warned of
Beijing's military modernization, Gates said US naval carriers and air
bases in the Pacific faced new threats from China.
"In fact,
when considering the military-modernization programs of countries like
China, we should be concerned less with their potential ability to
challenge the US symmetrically –– fighter to fighter or ship to ship ––
and more with their ability to disrupt our freedom of movement and
narrow our strategic options," Gates said in a speech to the Air Force
Association.
"Investments in cyber and anti-satellite warfare,
anti-air and anti-ship weaponry, and ballistic missiles could threaten
America's primary way to project power and help allies in the Pacific
–– in particular our forward air bases and carrier strike groups,"
Gates said in National Harbor, Maryland.
The new threats meant
long-range military aircraft would take on greater importance as the
latest weaponry would "degrade the effectiveness of short-range
fighters and put more of a premium on being able to strike from over
the horizon –– whatever form that capability might take," he said.
Defense analysts have warned that the US military will soon lose its
dominance on the high seas, in space and in cyberspace as China and
other emerging powers obtain sophisticated weaponry and missiles.
The United States released its 2009 National Intelligence Strategy
document Tuesday, in which China's "natural resource-focused diplomacy
and military modernization" were cited as factors making it a "global
challenge."
The intelligence guidelines for the next four
years also elevated the importance of the cyber domain, singling out
China as "very aggressive in the cyberworld."