[Pereira:] Welcome back to NEW DAY. Tensions growing this morning in Asia, China has now sent more fighter jets into a disputed are in the East China Sea. Vice President Joe Biden is set to visit Asia next week. His tour was supposed to focus on economic issues, but now it looks like he will to try to urge calm among all the players in this air space fight. CNN's Barbara Starr is following the story for us from the Pentagon. Good morning, Barbara.
[Barbara Starr, Cnn Pentagon Correspondent:] Good morning, Michaela. Well, China says it is on high alert to defend this disputed area. But indeed the U.S. and the allies in the region are challenging that.
[Starr:] Navy fighter jets roar into the Pacific skies. It is a scheduled exercise by U.S. and Japanese forces testing the ability to respond to a crisis. But China's declaration of a new air identification zone requiring aircraft to obey Chinese rules is causing these war games to take on a new significance. Vice President Joe Biden will arrive in Beijing next week. A senior administration official says the vice president going to, quote, "seek clarity regarding the Chinese intentions" about an area the U.S. considers international air space. Even Caroline Kennedy, the new U.S. ambassador to Japan, is weighing in on the Chinese restriction zone, part of a dispute with Japan about who owns these remote islands in the East China Sea.
[Caroline Kennedy, U.s. Ambassador To Japan:] This only serves to increase tensions in the region.
[Starr:] The U.S., Japan and South Korea have all flown aircraft into the restricted zone without notifying Beijing authorities, a violation of China's new rules. The Chinese military says it sent fighter jets on patrol into the zone to monitor planes flying there.
[Victor Cha, Center For Strategic And International Studies:] When the Japanese continue to fly into this area, the Koreans continue to fly into their overlapped area with the Chinese, sooner or later, the Chinese are going to start scrambling jets to intercept these aircraft. That is where you have the potential for not a military conflict, but some sort of accident, some sort of mistake that could then lead to a real crisis in the region.
[Starr:] A Chinese foreign ministry official made clear, Beijing isn't budging. "We also asked Japan and the United States to reflect on themselves," he says, "correct the error, stop making irresponsible accusations against China, stop creating frictions and put an end to statements and actions that may harm regional stability." So the question now is, will Vice President Biden be able to convince the Chinese, perhaps, that they overplayed their hand, that they are facing opposition from countries throughout the region for taking this step Don.
[Don Lemon, Cnn Anchor:] All right. Barbara, appreciate that. Thank you very much. The moment of truth drawing near. Tomorrow is the self-imposed deadline to fix the Obamacare Web site. President Obama has pledged that Healthcare.gov will be working. So, will millions of uninsured Americans be able to get through? We'll see. CNN's Jill Dougherty is at the White House this morning. And she looks very warm as a matter of fact. Good morning, Jill.
[Jill Dougherty, Cnn Foreign Affairs Correspondent:] Good morning, Don. You know, this is not supposed to be like the final fix. What it is, is to get the Website to the point where they can handle 50,000 people at one time. But what they are concerned about is what if there are 200,000 at the same time as there have been before back in October. So, that's only one of their concerns.
[Dougherty:] Withering criticism of the initial rollout of Healthcare.gov has intensified the pressure on the administration to get this fix right for Saturday. The White House hopes it can do that, at least for the vast majority of users.
[Barack Obama, President Of The United States:] And this Web site is going to get fixed.
[Dougherty:] Healthcare.gov opened for business October 1st, and it's been a disastrous two months. The site crashed unable to cope with people trying to sign up. Small businesses still won't be able to use the site for another year. Insurance industry insiders tell CNN, some customers' personal data is getting mangled or even lost. The White House says the site will be able to handle 50,000 users at one time. But, they admit, there will be times after Saturday when Healthcare.gov does not function properly, and they are bracing for another possible huge surge in volume that could force some people into virtual waiting lines for callbacks. Officials say consumers who pick a plan by December 23rd and pay their premiums by December 31st will have coverage effect the first of January. And the White House does have a team. It's technical experts, tech experts. And they are working on hardware and software and, of course, working toward that deadline Don, Michaela.
[Lemon:] All right. Thank you, Jill.
[Michaela Pereira, Cnn Anchor:] Certainly, we'll be watching that.
[Lemon:] Yes, absolutely.
[Pereira:] The real test of it. Next up on NEW DAY, how do Americans feel about the economy? We have the surprising answer from our new CNN poll. We'll have that for you just ahead.
[Lemon:] And you may want to think twice before writing the bad review online. I know. Who would have thought, right? It could end up haunting you when the company tracks you down. We're going to explain that.