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Experts tell Congress China, North Korea pose growing missile, naval and cyber threats to U.S. Pacific territories
Summary
Panel experts before the House Natural Resources subcommittee described an expanding set of military capabilities in China and North Korea's arsenals and recommended hardening, dispersal and expanded missile defenses for U.S. facilities in the Central Pacific.
Experts testifying to the House Natural Resources subcommittee on Indian and Insular Affairs said Chinese and North Korean military capabilities increasingly threaten U.S. bases and populations in the Pacific territories and urged steps to harden and disperse U.S. facilities and improve regional missile defenses.
Dean Chang, a nonresident senior fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, described expanding Chinese naval, air and long-range missile capabilities and said U.S. planners cannot rely solely on Guam. "The DF 26 apparently is specifically intended to range Guam," Chang said, citing the weapon as an example of Chinese intermediate-range strike systems. Chang told the panel Chinese forces now field expanded aerial refueling, long-range missiles and command-and-control platforms that complicate U.S. operations in the Western and Central Pacific.
Bruce Klinger, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, focused on North Korea's modernization and the threat to Guam and allied territories. He told the subcommittee that Pyongyang has fielded intermediate-range systems and new mobile ICBM capabilities; he recommended steps including augmenting regional missile defense, deploying additional THAAD assets on Guam, and pursuing an Aegis Ashore site on the island. Klinger also urged accelerating development and deployment of next-generation homeland interceptors to increase the ground-based interceptor count from currently deployed forces.
Members from Guam and other territories underscored the local consequences. Representative James Moylan said Guam hosts major U.S. logistics hubs and submarines and is "essential for the movement of personnel and supplies throughout the Indo PACOM." Committee members pressed witnesses on allied coordination and on specific force posture changes that could improve deterrence and protect U.S. assets and citizens in the region.
Witnesses and members also linked these military concerns to broader policy recommendations: dispersing infrastructure and hardening facilities, investing in resilient commercial infrastructure such as undersea cables that add redundancy, and increasing allied coordination on missile defenses.
