Regarding intelligence on Chinese advanced systems, we should bear in mind that the Chinese are diligent students of Sun Tzu in general and deception warfare in particular. It’s probably safe to say that American intelligence-gathering is superior in some technical aspects, such as imagery and signals processing. It’s equally safe to say that the Chinese are well aware of our strengths. The most dangerous attitude the American intelligence community could have is the assumption that we know what we think we know. Hubris has laid low many great powers.
That much said, if there is deception at work it’s probably on the side of over-stating China’s state-of-the-art abilities. Sun Tzu observes that it’s easier to beat an enemy who is convinced he will lose. If we get worried about the survivability of our carriers, we’ll make an adjustment. If the Chinese can use deception operations to make us adjust to their liking, it hardly matters whether the new weapon works as advertised or not.
Webstral
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08-11-2010, 01:21 AM
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