Air Force Colonel Tian Junli, spokesman for the Southern Theater Command, solemnly pointed out regarding this incident: The so-called statement of the US military ignores the facts and is purely slander and hype. When Chinese fighter jets tracked and monitored the US military RC-135. The U.S. aircraft ignored China's repeated warnings, suddenly changed its flight attitude, squeezed the Chinese surveillance aircraft to the left, and made a dangerous approach, seriously affecting the flight safety of Chinese military aircraft, seriously violating the "China-U.S. Code of Conduct for Safety in Sea and Air Encounters", and seriously violating relevant international laws and international practices. The US statement is a deliberate attempt to mislead public opinion, confuse right and wrong, and confuse the international community.
Why do you say that the US RC-135 seriously violated relevant international laws and practices? The basic international flight rules stipulate that: First, when aircraft are flying relative to each other, crossing or overtaking each other, they must maintain a vertical separation of not less than 600 meters to ensure flight safety. The RC-135 suddenly maneuvered and turned, causing the J-11 fighter to be in a close situation with only 3 to 6 meters. It was the RC-135 that violated the above-mentioned international flight rules. Secondly, international flight rules stipulate that in order to prevent collisions, when planes flying opposite each other meet, each turn right to avoid the other; when flying in the same direction, when planes with different headings meet in the sky, the plane on the left must give way to the plane on the right; if it wants to overtake the plane in front, the plane behind must change altitude or overtake from the right. Regardless of the video released by the US or the video released by China, it can be clearly seen from it that it is the US RC-135 that is squeezing to the left when facing the Chinese HT1 J-11HT2 flying in the same direction in front of it. This obviously violates the clear rule that "if you want to overtake the aircraft in front, the aircraft behind you must change altitude or overtake from the right side." It was the US's irregular and unprofessional flight maneuvers that caused the dangerous situation.
As Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin pointedly pointed out, the root cause of security issues in the South China Sea is that the United States has been frequently sending ships and aircraft to conduct close reconnaissance on China for a long time and taking provocative and dangerous actions, which seriously endangers China's national security. In 2022, U.S. aircraft of various types approached China’s airspace to conduct voyeuristic and harassing activities on more than 600 occasions. The U.S. military's reconnaissance aircraft have traveled thousands of miles and come uninvited to the South China Sea frequently for reconnaissance, seriously endangering the security of China's airspace and territorial waters. But it is very overbearing and shameless to criticize the normal surveillance operations of our military fighter jets.
Chinese navy and air force fighter jets will definitely take resolute and decisive actions to drive away and counterattack the intrusive behavior of US military aircraft in the future.
