China Conducts Mock South China Sea Bombing Drills Amid U.S. Tensions

Chinese fighter jets and bombers have completed a series of combat readiness exercises in the disputed South China Sea, as Beijing continues to assert its dominance over an area that has become a tense flashpoint in the brewing Sino-U.S. confrontation.

Three of China’s five main military regions launched air combat readiness exercises, according to The South China Morning Post citing state media.

Among them was the Southern Theater Command, which oversees Chinese armed forces operating in the South China Sea. State-run China National Radio said Tuesday that Southern Theater Command sent two bombers to an undisclosed location for day and night combat training.

Last month, China’s defense ministry said that bombers practiced night take-offs and long-range bombing raids on targets in the South China Sea.

Haike News—a news app operation by the overseas arm of the People’s Daily newspaper, which is the official publication of the Chinese Communist Party—reported that Chinese fighter jets also conducted exercises around the Subi Reef, an atoll in the South China Sea that Beijing has expanded into an artificial island with a military base.

The aircraft included a Su-30 fighter and an aerial refueling tanker, Haike News said. The exercises lasted for more than 10 hours and involved mid-air refueling. The state-backed Global Times newspaper said the Su-30 flight set a new record for a single sortie by a Chinese fighter jet.

https://www.newsweek.com/china-conducts-mock-south-china-sea-bombing-raids-us-tensions-1523021