I cannot believe Team Obama actually let this happen

In an escalating standoff reminiscent of the Cold War, China on Tuesday responded angrily to news that two U.S. B-52 bombers had flown over a contested chain of islands in the East China Sea without first alerting Beijing — just days after China unilaterally announced an expanded air-defense zone around the islands.

The Pentagon’s sudden dispatch of the bombers was meant as a show of support for close ally Japan, which is in a protracted sovereignty dispute with China over the islands. But the move risks escalating an already heated situation, according to an editorial posted on the website of China Daily, a state-supported newspaper known to closely track Beijing’s official positions on such matters.

“The Japanese and U.S. hysteria is unnecessary, and potentially dangerous, because it is based on a serious misreading, if not intentional distortion, of Chinese strategic purposes,” states the editorial, which claimed Washington has no legitimate basis for challenging the new air-defense zone, known in Chinese military parlance as an Air Defense Identification Zone, or “ADIZ.”

“Dozens of countries, including Japan and the United States, have their own ADIZs. And the US, as the inventor of such zones, should be well aware of their defensive nature,” the editorial states. “If the world’s sole superpower, with an unrivaled military, needs multiple ADIZs to fend off perceived threats, why should China not need any?”

Publication of the editorial came as The Wall Street Journal first reported that the Washington had dispatched the two B-52 bombers from Guam Monday evening specifically to challenge the Chinese claim to exclusive control of the airspace.

China is testing us, I pray we have the resolve not to blink