The following is the Q&A between US Secretary of State Rubio and journalists on China issues during an interview with the media:
Question: Let's take a look at the comparison between us and China objectively. The size of the US Navy is the smallest since World War I. Our army is the smallest since World War II. Our air force is smaller than before, and the tonnage is older. Meanwhile, China has the largest naval shipbuilding line in the world and the largest navy in scale. The number of ships they build in a month - I think this will shock people - is more than we build in a year. At the same time, we are cutting defense spending.
What measures are we taking to prepare for a possible war with China?
Rubio: Well, we are -
Question: If there is a war, can we win?
Rubio: What we need to do is prevent China from starting a war by making them realize that they can never win a war against the United States. Starting a war with China would be terrible.
Question: But if I were China, I would think we might win this war.
Rubio: This is why it's dangerous, because China is undergoing the fastest, most rapid, and largest peacetime military buildup in world history - not just modern history, but in all of world history. For various reasons, the United States has fallen behind.
You mentioned the example of the navy. There is no shipbuilding industry now. The US has some shipbuilding industry, but its scale is far smaller than China's. It's not just because we haven't invested money in this area; it's because we don't have the ability to do so due to huge challenges in the labor market. Due to various free trade agreements and our arrangement to allow China to join the World Trade Organization, we allowed them to accelerate production. Meanwhile, we lost our own industrialization capabilities.
It's not just about shipbuilding. Like airplanes and aircraft components, our country has lost the ability to produce complex materials. We can't produce chips. 88% of our active ingredient medicines rely on China. We no longer have chip manufacturing equipment. The economy is not just about GDP, employment, and wages; it's about our reliance on the visible production capacity everywhere, the infrastructure of productivity. These things affect production elsewhere - not being hit, but having more influence. This is dangerous and must not continue.
Original Source: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1830361622606860/
Disclaimer: The article represents the views of the author alone.