7th Fleet Focus: A Twist to the Kitty Hawk Incident

Last night I speculated a bit about the reasons why China denied access to the Kitty Hawk Strike Group visitation to Hong Kong, but in catching up on the news of the week I think it should be noted there was another event taking place at the time. From what we have gathered from the news, back around November 19th the USS Patriot (MCM 7) and USS Guardian (MCM 5) were denied visitation to Hong Kong to refuel and take shelter from a storm. A few days later the Kitty Hawk Strike Group was also denied visitation.

Well, according to the Chinese Media, the PLAN was conducting a major exercise in the region that included nearly 20 ships and several dozen aircraft. As Feng has noted, most of the article itself is propaganda, nonetheless it raises the question whether the US Navy was perhaps observing a bit too close for China's tastes.

It is noteworthy there is no word at all regarding the exercise in the western press, including in all of the comments by Admiral Keating made regarding the incident. One would think he would be at least minimally aware that China was conducting a live fire exercise in the region.

I don't think this excuses China for its behavior, but it could potentially explain it. Irrational behavior is a potential side effect that could be expected by the PLAN if they felt the least bit intimidated by 4 acres of sovereign US territory sailing near their major PLAN exercise.

Given the location of the exercise based on Chinese media reporting, and the probable travel routes of both the minesweepers and eventually the CSG from the South China Sea, the US Navy would have been near the areas of the exercise around the time of the exercise.

Update: Never mind, the quality here may be in decline, because right under my nose Yankee Sailor links to a story that discusses the Chinese exercises. By the way, those pictures from the Chinese link are worth a peek.