AirSea battle

Very interesting article

http://www.airforce-magazine.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/2010/August%202010/0810battle.aspx

No Fait Accompli

The concept of AirSea Battle is being forged in a collaborative effort of Pacific Air Forces, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, and the Pentagon’s influential Office of Net Assessment.

AirSea Battle was begun under the former PACAF commander, Gen. Carrol H. Chandler, now vice chief of staff of the Air Force. CSBA is a Washington think tank with close ties to the Pentagon, two of its chief researchers, Jan M. van Tol and Andrew F. Krepinevich Jr., having worked in the Office of Net Assessment, while Mark A. Gunzinger was engaged in drafting the Pentagon’s Defense Planning Guidance and Jim Thomas toiled on the Quadrennial Defense Review. The Office of Net Assessment, often labeled the Defense Department’s internal think tank, has been led for nearly 40 years by Andrew W. Marshall, considered to be among the nation’s foremost strategic thinkers.

Over the last three years, the collaborators have staged a half-dozen wargames to scope the tasks of AirSea Battle and have sent their findings to the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, Gen. Norton A. Schwartz, and the Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Gary Roughead. Schwartz and Roughead signed a memorandum of understanding in September to proceed on AirSea Battle. Each appointed a team of four O-6s to draft tentative doctrine to govern AirSea Battle.

The draft doctrine will undoubtedly be sandpapered for many months before an agreement is reached.

Based on PLA writings, researchers at CSBA have discerned a likely Chinese strategy for seeking to drive US forces out of the western Pacific, a strategy they say “mimics the Imperial Japanese strategy of 1941-1942.”

The Japanese mounted the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, intending to destroy the US Pacific Fleet. Simultaneously, the Japanese Army invaded the Philippines and broke out of northern Vietnam to transit across Thailand into what is now Malaysia and on to Singapore. They took what is now Indonesia, critical islands in the South Pacific, and threatened Australia, then marched to the gates of India. Japan intended to present the Western powers with a fait accompli and sue for peace. That strategy, however, failed.

Would be suprised if the PLAAF follow the same strategy but I guess they need something to defend against and the picket line across southeast and west Asia is not a bad idea.