.If the United States is the initiator of the Taiwan Strait issue, then Japan is the stakeholder of the Taiwan Strait issue.

For the United States, Taiwan is just a relatively important link in the strategic chain of encirclement and suppression of China, not a decisive link. After completing the great cause of unification, China can only break through the first island chain from Taiwan and obtain a strategic channel to enter the Western Pacific waters. Because there are the Ryukyu Islands to the north and the Philippine Islands to the south, Taiwan is still in the United States' strategic double-team. Even if China enters the Western Pacific, it has to face the second island chain carefully deployed by the United States and has to cross half of the Pacific Ocean to pose a threat to the United States. The United States has a very huge strategic depth, and losing the first line of defense will not have an immediate obvious impact.

For Japan, it is not so optimistic.

Before entering the Western Pacific, China could only pose a threat to Japan in the East China Sea direction, and Japan only needed to strengthen the strategic forces in the western region to cope with it.

After the Second Korean War, Japan's strategic security has deteriorated seriously.

The reason is very simple. The volunteer army did not withdraw all of them, and North Korea owed huge extra debts, so sooner or later it would lease the military base to China. After obtaining North Korea's military base, the squadrons could enter the Sea of ​​Japan and threaten Japan's mainland from the north, forcing Japan to extend its strategic defense line.

If China obtains access to the Western Pacific, Japan will face the threat of a full siege.

This is not the biggest problem.

In any case, the Japan-US alliance agreement is there, unless China is confident of challenging the United States' maritime hegemony and defeating the United States on the ocean, it will not attack Japan's mainland.

For Japan, the most important thing to consider is not local security, but strategic route security.

As the world's third largest importer of raw materials, Japan's strategic materials are heavily dependent on imports. The grain of African Agricultural Reclamation Group, oil from the Middle East, rubber from Southeast Asia and ore from Australia all need to be transported by sea, and more than 60% of them are imported from the Southwest strategic route.

This route must pass through the waters around Taiwan.

Just imagine, if China completes the great cause of unification and controls the international waterways around Taiwan, even a strategic blockade with limited scale can destroy Japan.

Before the outbreak of the Second Korean War, Japan followed the United States and repeatedly reiterated its strategic interests on the Taiwan Strait issue.

As the United States gradually withdraws from the frontline defense line in the Western Pacific region, Japan will inevitably actively fill the power vacuum left by the United States for basic security reasons.

In fact, that's what Japan does.

The construction of air stations on Xibi Island and the construction of naval terminals on Yunako Island are all aimed at the Taiwan Strait and strengthen the military presence on the southwest strategic route.

Relatively speaking, the sovereignty dispute between China and Japan on the Diaoyu Islands is nothing at all.

Japan's requirements for basic strategic security are understandable, and it is normal for China to pursue the great cause of unification, so there are irreconcilable contradictions between the two sides.

This contradiction is enough to make both sides fight each other.

What the United States needs to do is to ignite the fuse at the right time and let these two powerful countries fight for unabandoned interests.

Now, the time is ripe.

At the beginning of the year, Chandler smelled the smell of gunpowder between China and Japan, especially after Japan announced the strengthening of military deployment in the Okinawa Islands.

It was not Chandler's decision to create conflicts and push China and Japan to the battlefield.

The Secretary of Defense has no right to make a decision on such a major matter.

But Chandler knew very well what Macmillan was thinking.

After being sworn in, Macmillan did a lot, but the US global strategy has not been substantially improved, and voters have been disappointed with him. Next year, a new election will begin again. Before that, Macmillan must do something practical to gain the support of voters.

What he had to do was to detonate a war that could bring huge benefits to the United States without the participation of the United States.

More importantly, through this war, more Americans must realize that China has posed a tangible threat to the global interests of the United States, so as to use the will of the people to dominate the future US policies and help him through a number of serious cases that will help enhance the strategic strength of the United States.

For Macmillan, the best choice is to detonate the Sino-Japanese conflict.

However, this matter must not be related to the United States, otherwise the United States may be involved in the Sino-Japanese military conflict.

McMillan handed this matter to Chandler because before he became Secretary of Defense, Chandler was the Director of Cia and a retired four-star general.

Following McMillan's instructions, Chandler made careful arrangements.

In March, after a Chinese intelligence ship was sunk by a patrol ship from the Japanese Maritime Guard Office near the Diaoyu Islands, Chandler sent an attacking nuclear submarine to the western Pacific. In order to cover up, or to avoid ties, the submarine was deployed in Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, rather than Apula Port in Guam.

This submarine has only one mission: the waiter creates trouble between China and Japan.

After two months of patient waiting, the opportunity finally came.

After the "Intelligence Ship Incident", although China was very restrained and did not send the assembled fleet, it only conducted a particularly targeted joint landing exercise in the waters of the Zhoushan Islands, which made the situation in the Taiwan Strait once full of gunpowder. However, the Chinese Navy did not retreat, but sent submarines with more secretive whereabouts to the eastern waters of the East China Sea to monitor nearby Japanese ships and survey the seabed terrain.

Japan did not retreat, and sent submarines and anti-submarine patrol aircraft in a tit-for-tat way.

However, these confrontations were all carried out under the table, and neither side made a big statement.

Why do you do this? Chandler is very clear.

Before the situation worsened to the point where war had to be used to resolve the problem, China and Japan lacked the confidence to win, or both believed that they could gain more benefits through non-war methods. More importantly, secret confrontations at the military level did not involve the core interests of both sides.

China's military modernization has worsened the situation in the Taiwan Strait.

As early as 2016, the newly elected Taiwan "President" Li Mingkui proposed a new arms procurement case despite the opposition of Liu Junshi who had retreated to the second line, including purchasing 160 F35a fighter jets from the United States for US$24 billion and re-proposing to purchase conventional submarines.

The squadron conducted a joint landing exercise in the Zhoushan Islands, making the Taiwanese authorities think that this was targeting the Taiwan Strait.

As a result, in April, Taiwan's "Vice President" Luo Bingkuan returned to Yale University as an alumni and took the opportunity to meet with senior U.S. officials, including Chandler, and formally proposed a new arms procurement plan. In addition to the F35a fighter jets and conventional submarines, he also proposed to purchase the US military's retired "Ticonderoga" class cruisers, and spent huge amounts of money to equip these cruisers with sea-based anti-missile systems.

Because the United States did not refuse Luo Bingkuan's entry, China temporarily withdrew its ambassador to the United States.

Taiwan is so active, so naturally there is no need for Japan to make a big splash.

From Japan's standpoint, as long as the Taiwan Strait issue intensifies, China cannot focus on the East China Sea and must spend more energy to solve the Taiwan Strait issue.

In fact, China does the same.

For example, after the "intelligence ship incident", China's restrained attitude was considered a direct manifestation of China's need to concentrate its efforts to resolve the Taiwan Strait crisis.

The question is, will China give in to the East China Sea issue?

To put it more directly, can the Taiwan Strait crisis be separated from the East China Sea dispute?

All politicians with a little vision should know that the Taiwan Strait and the East China Sea are inseparable. The two things are inherently related, and China cannot solve any problem alone.

There is no doubt that China's national leaders are very visionary.

As long as China makes up its mind and has sufficient military strength, it will solve two problems at the same time.

Determination is no problem, and China will never allow the country to divide.

As for military power, the Chinese Air Force and Navy have shown strong combat effectiveness in the Second Korean War, and there is no need to say more about the Army.

For Chinese national leaders, all they need is a reason to solve the problem.

Although fundamentally, this reason is mainly in Taiwan, not in the Diaoyu Islands. As long as China insists on claiming sovereignty over the Diaoyu Islands, no matter how long Japan has occupied it, China has a reason to take action when the time is ripe to retake the Diaoyu Islands. However, as long as the Diaoyu Islands issue worsens and develops to the point of fighting, the Chinese authorities will consider solving the Taiwan Strait issue at the same time.

If you take a step back, even if China does not take action in the Taiwan Strait, Japan will let China take action.

After recognizing this, what Chandler has to do is simple.

For example, in the waters where both sides have disputed, kill a Chinese submarine, or kill a Japanese submarine, or kill both sides' submarines at the same time.

Anyway, as long as both sides think that the other party did it, it will ignite the fuse of the war.

On May 18, 2019, this opportunity came.

Because the news sent back by the secret submarine carrying out the mission was very short, Chandler was not very clear about the actual situation, so he could only be sure that there was a conventional Chinese Navy submarine and a Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force submarine. The Virginia-class submarine fired a specially manufactured torpedo to each of the two submarines, and two more obvious explosions were heard one after another.

In other words, both submarines are likely to be sunk by torpedoes.

More importantly, the two submarines did not have time to float in Shanghai before sinking, so it was impossible to send a message. Even if the communication float was used, the signal sent was interfered with by the ec135. In the short term, it is impossible for both China and Japan to find out the truth of the incident.

It won't take long before both sides will be at a strife and fight in the East China Sea.

Chandler did not delay the time, he had to report to Macmillan immediately, and then let the president take appropriate action at the right time to worsen the situation.

In Chandler's view, China and Japan are only one step away from the outbreak of a war.

As long as one step forward in either direction, instead of both sides dealing with the matter with restraint, the war will break out before the truth comes to light.
Chapter completed!