Are Chinas military interests in the Indian Ocean a threat to the US?
US Air Force Lt. Col. Christopher Pehrson called China’s military strategy in the area the “String of Pearls,” defining it as a “manifestation of China’s rising geopolitical influence through efforts to increase access to ports and airfields, develop special diplomatic relationships, and modernize military forces.” He wrote in 2006 that “a question posed by the ‘String of Pearls’ is the uncertainty of whether China’s growing influence is in accordance with Beijing’s stated policy of ‘peaceful development,’ or if China one day will make a bid for regional primacy.” That question is being weighed by strategic thinkers in the US and elsewhere. In 2008, China boosted defense spending to $60 billion – nearly 20 percent. The United States Joint Forces Command, in its 2008 assessment of the global strategic environment, carries a graphic detailing China’s “pearls,” which stretch from its deepwater port at Hainan Island, past a string of port facilities on the Burmese coast and in Bangladesh,
