Timothy A. Walton and Thomas H. Shugart pointed out a few months ago that US airfields face a threat of severe Chinese military attack:
People’s Liberation Army (PLA) strike forces of aircraft, ground-based missile launchers, surface and subsurface vessels, and special forces can attack US aircraft and their supporting systems at airfields globally, including in the continental United States. The US Department of Defense (DoD) has consistently expressed concern regarding threats to airfields in the Indo-Pacific, and military analyses of potential conflicts involving China and the United States demonstrate that the overwhelming majority of US aircraft losses would likely occur on the ground at airfields (and that the losses could be ruinous). But the US military has devoted relatively little attention, and few resources, to countering these threats compared to developing modern aircraft.
The People’s Republic of China, on the other hand, expects airfields to come under heavy attack in a potential conflict and has made major investments to defend, expand, and fortify them:
Since the early 2010s, the PLA has more than doubled its hardened aircraft shelters (HASs) and unhardened individual aircraft shelters (IASs) at military airfields, giving China more than 3,000 total aircraft shelters — not including civil or commercial airfields. This constitutes enough shelters to house and hide the vast majority of China’s combat aircraft. China has also added 20 runways and more than 40 runway-length taxiways, and increased its ramp area nationwide by almost 75 percent. In fact, by our calculations, the amount of concrete used by China to improve the resilience of its air base network could pave a four-lane interstate highway from Washington, DC, to Chicago. As a result, China now has 134 air bases within 1,000 nautical miles of the Taiwan Strait—airfields that boast more than 650 HASs and almost 2,000 non-hardened IASs.
[…]
Since the early 2010s, examining airfields within 1,000 nautical miles of the Taiwan Strait, and outside of South Korea, the US military has added only two HASs and 41 IASs, one runway and one taxiway, and 17 percent more ramp area. Including ramp area at allied and partner airfields outside Taiwan, combined US, allied, and partner military airfield capacity within 1,000 nautical miles of the Taiwan Strait is roughly one-third of the PRC’s. Without airfields in the Republic of Korea, this ratio drops to one-quarter, and without airfields in the Philippines, it falls further, to 15 percent.
“Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.”
Typo: “iPeople’s”.
[Isegoria: Fixed!]
The recent exchange between India and Pakistan revealed a bigger problem.
The Chinese-supplied force had complete networking and integration of fighters, long range missiles, AWACS aircraft and ground radars. The Pakis slaughtered the Indian aircraft, which included three ultramodern French Rafales (at $240 million per copy), with no losses of their own. The Rafales never got to launch their own missiles.
The Chinese’s own air force is at least two generations more advanced than the equipment sold to Pakistan.
Egypt and other Gulf states might acquire the Chinese systems, too. Something for the Israelis to ponder.
Any US base within range of PRC short & med range ballistic missiles is toast within minutes of the beginning of hostilities with the PRC. Just too many missiles to counter or survive. Same thing with allied bases. Note, I did not even mention LRBMs or hypersonics. Only way US & allies could maintain land-based aircraft is in a dispersed fashion, like the Swiss used to.
As demonstrated 10 years ago, it’s more than “can shoot at”, mainly due to sloppiness.
https://visionsofempire.wordpress.com/2015/10/13/china-in-alaska-part-i-sending-a-message/
https://visionsofempire.wordpress.com/2015/10/27/china-in-alaska-part-ii-turning-the-other-cheek/