Interview: Washington plants seeds of fear about China

The US exaggerates China’s military threat in a bid to make Beijing look frightening in the eyes of the American public, says a political commentator and journalist in Atlanta, Georgia.

Jim W. Dean, a managing editor at VT, made the remarks when asked about the US military sightings of a fleet of Chinese warships near the US coasts of Alaska.

“This is a very strange story; it is a classic case of the US and the Pentagon sometimes wanting to get something into the news to plant some seed of fear about China over nothing,” Dean told Press TV on Thursday.

“It is being puffed up,” it is part of a military confrontation with China that the US Navy exaggerates, he added.

The Pentagon officials said on Wednesday that they have been tracking the movements of the Chinese fleet seeing them move toward the Aleutian Islands.

“This would be a first in the vicinity of the Aleutian Islands,” one official noted about the warships, which have been operating in international waters. “I don’t think we’d characterize anything they’re doing as threatening.”

Dean, however, said that the story is nothing but “propaganda” and part of a “hype” that the US military has designed to avert the public attention from more important matters.

He noted that Washington is trying to “manipulate the public opinion” and introduce China as a “military threat.”

Beijing and Washington have been inching towards a military confrontation during the past few months.

China accuses the United States of meddling with regional issues and purposely playing up existing tensions in the South China Sea, over half of which Beijing claims sovereignty.

Beijing, in return, showcased its strategic Dongfeng (East wind) 21D missile, dubbed the “carrier-killer.” The much-speculated weapon is deemed a major threat to aircraft carriers which form the basis of Washington’s current naval strategy.

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