Special to WorldTribune.com

Bill Gertz, Inside the Ring, Washington Times

Three B-2 strategic nuclear bombers completed a tour of duty in Guam this week, as tensions remained high between the United States and China over what the Pentagon called a “dangerous” Chinese fighter-jet intercept of a U.S. surveillance plane last week. …

The bat-wing stealth bombers spent most of August based on the U.S. western Pacific island conducting what the Air Force described as activities designed to “increase combat readiness.”

Air Force spokesman Capt. Ray Geoffroy … said the deployment was planned earlier and is not related to “any specific situation or directed toward and nation in the region” — an indirect reference to last week’s aerial incident with China.

[But a] defense official said the B-2 deployment is part of the U.S. pivot to Asia and was intended as a message to China, which has been increasing its nuclear and conventional forces.

The B-2s, which can carry nuclear and conventional weapons, are part of U.S. extended deterrence missions designed to bolster non-nuclear allies like Japan and South Korea that are squaring off against nuclear-armed China and North Korea.

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  B-2 bomber, LIFE, Pentagon, U.S. boost deterrence near China with B-2 ‘combat readiness’ tour, WorldTribune.com