US defence secretary Pete Hegseth reassured allies in the Indo-Pacific on Saturday that they will not be left alone to face increasing military and economic pressure from China, while insisting that they also contribute more to their own defence.
He said Washington will bolster its defences overseas to counter what the Pentagon sees as rapidly developing threats by Beijing, particularly in its aggressive stance toward Taiwan.
China has conducted numerous exercises to test what a blockade would look like of the self-governing island, which Beijing claims as its own and the US has pledged to defend.
China's army “is rehearsing for the real deal”, Hegseth said in a keynote speech at a security conference in Singapore. “We are not going to sugarcoat it — the threat China poses is real. And it could be imminent.”
The head of China's delegation accused Hegseth of making “groundless accusations”.
“Some of the claims are completely fabricated, some distort facts and some are cases of a thief crying stop thief,” said Rear Adm. Hu Gangfeng, vice president of China's National Defence University. He did not offer specific objections.
China has a stated goal of ensuring its military is capable of taking Taiwan by force if necessary by 2027, a deadline that is seen by experts as more of an aspirational goal than a hard war deadline.
China also has built artificial islands in the South China Sea to support new military outposts and developed highly advanced hypersonic and space capabilities, which are driving the US to create its own space-based “Golden Dome” missile defences.
