US May Use Military To Confront China In South China Sea Islands Dispute

• US May Use Military To Confront China In South China Sea Islands Dispute
  by Tyler Durden, www.zerohedge.com  
  Just days after Japanese PM Shinzo Abe leaves Washington (having stepped up his nation’s military assertiveness), The Wall Street Journal reports that the US Secretary of Defense has asked staff for military options in the South China Sea (as we have detailed China’s land reclamation efforts):
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  *U.S. MAY USE MILITARY TO CONFRONT CHINA IN SPRATLY ISLANDS DISPUTE: WSJ
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  Having ironically commented on China’s “bullying,” it appears Nobel-Peace-Prize winner President Obama is preparing for an even bigger objective, amid China’s rising threat to USD dominance (with Yuan liberalization and AIIB success).
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  As The Wall Street Journal reports, the U.S. military is considering using aircraft and Navy ships to directly contest Chinese territorial claims to a chain of rapidly expanding artificial islands, U.S. officials said, in a move that would raise the stakes in a regional showdown over who controls disputed waters in the South China Sea.
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  Defense Secretary Ash Carter has asked his staff to look at options that include flying Navy surveillance aircraft over the islands and sending U.S. naval ships to well within 12 nautical miles of reefs that have been built up and claimed by the Chinese in an area known as the Spratly Islands.
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  Such moves, if approved by the White House, would send a message to Beijing that the U.S. won’t accede to Chinese territorial claims to the man-made islands in what the U.S. considers to be international waters and airspace.
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  The proposal under consideration would be to send Navy ships and aircraft to within 12 nautical miles of only those built-up sites that the U.S. doesn’t legally consider to be islands, officials say.
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