A Chinese fighter jet pilot performed "an unjustified aggressive maneuver" near a US military reconnaissance aircraft operating over the South China Sea, the US military denounced on Tuesday (May 30th). The incident comes at a time of already high tensions between Beijing and Washington over issues such as Taiwan or the overflight of a Chinese balloon over US territory in late 2022.
The Chinese plane flew Friday "directly ahead and within 120 meters of the nose of the RC-135, forcing the U.S. aircraft to traverse turbulence in its wake," the U.S. military's Indo-Pacific Command (IndoPacom) said in a statement. The RC-135, a military reconnaissance aircraft, "conducted routine operations without risk over the South China Sea and within international airspace, in accordance with international law," IndoPacom added.
Video footage released shows a fighter jet passing in front of an American plane, which is seen shaken by the turbulence following this passage.
A senior U.S. military official speaking on condition of anonymity said there was "an alarming increase in the number of interceptions and risky aerial confrontations at sea" by Chinese aircraft and ships. Such acts "can create a dangerous incident or miscalculation," he added. "We do not consider that (these interceptions) are carried out by pilots operating independently," the senior official said, also stating: "We believe that this is part of a broader repeated pattern."
'An alarming increase in the number of risky confrontations'
A similar incident involving a Chinese fighter jet and a US RC-135 had already taken place in December, forcing the US aircraft to "perform evasive maneuvers to prevent a collision," IndoPacom said at the time. The latest incident comes a day after the Pentagon claimed Beijing had declined a U.S. invitation to hold a meeting this week in Singapore between Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and his Chinese counterpart Li Shangfu. But, according to the senior US official, the two announcements are not linked.
Lloyd Austin and other U.S. officials are working to strengthen U.S. alliances in Asia to counter Beijing's increasingly assertive actions in the region, though both sides have also at times played appeasement. White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Vienna in May. And U.S. President Joe Biden recently indicated that relations between Washington and Beijing should "very soon" relax.