A native of Indiana, John Shields' career includes work in education, business and industry, management consulting. He is also a published writer / photographer and lecturer.
As a professor and head basketball coach at Purdue University Calumet in the late 1960's, Shields' office was located in the Armory of the Indiana Army National Guard 376th Engineering Company. For six years, in addition to his teaching and coaching duties, Shields worked closely with Army National Guard personnel.
Later, Shields was appointed Dean of Admissions at Culver Military Academy. During his Culver tenure, Shields worked closely with many active and retired military personnel from all branches of service. He became involved with Culver's JROTC program and was associated with military personnel from the U.S. Marines, Army, Navy and Air Force, along with military officers representing various foreign services.
While at Culver, Shields spent time at the United States Naval Academy, the United States Air Force Academy and the Citadel.
Later, his son was in his final Para Rescue training phase at Kirtland AFB when he suffered a career-ending fractured leg. He also has a nephew who graduated from the Canadian Military Academy and is now a Captain in the Canadian Army.
Shields has a unique prospective of the military, having worked as a civilian hand-in-glove with military people most of his working life.
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June 29, 2005
[Have an opinion on a John Shields column? Sound off in the Discussion
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China's pursuit of energy resources and the projection of power and influence in Asia may eventually lead to a conflict between China and the United States. In a recent opinion piece that I wrote for Military.com, I talked about the importance of training to be prepared for an adversary who is highly trained and well equipped. The question was then posed, "Would our military be adequately prepared to meet the challenge?"
Unfortunately, world events may be pointed in a direction where we may have a conflict with a military force comprised of troops who have strong national pride, vast manpower and much improved weaponry.
Right now we're mired combating terrorism in Afghanistan, Iraq and other parts of the world. As a result, our assets, both hardware and troop strength, are extended almost to the breaking point. Recruitment levels are much below expectations, so trained replacement troops are slow to come on line. We're also much more dependent on our National Guard and Reserve to take over major combat and support roles.
In addition to these issues is the fact that our intelligence agencies have either fallen asleep at the helm or have maintained a lax and perhaps cavalier attitude toward China's potential. They've downplayed Taiwan being threatened by China, thinking that if China ratcheted up war preparations in an attempt to perhaps retake Taiwan by force, American technology and power would be perceived as being too great to risk war.
Well, we've recently discovered that China is becoming a military power (striving for super power status) through stolen technology from the West, help from Russia and its own efforts to modernize its military.
Bill Gertz, Washington Times investigative reporter, discovered that the Chinese now have advanced missiles systems, land and sub-based, that can eventually be equipped with nuclear MIRV warheads that could defeat our defensive missiles now being installed. China has purchased sophisticated aircraft from Russia and has even produced their own fighter aircraft. The Chinese have manufactured 14 submarines that can be lethal; they have early warning aircraft systems, and surface-to-air and surface-to-surface missiles; and they have recently produced 23 amphibious landing craft capable of transporting troops to Taiwan.
The Chinese are concentrating a great deal of money and energy to engineer weaponry designed to defeat American aircraft carriers operating many miles off the China coast. This is a serious threat since carrier groups would constitute our main offensive force in case a conflict should break out with China.
Besides advanced weaponry that is more sophisticated than we first imagined, China has vast manpower and reserves that are trained and well indoctrinated.
One may ask, "How are the Chinese financing all this military equipment?" The simple answer is that the United States is supplying the resources through our purchases of inexpensive merchandise manufactured in China. Furthermore, the United States and other western countries are supplying advanced technology to help run China's manufacturing facilities, facilities that produce both consumer products and military hardware. This technology transfer allows China to bypass the research/development cycle, and reap immediate benefits from our efforts.
China is now flush with cash that it has gained from trade with the West, and is willing to spend that money not only to modernize their military but to purchase foreign companies and even attempt to use their new found influence in an attempt to isolate and undermine American strategic alliances.
China is making substantial inroads into South America and, even worse, is managing the Panama Canal, which could become a major choke point during a time of conflict.
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It has been reported that there are between 50,000 to 150,000 Chinese citizens attending American universities. Most Chinese students are pursuing engineering and scientific degrees so they can return to China and beat us at our own game. Hopefully, they'll experience the benefits of an open society and demand changes when they return, but that's a waning hope because the Chinese Communist government doesn't tolerate dissention.
As reported by Chinese citizens seeking political asylum and contrary to some thinking in the United States, China views America as their principal adversary!
Now let's examine a possible scenario. There are a number of "hot spots" around the world that could further complicate the situation with China. There's the increased concern that Iran will produce nuclear weapons and could soon pose a real threat in the Mideast not only to United States troops and our allies, but to Israel as well. We know that North Korea has nuclear weapons and perhaps a delivery system that could hit Japan and select cities in the United States. Combine that situation with the anti-American leadership of Venezuela, where the United States gets much of our oil, and the instability in Africa, and there could be more trouble spots than we can handle.
If all or even some of these trouble spots get active on or about the same time, we could be attempting to put out brush fires almost everywhere in the world, which would give the Chinese an excellent opportunity to move against Taiwan.
If the Chinese are emboldened by their new military strength and believe they have the trump card that would emasculate the United States because of possible nuclear reprisal directed at our mainland, then we're in serious trouble. China could take military action against Taiwan and there's not much we could do to prevent it.
This then brings us back to the initial question: Do we have adequate troops and ample hardware to handle multiple conflicts? Are our troops being trained properly to handle the likes of China, if it gets belligerent?
The answer to that question is still an unknown, but it's one that our leaders should be asking and preparing for.
This "quicksand" situation in Iraq may be termed a "minor encounter" when compared to what may lay in store for us in the not too distant future. Let's hope we can show overwhelming strength in Iraq, something that only the Mideast people seem to understand, and get Iraqi troops trained ASAP to carry the load. At the same time, the military should be preparing for possible combat against a much more sophisticated adversary.
© 2005 John Shields. All opinions expressed
in this article are the author's and do not necessarily reflect those
of Military.com.
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