Billy Long: We can't allow China and Russia to beat us on technology

(From Seventh District Congressman Billy Long)

We're not talking days, weeks, months, or even years but literally decades that the United States has been turning a blind eye to the aggressive push for world domination from the Communist Chinese Party (CCP). They haven't been subtle or sly about their approach either but more like 'here we come, and you can't stop us.' 

Then along came Russia, which recently shot down one of their own satellites which is more than concerning in its own right. And just this week we learned that Russia and China's militaries will be working together hand in glove. 

While we have been concerning ourselves with which pronoun or bathroom to use, folks that hate us have been concerning themselves with advanced military options. It is ironic that Xi is pronounced 'she' but I guarantee China's president for life Xi Jinping couldn't care less about pronouns. 

As it turns out, Russia and China don’t care one thing about woke ideology, human rights or green new anything. They care about absolute power, being the world's superpower and controlling everything on every front. 

If the United States is to survive, we need to recognize the aggressive actions our enemies have taken to build up their militaries and respond in kind. On January 20, 2021, we were energy independent. Now you have to wonder if Russia will open the oil spicket when we or our allies need it. President Biden did tap our oil reserves this week releasing a massive two-and-a-half-day supply. Reread that last sentence.

For 11 years I've been railing against China's aggression and have written numerous times about the dangers of the CCP's quest for world domination. They are currently trying to control the global supply of essential rare earth minerals and are solely responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. While these both pose grave risks to the entire world, their military buildup is even more alarming.

President for life Xi Jinping yearns to be king of the world and no one is surprised that he has continued to build up China's military much like his predecessors. 

What is surprising is the hypersonic speed at which he has done so. Recently the CCP tested a prototype nuclear weapons system, the hypersonic missile. It sounds like something you would find only in a James Bond movie but sadly it is not. 

Traveling at nearly 5 times the speed of sound, these missiles are almost impossible to track down and destroy. If China were to launch a hypersonic nuclear warhead against the United States, we would be virtually defenseless. 

The Pentagon is working on technologies to defeat this evolving threat, but it will take a long time, time we may not have thanks in large part to the massive bureaucracy of red tape hoops we must jump through. China has also been creating mock American aircraft carriers in the desert to practice destroying. 

These actions up the ante and represent serious new aggression by the CCP and should serve as a warning to the folks at the Pentagon, on Capitol Hill and on Main Street USA.

While China has been developing hypersonic missiles, Russia has been working on ways to destroy orbiting satellites. When they shot down their own satellite last week it created a massive debris field which endangered the lives of our astronauts on the International Space Station. 

While the technology has existed for a few years, including in the United States and China, this is the first time Russia has successfully destroyed a satellite. It represents a dramatic change in potential warfare. 

If Russia can shoot down one of their own satellites, what is stopping them from shooting down one or all of ours? If they were to do this, it would cripple the United States, both militarily and domestically. Think of how much we rely upon satellites for everyday life, and then imagine what our society would look like if that all went the way of the dinosaurs tomorrow. Allowing Russia to shoot down our satellites would be devastating beyond belief.

You may think that countering aggression from China and Russia on their own is scary enough but wait until they partner together. 

As I mentioned earlier, just this week Russia and China announced a new military cooperation to counter American dominance of the sky. Russia and China are now flying joint patrol missions over the Sea of Japan and East China Sea in direct response to US bomber flights in the region. 

This unprecedented alliance is yet another sign of aggression by our enemies, and the United States cannot afford to sit idly by. The domestic debates our country is currently having pale in comparison to the military advancements of our enemies. 

President Vladimir Putin and president for life Xi Jinping want Americans fighting amongst ourselves so we'll be too distracted to notice what they’re doing. Well, we've noticed, and now the only question is do we take decisive action, or do we fiddle while Rome burns? We must build up our own military, and President Biden must take swift and decisive actions to maintain our military superiority.

When the Soviets launched the Sputnik I satellite on October 4, 1957, the United States sprang into action. We developed weapons and technologies to counter the Soviets in the event of a full-on war. These recent developments from China and Russia warrant the same innovative spirit. If we are going to remain the world’s superpower, we must develop new technologies to prevent attacks from our enemies. We simply cannot allow China and Russia to beat us on this front because we are too worried about which statue to remove next.