Even the French are troubled by China's growing militarization

France Urges Greater Transparency from Chinese Army:
"The Chinese Navy has recently embarked on tests in the Pacific of the first of five nuclear submarines capable of launching nuclear missiles with a range of 8,000 km, according to the us Armed Forces. As for Wen Wei Pao, the Hong Kong daily financed by Beijing, it announced a few days ago that work has begun on the construction of China's first aircraft carrier, by 2010."

That little nugget quoted above was the last paragraph of the article. Note that a carrier is a force projection tool, as are the "boomers." Just where is this force to be projected? Taiwan can be taken without this expense, but Japan, the Philippines, and other interesting targets might require such leverage.

Not mentioned here, but seen in other recent coverage of the Red Chinese military budget announcement, the official Chinese military budget omits most big-ticket purchases which apparently can be found with difficulty, it at all, elsewhere in the government's accounting system.