NEW DELHI: According to US intelligence officials, Russia and China are working more closely together on defense issues, including a possible conquest of Taiwan, which could prompt novel planning by the authorities to counteract a possible scenario where the nations might cooperate militarily.
In testimony to Congress on Thursday, director of national intelligence Avril Haines said,” We see China and Russia exercising jointly in relation to Taiwan and acknowledging that this is a place where China unquestionably wants Russia to work with them, and we see no reason why they would n’t.”
At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, South Dakota’s Republican Senator Mike Rounds inquired about like a probable scenario. He even inquired about the Pentagon’s plans for a situation like this with the mind of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse responded,” We need to take that into account even more seriously because the Defense Department is concerned about our combined forces ‘ needs in an atmosphere where” Russia and China “would undoubtedly been joint.”
Rounds said that the” the bottom line is that, generally, if we were to have a fight with one, odds are that we would have a second top”, affecting planning, technology and workforce needs.
” Truly it’s a possibility”, Haines said. Depending on the situation,” the issue of how good it is” is, in my opinion, varies. Haines added that knowledge assessments indicate there is “increasing participation in the’ no- limits ‘ relationship” between Russia and China “across actually every sector of society: social, economic, military, scientific and so on”.
