the “Achilles heel” of the U.S. strategic posture is its dependence on forward bases. Deny access to those bases and you roll back American power. The observation was included in a paper by Andrew Krepinevich of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a defense-oriented think tank.
Both China and Iran are well along in their efforts to achieve “access denial,” Krepinevich wrote.
China is developing anti-satellite weapons, boosting its cyberwarfare capabilities, threatening America’s computerized command-and-control networks.
It is building up its conventional forces, including the recent launch of its first aircraft carrier. China is also investing heavily in medium-range missiles, a weapon category in which the U.S. was disarmed by a Cold War treaty with Moscow.
Iran’s military capabilities are far less imposing, but it enjoys important crucial geographic advantages. The Persian Gulf’s entire eastern shore is Iranian territory, much of it fronted by a high ridge and lined with dozens of ports and harbors capable of hiding patrol boats and other small craft.
Any U.S. force passing the narrow Strait of Hormuz during a confrontation could expect to face a “hornet’s nest of Iranian mines, submarines, torpedoes, anti-ship cruise missiles and suicide swarm boats, supplemented by land-based strike aircraft and Special Forces,” Krepinevich wrote.
Keeping the peace requires deterrence, and deterrence requires strength. Count on Beijing and Teheran to closely follow the work of the supercommittee.