China's Anxiety About US Missile Defence: A Solution

摘要

On 26 March 2012, the United States announced its ballistic-missile-defence (BMD) plan in the Asia-Pacific and the Middle East.1 The following August, it was reported that Washington was planning to deploy two forward-based X-band (FBX) radars in southern Japan and Southeast Asia (perhaps the Philippines) to supplement the one already positioned in Aomori Prefecture in northern Japan.2 During his visit to Japan in September 2012, then US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta reached an agreement with his Japanese counterpart on the deployment of a second FBX radar.3 In February 2013, Japan and the United States declared that this new radar would be deployed in the Kyogamisaki base in Kyotango, Kyoto Prefecture.4 As expected, Beijing expressed its strong opposition, despite Washington's insistence that it was not directed against China or Russia.