WAIKIKI, Hawaii—The Chinese government is “on a dangerous course” and its military’s “aggressive maneuvers around Taiwan right now are not exercises, as they call them. They are rehearsals,” U.S. Indo-Pacific Command leader Adm. Sam Paparo said today.
The Chinese actions—which just this month have included sending multiple spy balloons, naval vessels, and military planes around the island—are “rehearsals for the forced unification of Taiwan to the mainland,” Paparo said at the Honolulu Defense Forum.
What’s more, China’s “increasingly complex multi-domain operations demonstrates clear intent and improving capability,” he said
When Paparo took command of U.S. Pacific Fleet in 2021, the Chinese military did a summer exercise with one brigade. The following year, the exercise grew to six brigades. In summer 2024, it was 42 brigades—as well as 150 Chinese navy vessels, 200 amphibious assault craft practicing “breach of obstacles and outward movement to military operations in urban terrain,” he said.
The rapid increase in aggressive actions and drills has also made it more possible that the “fig leaf of an exercise” could disguise intentions, the admiral said—adding that AI “would be a very effective tool to suss out that kind of warning.”
Paparo also evinced concern about recent cooperation between China, Russia, and North Korea, which he called a “triangle of troublemakers.”
“We see their coordination on everything from joint bomber patrols that penetrate the American [air defense identification zone] to shared anti-satellite capabilities and advanced submarine technologies from the seabed to the heavens.”
Paparo also painted a troubling picture of U.S. readiness with maintenance backlogs, munition stockpiles running low, and aging platforms. But he said that despite those challenges, the United States maintains “war-winning advantages” in space, counter-space, and cyber, and a “generational advantage” in submarines.
Alluding to the Navy’s “hellscape” concept of using a swarm of unmanned systems in the air, on land, and at sea to defend Taiwan, he said the idea is not to replace troops, but rather to give “warriors the advantage they deserve.”
The technology for such a defense already exists, he said, and the “concepts are proven,” but the challenge is to scale and integrate it.
“Technology alone is not going to win this fight,” Paparo said, but added that the Pentagon must act quickly to streamline its acquisition system so that “procurement [moves] at the speed of combat, not at the speed of committee.”
