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2 US puzzles over China's military
might By Benjamin A Shobert
WASHINGTON - For slightly more than 100
years up to World War II, the American government
continued to develop plans based on the
possibility of conflict with the United Kingdom.
Looking back at what now seems to be an historical
oddity is useful when attempting to characterize
the complicated nexus that exists between the
competing agendas of US and Chinese military
policies.
The trajectory and overlap
between planning for a particular contingency and
partnership designed to avoid confrontation is
never linear in matters of
statecraft, and it should be of no surprise that
the US military community is wrestling with an
accurate portrayal of China's role in relation to
both regional and global activity. If any
particular aspect to this debate is most important
to understand, it is this: simply because the US
is currently re-evaluating its plans for how to
manage a US-China military confrontation does not
mean any such event is inevitable.
When
the US Department of Defense (DoD) released the
2006 Quadrennial Defense Report (QDR), it
identified four primary challenges to US national
security: irregular warfare, catastrophic attacks,
traditional war and disruptive attacks. While
other developed countries friendly to the US
conceptually have most, if not all, of these
capabilities, China remains both the only country
in the world whose political fealty to the
principles that guide the US can be questioned and
the only country that can field operational
capabilities in three out of the four QDR areas.
Recent analysis and reports from the DoD
and the US-China Economics and Security Review
Commission (USCC) have suggested that the fourth
area - irregular warfare - might be an area where
China's export policies may be playing a
facilitating role for countries or groups eager to
develop such capabilities. Consequently, two
primary sensitivities guide much of the DoD
analysis of China's military policy: how China's
military exports migrate to rogue nations and
non-state actors, and how a fully modernized
People's Liberation Army (PLA)negates the ability
of the US to project its own foreign-policy
agendas.
If the word "inevitable" can be
used wisely anywhere in this discussion, it is
likely to be in the realm characterizing how the
PLA views American concerns. The fears on the part
of the US are likely considered largely
"inevitable" on the part of the PLA if China's
military is to modernize. In short, US fears are
considered a calculated risk for China to do what
it believes it must for its own national interest.
Since the first Gulf War in 1991, the
Chinese military has been painfully aware of its
need to modernize. The level of technological
sophistication exhibited by US forces was a moment
of truth for the PLA; no longer could its leaders
continue to overlook the antiquated theory and
weapons' platforms that their meager war colleges
and military-industrial complex produced. This
realization was the spark behind China's military
modernization efforts, the results of which are
now obvious to all.
Understanding the
extent of China's military capabilities should be
the easiest part of this riddle to decipher;
however, from time to time the demonstration of
new capabilities on the part of China raises the
question of how much the US actually knows about
the hard assets of the PLA. As increasingly
limited resources are diverted away from competing
national-security threats and allocated toward
fighting terrorism, it is likely that the US will
continue to be surprised as China demonstrates new
military capabilities. Witness the recent shooting
down of an orbiting satellite.
China's
desire to have an anti-satellite (ASAT) capability
should not have caught anyone paying attention to
the PLA's stated objectives by surprise. The
capability itself had been debated within China at
least as far back as 1994, in an article in Modern
Defense Technology, Issue No 2, titled
"Miniaturization and Intellectualization of
Kinetic Kill Vehicle". A number of Chinese
military analysts had already argued that the role
of ASAT technology was critical to China's
national security.
As one example, Wang
Cheng, in a July 5, 2000, article from Liawang
(Outlook), Volume 27, called "The US Military's
'Soft Ribs', A Strategic Weakness", said: "For
countries that can never win a war with the US by
using the method of tanks and planes, attacking
the US space system may be an irresistible and
most tempting choice."
Adding to the
notion that Washington is badly preoccupied with
events in the Middle East and not properly working
to understand China's military intentions is
Northern Command's tentative suggestion that the
now-destroyed Chinese satellite FY-1C was actually
the target of three previous tests dating to
October 26, 2005, (the other two tests are
believed to have taken place on April 20, 2006 and
November 30, 2006).
If this proves to be
accurate, it would suggest that the truncated
communication linkage to be troubled about is not
only between President Hu Jintao and the PLA, but
the US intelligence community and the current Bush
administration. Fortunately, portions of the DoD
and policy institutions outside the government
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