Chinese fighter jets on Tuesday again conducted an unsafe intercept of a US reconnaissance plane, US Pacific Command said. An Air Force RC-135 was intercepted by two Chinese J-10 fighter jets in international airspace over the East China Sea, PACOM said in a statement. The jets flew with “an unsafe excessive rate of closure” on the Rivet Joint, PACOM said. The Pentagon is addressing the issue “in appropriate diplomatic and military channels.” China’s Defense Ministry, in a statement to Reuters, said the US is “deliberately hyping up the issue of the close surveillance of China by US military aircraft.” Air Force and Navy jets have repeatedly encountered unsafe intercepts in the region as tensions have increased over the South China Sea.
A three-month continuing resolution that ended in December inflicted less pain on the Department of the Air Force than it had expected, as procurement and construction continue in the new year. The federal government operated under a stopgap spending measure that stretched from the beginning of the fiscal year on…