林中斌 部落格 / Blog Chong-Pin Lin

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TAIPEI, Taiwan — China's recent military advances have launched a debate in security circles on whether the People's Liberation Army is more bark or bite.

Much of the talk has focused on China's new anti-ship ballistic missile, which is now deployed, according to the top U.S. military commander in the Pacific. Not to mention today's news about a runway test for China's first radar-evading stealth fighter. State media called the news "rumors" and played down the aircraft's capabilities.

But for one top Taiwanese security analyst, rumors of the runway test and China's other upgrades have already achieved their key objective: to mess with U.S. war planners' heads.

"It's a very effective deterrent on the minds of strategic planners in Washington," said Lin Chong-Pin, a former Taiwan defense official who teaches strategy at Tamkang University. "The Chinese don’t have to do anything in the future. Their announcement has already thrown a monkey wrench in strategic planning for U.S. action in and around the Taiwan Strait."

To be sure, no one is arguing that China could beat the United States in a full-out conflict. U.S. military spending, war-fighting experience and technology vastly outmatch China's. That would make any war between the world's sole superpower and its rising challenger a lopsided, if devastating, fight.

But Lin and other experts say China's rapid military advances have exposed the vulnerabilities of one linchpin of U.S. military might: the aircraft carrier battle group. Now, they say, China has advanced just enough to deter or slow such a battle group from joining a fight in East Asia — thereby forcing U.S. strategists to rethink war plans, for example in a flare-up over Taiwan.

China's so-called "carrier-killer" missile is just one of its recent advances. It has also demonstrated its prowess in anti-satellite warfare. And its fleet of attack submarines — now Asia's largest — continues to grow apace.

Add to that the recent news that China's first aircraft carrier (a refurbished Soviet hand-me-down) may sail as early as next year, and that its advanced stealth fighter may be for real, and some are alarmed. "We are seeing the erection of a new Chinese wall in the western Pacific, for which the Obama administration has offered almost nothing in defensive response," security expert Richard Fisher told the Washington Times.

Others downplay the threat. They stress that the anti-ship ballistic missile has not yet been fully tested, involves extremely complex technology and can be countered through various means, including attacks on China's military satellites that would be key to the missile's targeting.

But Tamkang University's Lin said fundamental trends are "not favorable for the U.S. to maintain its dominance in East Asia, and even in space."

"Currently the Chinese are far behind, of course, but one country [the U.S.] is going level or down, the other is going up fast," he said.

For Lin, the real question is not whether the ballistic missile and China's other new equipment would turn the tide in an actual fight. The question is whether such advances can alter U.S. strategic thinking — and by that measure, the answer is already a "yes."