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Ian Ellis Profile picture
@ianellisjones
Apr 30, 2023 • 9 tweets • 4 min read • Read on X
Pacific Theatre Update 👀

Done:
🇨🇳 "Major military activity" & training
🇷🇺 Pacific Fleet "high alert" & drills
🇰🇷🇯🇵🇺🇸 Combined exercises
🇵🇭🇦🇺🇺🇸 Exercise Balikatan

Ongoing:
🇰🇵 Spy satellite launch
🇸🇬🇨🇳 Drills
🇻🇳🇨🇳 Paracel
🇵🇭🇨🇳 Spratly
🇨🇳 Response to 🇺🇸P-8 Poseidon🇹🇼 & Subs in 🇰🇷
Also watching movements of key naval assets:

🇨🇳 Shandong Carrier Strike Group

Transited Bashi Channel on 24-04 & likely headed for port after 3 weeks in the Philippine Sea

🇺🇸 Nimitz CSG

Departs Thailand 29-04

🇺🇸 Makin Island Amphibious Group

Last known location: Philippines
This year marks the 38th and largest-ever iteration of the prominent annual military exercise between the 🇵🇭 & 🇺🇸:
A reminder about my maps & analysis:
Latest: In a statement, the 🇺🇸 State Department criticized 🇨🇳 China's "harassment and intimidation" of 🇵🇭 Philippine vessels in the contested SCS waterway. It added any attack on Philippine armed forces would trigger a US response.

The US "stands with our Philippine allies in… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
North Korea update:

In Washington, 🇰🇷 President Yoon held a summit with 🇺🇸 President Biden and announced the adoption of the “Washington Declaration,” under which the US will share information on nuclear and strategic operations and planning and regularly deploy strategic assets… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…
The 🇫🇷 French Navy is also active in the region, operating with 🇰🇷🇯🇵🇺🇸
🇦🇺 Australia is also exercising in the region, participating in Exercise #Balikatan23 with 🇵🇭🇺🇸 and now drilling with 🇯🇵
Location of @USNavy ships released today by @NavalInstitute:

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More from @ianellisjones

Ian Ellis Profile picture
Jan 27
A lot of U.S. military activity in the Indo-Pacific:

- 200 National Guard Airmen + F-35A fighters deployed to Kadena
- Elevated recon sorties; additional ISR assets moved into theater
- First exercise with the Philippines involving a U.S. carrier
- USAF B-1B Lancer bombers deployed to Guam
- USS America + USS Blue Ridge operating in WESTPAC
- Multiple exercises at Kadena, Yokota, & Misawa Air Bases
- Fast attack-sub USS Columbia (SSN 771) pulled into Guam
- Conducted 4-day combined aerial exercise with South Korea

More info + sources below.Image
Snapshot: 2025 U.S. Navy footprint

8 of America’s 11 aircraft carriers are active or working up, and 3 are currently deployed: Truman in the Middle East (5th Fleet), Vinson + Washington in the Indo-Pacific (7th Fleet)
More than 200 Vermont Air National Guard Airmen, equipment and F-35A Lighting II aircraft recently deployed to Kadena Air Base, Japan, as part of a planned rotation to enhance regional security and strengthen interoperability with joint and allied forces.

“We are there to support operations and train in the Indo-Pacific region,” said U.S. Air Force Col. Michael Blair, 158th Operations Group commander. “Operating out of Kadena provides our Airmen the opportunity to execute missions in a sustained deployed environment, sharpening their skills and bolstering readiness.”

This deployment, part of scheduled ongoing rotations of aircraft and Airmen to that region, will span several months and include exercises in Japan and other regional islands. Among the key activities is Cope North, a premier multilateral joint exercise and the largest of its kind in the region.

“Exercise Cope North is a unique opportunity to work closely with our allied partners,” Blair said. “The level of interoperability required during this exercise demonstrates our collective ability to respond to emerging threats and ensure regional stability.”

The deployment to Japan complements the Vermont Air National Guard’s ongoing global commitments, including the more than 50 Airmen deployed last fall to support missions in U.S. Central Command and U.S. Africa Command theaters.

“With this latest deployment, more than a third of our Airmen are actively contributing to critical missions worldwide,” said U.S. Air Force Col. Daniel Finnegan, 158th Fighter Wing commander. “Their efforts underscore our unwavering dedication to peace, security and the fulfillment of our nation’s commitments abroad.”

Source: VT Air National Guard
Read 11 tweets
Ian Ellis Profile picture
Jan 20
“The pace of modernization that the PLA is going through is unprecedented. It’s far outpacing what we are doing...

We are the smallest and oldest that we’ve ever been. The Chinese, the PLA, is the largest and most modern that it has ever been.”

—USAF Brig. Gen. Douglas Wickert
“That is risk. That is uncertainty. And that’s why what we are doing here at Edwards Air Force Base is extremely important.”

Fascinating perspective on China from the Commander of the 412th Test Wing, which plans and conducts all flight and ground testing of next-gen aircraft.
This is the first time I’ve seen a senior U.S. military official publicly address the two new advanced airframes that China recently leaked online (what some are calling the J-36 & J-50).
Read 6 tweets
Ian Ellis Profile picture
Jan 18
U.S. Navy force posture ahead of the presidential transition of power 🇺🇸

8 of America’s 11 aircraft carriers are active or working up, and 3 are currently deployed: Truman in the Middle East (5th Fleet), Vinson + Washington in the Indo-Pacific (7th Fleet) Image
Last update:
Carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75), cruiser USS Gettysburg (CG-64), and elements of Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 28 are operating in the Red Sea. Image
Image
Image
Read 8 tweets
Ian Ellis Profile picture
Jan 11
To counter China’s anti-access, area-denial approach to keep the U.S. out of the Pacific in a crisis, Dep. SECDEF says: “we’re changing the game,” and in “classified war games these approaches are paying off.”

“We’ve focused on developing and fielding innovative operational concepts and force designs for how we use our capabilities, showing that we can continually shape and master the changing character of warfare.

From the 1990s on, the PRC carefully crafted its elaborate military modernization to counter two longstanding U.S. approaches to power projection.

One was aircraft carriers, as deployed during the 1996 Third Taiwan Strait Crisis. The other was our multi-month, time-phased force deployments that moved America’s military might from the continental U.S. into theater before an operation — like Desert Shield before Desert Storm and subsequent regional build-ups preceding later wars in Iraq and Afghanistan...

While there is much more work to do, it’s already manifesting in aspects that are quite different from the military that the PLA built itself to beat.”

More info below. Source: DOD, 10 Jan
Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks spoke about “four lessons” she views as critical for prevailing in the U.S. strategic competition with China during a keynote address today at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
Key considerations: Image
Read 7 tweets
Ian Ellis Profile picture
Jan 11
Outgoing U.S. Dep. Secretary of Defense:

“We want the PRC leadership to wake up each day, consider the risks of aggression, and think to themselves, ‘today is not the day’ — and for them to think that today, and every day, between now and 2027, in 2035, 2049, and beyond.”
"Outpacing the PRC: Lessons Learned for Strategic Competition"
Full quote: Image
Read 5 tweets
Ian Ellis Profile picture
Jan 9
Top conflicts to watch in 2025: @CFR_org

“The possibility that the U.S. could find itself in wars with not one but two major, nuclear-armed powers simultaneously is very real. The stakes today... cannot be overstated.”

680 experts prioritized 30 global hot spots (thread) Image
“The level of armed conflict around the world has steadily grown in recent years, which in turn has increased the risk of costly U.S. military intervention. This is particularly the case in the Middle East, which continues to be wracked by deadly violence across multiple countries. This violence has clear potential to intensify and spread. The horrific war in Ukraine that by some estimates has already claimed a million casualties also shows no sign of abating. This conflict could likewise escalate in ways that threaten vital U.S. interests and necessitate much deeper and more costly involvement. While the situation in the Indo-Pacific region is comparatively peaceful, numerous flashpoints exist, not least across the Taiwan Strait and in the South China Sea, that could suddenly ignite and rapidly draw in the U.S.”
“There have never been so many contingencies rated as high likelihood/high impact events (five) since the PPS began in 2008. Put differently, the level of anxiety that survey respondents feel about the risk of violent conflict over the coming twelve months has never been greater. Of the thirty contingencies surveyed, twenty-eight are judged to be either highly or moderately likely to occur in the next twelve months. Eighteen of those, moreover, would have a high or moderate impact on U.S. interests.”Image
Read 7 tweets

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