Fine...So am a fuddy-duddy...
Transparency is about expressing intentions and goals. Sure, Imperial Japan was not going to say: 'Our intention is to invade mainland China and colonize Manchuria.' But IF Imperial Japan was transparent, the statement would say something similar to: 'Our intention is to modernize the military and expand our national interests for...blah...blah...blah...because of blah...blah...blah...' Then all regional powers would conduct high level meetings between politicians and military leaders to discuss the negatives and positives of what Imperial Japan want to do. Yes, Japan could be generous and divulge Zero fighters manufacturing capacity, reorganization of the forces, new recruitments, etc...etc...And in the interests of transparency, those would be good things to divulge without affecting national goals.
There is a wealth of publicly available historical information and commentaries on what is 'transparency' but I guess finding, reading, and thinking about them is tooooooooo much work for you.
First of all that article says nothing of what America actually wants to know, now that I read it. All it does is give reasons why he thinks or others thinks of not revealing things.
Let's take a look, I gather one of three things, don't want to deter because want war, military hardware not actually good, and surprise first strike.
btw, this is his last sentence, he CHOOSE to believe we just suck based on nothing. It could be true, but he gave no credible reasons for why and you want me to use this as guide line?! In fact if it was me writing the article I could have named a few reasons why the PLA sucks based on FACTS, and not I thinks so because I hope so.
Not a strategic force, some forces are still using obsolete weapons, doesn't have nuclear submarine in number, carrier not operational, aircraft engines not up to task, not enough nukes, Beidou not finished, and a whole host of things, this article just shows he knows nothing about Chinese forces and clearly doesn't follow it as much as me, even though it's his job.
I tend to believe that this last possibility is probably the most likely. However, as noted above, it is impossible to know the truth with any degree of certainty. This is what makes military opaqueness potentially so dangerous, as a lack of knowledge allows potential adversaries to come to a host of very different conclusions.
Now our version of pearl harbor attack? That's for certain, we are a weaker force, of course we will try to knock out as many as possible before the actual war. The US clearly knows and thinks this as I have heard, US is considering eventually retreating to Guam to not suffer this.
As to don't want to deter because we want war? That's ludicrous, Americans will look at our economy second in the world and say it's a hoax, and I have SEEN Americans saying Chinese weapons are just for show and don't work even though it was on Youtube and it was a video. Also have you seen the internet lately? China sucks theory is no longer a theory it's a "fact". Not based on actual facts, but it's a "fact."
