It is one of the last things you want to do with any kind of ship like that. Happened when the uss cal pence today. Two halt a crash. It was meant to represent that. Crashbackhis term, is. Thepolicy and arrow western pacific two. Oo. Where did you go to catch up on what was going on . Aboard a chinese worship. I was on heaps of american and australian warships. I went into singapore. Throughout the whole region. What was your conclusion . We are it is that engaged in a war of words with china, it is not a cold war, the oldfashioned cold war. This is a jostling that is for theand shoving right to operate in International Waters. All of this research when did you finish it . Writing the book right after the election last year. The election in 2016 . Yes. But who was the most interesting character you met . Harry harris. Al he is the commander of the specific commands. Pacific command. He is japanese by birth. He is the perfect person for that job at this time. More than that, he has a real feel of the pulse of how far you need to go to stop the chinese without escalating to something that creates war. How would he best describe himself . He says i hate to lose. I was one way he described himself. Was an aviator for the navy and he has that look and feel about him as someone who is in charge, knows what he is doing and is not going to stop until he gets it done. Lets look at video to see who Andrew Harris as. Nobody including me once conflict. I have been loud and clear that i prefer cooperation so that we can share our security challenges. But i want to be loud and clear that we will not allow this to be closed down unilaterally. No matter how many bases are taste on artificial features in the South China Sea. Michael at the time i met him. He just made admiral, he was in charge of the specific week. 2013, hed have been had just taken charge out there. He had just come aboard and the price was full of stories, especially in the Chinese Press about concerns over his heritage. Ever wonder how he felt about the chinese were worried. They hoped that someone would take a much tougher stance. His predecessor said the biggest concern is climate change. Where is he . He is in charge of specific commands. In the spring, he ones that down. There he is out there have been reports of the freedom navigation at that and our ships sail in the natural waters to prevent we can. He has run this operation and things like that right now. Admiral harris is have chinese, half american. Japanese. He was born where . He was born in japan. So his father by then and shes in the navy, his mother had calmed from one of the bombed out cities and going to work on naval bases there. The two of the net and then over in thee was west pacific. Kentucky. Ew up in he was raised trueblue american. What is the significance of him being have japanese and we are talking about the relationship to the United States with china. View,m his point of especially from growing up, his mother, he got a sense of the asian philosophy, eric patient. A group of people willing to a generations. But in his current position, the chinese have a very gut level reaction to the japanese going back centuries. Especially preworld war ii. There is a sense among the Chinese People of some of the things that were done when japan invaded china at that time that had not been forgotten. It wasas a sense that have japanese and therefore he has something against china. He is going to take action that is going to be seen as antichinese. That is the way they felt. This is not a picture but it is a drawing of the map of that area. This is an idea of china considers to be this its territory. As the Biggest Issue going on right now. Is some of the largest area for International Shipping and International Trade as well as areas represented by our allies like japan and south korea. And off, we are having trouble with vietnam are now. You try to reestablish vietnam. We are going to have Aircraft Carrier calls. Right now, you can get an idea hes chinaying sea, South China Sea, that is their territory. Thereerything alone if you they said want to sell here, you have to is the International Skies and we will do what we want. Now, the top of the east china sea, those were surveillance ships and for the most part that was chinese their time forces. This is working with some of the Government Forces and things like that. Scripting ust of up at that. Down in the South China Sea and this ish of hong kong, one of the most important places where chinese militaries and secret subbase is. A big buildup if you will, you have this incident where a v3 is one of our Surveillance Aircraft it was taking some pictures and things like that. Right as it was doing that, it had the chinese aircraft that startedthat basically doing some kind of aggressive actions toward an aircraft. In this particular case, it was a collision and the chinese aircraft was lost. Daraprim, they found the crew was sent back. Close it is a very large aircraft, it is similar to the size of the 737. It is filled with this incredible amount of intelligence gathering information, sensors that can take pictures, sensors that can take all kinds of signals. Basically, one big vacuum cleaner. How Many American sailors would be on that ship . Michael you have a dozen or more at any given time. What is International Law when that plane was flying over that area of the map. Basically, there going to keep on going straight. Go to the pilot of the chinese jet. And someone about what he did. Be was known before then as being a very aggressive pilot. This was someone who would come andgainst american aircraft the airstream would bump the plane. He comes over, rose down, flying circles around our aircraft, eric close and very dangerous. How did that accident happened . Michael this particular aircraft had a issue with stalling. A jet fire is going to have to go very slow to go sidebyside with some of this. They think he was trying to maneuver and lost control and flipped up into the plane and the prop is going to cut that aircraft in half almost. What happened to him . Michael he was never found. They wondered if he rejected and that he did at the aircraft was lost. What did china do in relationship . Are plane landed on the territory. That happened after this was going to the bush administration. We are putting different Holding Areas and do it all kinds of interrogations and things like that. If you go back to this book, he describes this dashboard to fly this born to fly. That is something they are trained to do. This is what they were trying to charge them with. China wanted an apology from the u. S. And the u. S. Was loath to apologize for doing something that it was allowed to do you are allowed to Fly International space is five. Very recently we had some information to come out about a rush russian ship. U. S. Was not about to apologize for something youre going to do anyway. This was the death of a pilot, account apology. This very specifically apologizing. Bowties to say you apologized, they said is like a mini run. At that point in time, this is a lot of back and forth. The plane was important pieces. It was finally sent to the u. S. After that, the amount of intelligence, not to much capability but they now live what our capabilities were with that aircraft. That was our premier spy. How to jump to 2013. Think abc 10 is an san diego for this because you started talking about the uss covens cruisers incident. Lets watch what they were reporting back then. This is how make a dangerous turn in the South China Sea to avoid the chinese ship that pulled in front of it. But a Chinese Government run newspaper is accusing the u. S. Navy of harassing chinese ships. The uss cowpens got too close. You are smiling . Smiling . Michael i was. Though i did that they would be harassing the chinese ramada. There is one thing reported in that segment. They have to carry is now but that was their own carrier. They declared this 27 square mile no operator around the carrier. An island that says this is our territory now. Was will idea that the us harassing all of these chinese s who was the skipper . The captain was a rising star in the u. S. Navy at the time. He had commanded before this. He was someone who was really looking for bigger things out there. He was given a job which before thesencident was honestly are coming out. They said this could basically put extra dock. Wetead, they briskly said have an idea now, were going back to the western pacific, is a part of the rebalance. Are talking about rebounds of our forces in the western pacific. The pivot, rebalance, whatever you want to call it, exactly. Listen, we have this cruiser, it is best. This is a lone wolf patrol. Theree some presence out and so this i get a crew ready that is on another cruiser. With one of the best new combat systems around and were going back to a ship that was let go from an iphone 10 to one of the first left loons. Flip phones. The captain after this incident did not have a very fruitful career. Sick and there is a question of how sick he was, i talked to quite a few times and it seemed that he was pretty sick. He spent a lot of time in his cabin after this. You talk about the two different cabins on the praise. Bridge andser to the this is basically the port. That is when dignitaries come aboard. He was at the center of the lesser cabin for most of the time. He had been traded for a sickness. Treated for a sickness. The thing was that he was running the ship as much as he could from the cabin. When did people start raising concerns . The incident that happened with the chinese armada in early december. By the end of december and january is when there were concerns. One was about him being in the cabin. There are captains with idiosyncrasies but it was because he spent a lot more time with his xo. The executive officer. He sent his regular xo packing because he thought the regular xo had lost the faith and control of the crew. ,is chief engineer moved over this was a woman into destiny savage. There was some banter around the crew that the captain andy xo and the xo were having relations. Was it just banter . Michael when the crew came back a whole bunch of things happened. We took the ship out, it was in horrible shape. He got into just good enough. With it, it back was in bad shape, not as bad as when he took it out but it wasnt in bad shape. You can only take a broken car so far, whatever, it is hard to say but when it came back, it was in bad shape. He asked the review team to come aboard and give a report to him over what kind of shape it was. This is the banter it was the shape of the ship. When you talk to people in and out of the pentagon, they were there at the time and was in mand of the pacific side if you talk to everyone, it has never been called that. That is the way they felt it was. They were all able to leave the service. They were kicked out but they were not able to leave the service. The chinese Aircraft Carrier. You said they were to michael the original was a handmedown. Story a very interesting china first bought it that you will make the casino. Place on theing two portuguese buildings. That is what the cover story was. Then he took it and fixed it up. In the meantime, what theyve done is in this light design and build their own Aircraft Carrier. The recently, he Just Launched that and it was tested. Lets look at some video of the awning. Is a big difference in our Aircraft Carriers. Click the biggest difference is how they launch recover aircraft. It is a very sweet talking ship. It has that ski slope up there and basically uses the jets thrust. For the most part it is the jet taking off. With to usecarries the systems. We will throw that out there. As a result, we can put up operations in different kinds of weather and that is that. This is a training ship for the most part. They are learning how not only to operate on a carrier but a it is a major logistical nightmare. Right now we have 10. We just recently said were going to have 12. That is the idea, to have a dozen going forward. Out in the pacific . Onlyel we have the forward based carrier in the world. Its base is japan right now. For everything else, on the east st side, the carriers based out of san diego. In this case, this is base. It is home its home port is in japan right now. It patrols the region. You have a task force that is going around the region. Theses, cruise ships will peel off. They gone Solo Missions here and there. It will operate drills and it will make calls. Doing drillscop constantly. Likeything were to happen a Natural Disaster or Something Like that you have the aircraft going in and dealing supplies and eight and things like that. You talk about some of the chinese captains and admirals. Is the captain still there . No, he is not, i dont know where he has gone. I did not meet him but i have talked to some people who have. He is someone who is very engaging, very intelligent. He is very pleasant. He speaks english. They settle things out that day before they escalated too far. Someone id as can tell you on our side that people were very impressed with him. He was the chief of Naval Operations. Is he no longer the head . Is ael admiral greener former submarine or. He starts off everything by saying i dont know much quite honestly he knew a lot. What role did he play between the United States and the chinese . Job was tothat his keep things from escalated too far and the best way to do that was to develop a strong relationship out there. He would always be looking for ways to get us engaged with core exercises. Chinese to come. Was met very much a guy who would lean forward and shake your hand. He get his personal number two admiral lu. His own number . The admiral said that i cant give you mine. The pentagon people were not happy with that interaction. Lus job . S admiral how did you meet him . Michael he grew up in a communist regime. He is very party minded. He is also very chinese minded. The chinese are a very patriotic people. They call china the motherland. He is also considered a topnotch mariner, someone who is very much into it with growing the navy, modernizing the navy and making sure they act appropriately. His operas were in english so that they could do drills properly. You said there are 12 Chinese Nuclear subs, there are 30 other subs 75 missile destroyers, andhelicopter landing ships 60 carrier aircraft that would be on the Aircraft Carrier how does that compare with the United States . Overall it is a very small portion. Glad we have 11 Aircraft Carriers and they have two. Destroyers, at any point in time, we have 40 or 50 out there, we had a half dozen cruisers. Im thinking operational. What is the difference . Slightly bigger. What a cruise includes is that separate areale that you can do more to set Defense Operations and also for command and control. Big airser is your command, and defense type of ship. Chinese intohe build a significant navy . This was in 95 and 96 there are trying to get them to stop shooting missiles over toward taiwan. They were getting them to think twice. First of all, there was a public shaming and the chinese lost a lot of space. It is hard for westerners to get an idea of what that means to the asian culture. Especially something as big and proud as china. They came with the never again mentality. They start with this mindset that we will build up our navy and our Missile Defense forces in such a way that we knew never this space like this again. Do we ever put a ship import in china . Yes, we did. We go to hong kong, sometimes we can do that annually. Trouble with the u. S. And china. There are other parts. Do the chinese ships visit the United States . Michael yes. The chinese our motto was over in honolulu. The chinese attitude is we can do it to you but you can to do it to us. What is that mean . Concerned,s china is the very specific incident when the chinese ships were anticipating impact i happens to be on the uss Ronald Reagan aircraft at the time and they were saying is that . It is. It was just why would they send a spy ship . They had sent the spy ship to every other impact before. But the idea was that you are coming, you are participating. What made what they make there was that we are going to do some of our operations now, especially from the aircraft. We do not publicly complain and you have as look right to be there. So go ahead, that is fine. Were s time when we when we are in International Waters are collecting intelligence, he will leave us dead but that didnt happen. There were a couple of incidents, especially some aircraft incidents over the other South China Sea where the chinese started complaining. They were flying internationally. Let me show you video of something that we have seen a lot, a manmade islands off the coast of china. How many of these are there . There are dozens. They are all manmade . Thing, youre is the have these areas that have a little bit of area popped up. But they have done is gone over at low tide and build them up. You have these errors and things like that that they have created into these as part of and. Grace you go back about a decade and a decade and a half and theyre putting on the asphalt and some like that. China kind of came late to the game. But they did it in their own way and they do so much better. They just expanded it. So that it can hold a military aircraft runway. Now, i believe there is about three or four that can actually handle that kind of aircraft. As far as theyre concerned, the whole