HONOLULU -- In the seas around the U.S. island territory of Guam in the Central Pacific, a delegation of 10 Chinese army, navy and air force officers watched three American aircraft carriers and other armed forces go through strenuous training paces last week.
At the same time, in Beijing, the retired chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard Myers, met with Gen. Liang Guanglie, chief of the general staff of the People's Liberation Army, to discuss antiterrorism, nonproliferation of nuclear weapons and regional security, according to the official PLA Daily newspaper.
These were the latest military exchanges to which U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and PLA leaders had agreed during Rumsfeld's visit to China last fall. A crucial U.S. objective in exposing Chinese to U.S. military operations is to avert a Chinese miscalculation about U.S. capabilities.