evidence: Eric Sayers, who previously served as a special assistant to the Commander at U.S. Indo-Pacific Command and is now an adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, said this year’s SINKEX was important for several reasons, and showed significant growth in Pacific theater capabilities in recent years. [...] Sayers added that, in sum, the two SINKEX events at RIMPAC showed a "multi-axis strike capability" the U.S. is developing and could field in a few years. He noted it was just earlier this decade, when Adm. Robert Willard led PACOM from 2009 to 2012, that PACOM "was sending urgent operational needs statements back to Washington for an anti-ship weapon." "Today, this SINKEX is showing the Congress, our allies, and the Chinese that we have air, ground, surface, and undersea options for the anti-ship mission. We aren’t there yet, but we are slowly moving in the right direction," Sayers said.