China’s recent deployment of three warships to waters east of Australia was "designed to be provocative,” a top Australian intelligence official has said, as Beijing looks to normalize this type of military presence in the region — a move that also has implications for Japan.
“This is the furthest south a PLAN task group has operated, and at least some of its activities seem designed to be provocative,” Andrew Shearer, Australia’s director-general of national intelligence, said in reference to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy vessels.
Last week, the Chinese naval flotilla conducted an unusual series of live-fire exercises in the seas between Australia and New Zealand, forcing civilian flights to divert on short notice and prompting officials in the two countries to say that more advance warning should have been given.
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