China and Russia launch military patrol vessels close to Alaska, prompting the US to send warships.

After several Chinese and Russian military patrol vessels conducted a coordinated maritime patrol near Alaska last week, the United States of America sent four navy warships and a reconnaissance plane.

According to analysts, which was initially reported by the Wall Street Journal, the coordinated military patrol vessels seemed to be the largest of its kind to approach US land.

According to the WSJ story, at least 11 Russian and Chinese military patrol vessels passed by the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, a state in the north of the US, but they never entered US territorial waters and afterward sailed away. Four US destroyers and P-8 Poseidon planes were hovering over them.

Brent Sadler, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation and a former military captain, told the American publication that what happened is a historical first.

This action is extremely provocative, he continued, especially in light of the conflict in Ukraine and the tensions around Taiwan.

In a statement to the Journal, the US Northern Command confirmed the action and stated that the air and sea military patrol vessels under their commands conducted activities to ensure the defense of the United States and Canada. It was determined that the military patrol vessels remained in international waters and posed no threat.

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Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson of the Chinese embassy in Washington, DC, told to the Journal that the military patrol vessels are not targeted at any third party.

Russian and Chinese military patrol vessels recently performed coordinated military patrols in pertinent waters in the western and northern Pacific Ocean.

The USS John S. McCain, the USS Benfold, the USS John Finn, and the USS Chung-Hoon were the military patrol vessels deployed by the US to monitor the flotilla, according to The Journal.

After the joint Chinese and Russian military patrol vessels approached dangerously close to the Aleutian Islands, Alaska senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan indicated they were keeping an eye on the situation. 

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Murkowski stated that they have been in close proximity with the leaders for a couple of days as well as obtained detailed confidential briefings about the foreign military patrol vessels currently transiting US territorial waters in the Aleutians.

Sullivan corresponded to Republican colleague Murkowski’s remarks, saying that the intrusion by 11 Chinese and Russian military patrol vessels operating together near the coast of Alaska is another indication that they are at the beginning of a new era of authoritarian aggression led by the dictators in Moscow and Beijing.

He continued by drawing an analogy between the current circumstance and one that occurred last September when a single US coast guard cutter sighted a total of seven Chinese and Russian military patrol vessels close to Alaska.

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