China's red sea/gulf/middle east strategy

AssassinsMace said:

Frankly I think the US and UK are calling some of the missile attacks ASBMs just to get China to think ASBMS don't work against Western navies. One of Peter Zeihan's arguments for China collapsing was he said the US was going to stop being the policeman of the world and stop patrolling international waters leaving the world's oceans open to piracy and chaos. China's economy be would grinding to a halt from all the pirates of the sea taking over Chinese cargo ships. The Western alarmists are always crying that China has a bigger navy than anyone else... Does China cause geopolitical chaos in the world? The US stops protecting the seas for its allies, no more allies' economies. That why they're there at the Red Sea in the first place.

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An antiship ballistic missile is a ballistic missile capable of targeting ships. Which the munitions in question absolutely are. They may be primitive, they may be outdated, they may be ineffectual, but none of that makes them any less ballistic missiles targeting ships. A T-62 is still a tank, a T-34 is still a tank, and Little Willie is still a tank. Obsolete tanks, sure, but tanks all the same. There is nothing unusual about calling something what it is.

And the PLARF is well aware of its own capabilities relative to Iranian ones.

Wrought said:

An antiship ballistic missile is a ballistic missile capable of targeting ships. Which the munitions in question absolutely are. They may be primitive, they may be outdated, they may be ineffectual, but none of that makes them any less ballistic missiles targeting ships. A T-62 is still a tank, a T-34 is still a tank, and Little Willie is still a tank. Obsolete tanks, sure, but tanks all the same. There is nothing unusual about calling something what it is.

And the PLARF is well aware of its own capabilities relative to Iranian ones.

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Never underestimate the psychological warfare they wage against the public which can lead to poor morale.

FairAndUnbiased said:

Never underestimate the psychological warfare they wage against the public which can lead to poor morale.

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It is a very large stretch to call this "psychological warfare" against the Chinese public. There are much easier ways to do that. Do you think most of them are reading foreign media while also knowing the foreign names for domestic munitions? Be realistic, the general public (of any nation) doesn't even know the difference between cruise and ballistic missiles.

A

lcloo said:

The bold part is not true, they provide convoy protection to all ships regardless of flags.

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Any hard stats or evidence of this? I read some article saying they did 5 escort missions for one Chinese company since late January. If they have done that then why are Americans crying still in congress? Wouldn't every ship be going with China already and get zero attacks? Has china been attacked once even and had to use anti air defenses? I assume this would be reported if true and would be big news

lcloo said:

Regarding the bold part. If you are a paid subscribers of a live ship tracking application, you can see many ships that are travelling through Red Sea now added additional info on their ship description such as "This ship is manned by all Chinese crew", or "This ship does not sailed to Israel" etc.

Houthis can get public information on each ship by subscribing to many such live ship tracking apps. In fact any body can do that.

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Can't this be easily faked though? If I was houthi I wouldn't trust it. the only real way to be sure is to get ok from China itself or the 3 warships..

Wrought said:

An antiship ballistic missile is a ballistic missile capable of targeting ships. Which the munitions in question absolutely are. They may be primitive, they may be outdated, they may be ineffectual, but none of that makes them any less ballistic missiles targeting ships. A T-62 is still a tank, a T-34 is still a tank, and Little Willie is still a tank. Obsolete tanks, sure, but tanks all the same. There is nothing unusual about calling something what it is.

And the PLARF is well aware of its own capabilities relative to Iranian ones.

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Yes it follows all anti-ship missile profiles.

Wrought said:

It is a very large stretch to call this "psychological warfare" against the Chinese public. There are much easier ways to do that. Do you think most of them are reading foreign media while also knowing the foreign names for domestic munitions? Be realistic, the general public (of any nation) doesn't even know the difference between cruise and ballistic missiles.

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the general western public believes that ballistic missiles are evil dictator weapons that are inaccurate and only good for terror bombing small numbers of civilians. so by calling the crude rockets fired by the Houthis as "anti ship ballistic missiles" it reinforces that concept.

Evidence for this belief:

As a vehicle of terror, the ballistic missile is quite effective. But its battlefield impact in practice is little more than that of a heavy artillery shell — and an extraordinarily expensive one at that. Better means of long-range strike have not been available to the Chinese military until recently — a fact that the CCP’s propaganda machine has gone to great lengths to cover up, making it seem as if these glorified catapults were an end in themselves or an “assassin’s mace.” They are actually investments of rapidly diminishing returns.

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FairAndUnbiased said:

the general western public believes that ballistic missiles are evil dictator weapons that are inaccurate and only good for terror bombing small numbers of civilians. so by calling the crude rockets fired by the Houthis as "anti ship ballistic missiles" it reinforces that concept.

Evidence for this belief:

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This is an example of propaganda and/or psychological warfare, because it is deliberately crafting a certain narrative. News articles which simply refer to ASBMs as ASBMs are not.

"ASBMs are bad" vs "ASBMs are ASBMs," two different things.

Ex0 said:

A

Any hard stats or evidence of this? I read some article saying they did 5 escort missions for one Chinese company since late January. If they have done that then why are Americans crying still in congress? Wouldn't every ship be going with China already and get zero attacks? Has china been attacked once even and had to use anti air defenses? I assume this would be reported if true and would be big news

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Because PLAN does not do convoy protection inside the Red Sea where the Americans and its allies are operating.

The convoys start their journey at the Gulf of Aden and ended somewhere south of Iran where the boats of the Somalia pirates are not able to reach. It is well documented for decades that they accept any foreign ships that applied to join the convoy, it is in the news all the time (though the Western media rarely report this). You can google yourself (in Chinese if possible) or check some CCTV documentaries on You Tube.

All ships, Chinese or foreign, must applied to join the convoy by radio or other means. The conoy must travel together at the same time and same speed and headings.

No Chinese ships have been attacked in the Red Sea. There were a few attempted attacks on the concoy by Somali pirates in Gulf of Aden, but they were all repelled by PLAN.

Ex0 said:

Can't this be easily faked though? If I was houthi I wouldn't trust it. the only real way to be sure is to get ok from China itself or the 3 warships..

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You are trying to implied that China is collaborating with Houthi, there is absolutely no evidence of such or else the anti-China US news media, especially Bloomberg.com, would have it on big headlines for days, just like the "Chinese pinhead spy chip inside the Iphone" fake news that appear in Bloomberg's headline for weeks during 2018.

Houthi is supported by Iran, and they worked closely with each other. And Iran has good intel capability.