Symposium

0 Comments | Insight on the News, August 5, 2002 | by Larry M. Wortzel, | Lawrence J. Korb

Q: Is China's rapid military buildup threatening U.S. interests in East Asia?

YES: China's propensity for settling disputes with the use of force poses a direct threat to U.S. interests in the region.

LARRY M. WORTZEL

China's policies on weapons proliferation--the supplying of missiles, weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) and the technology to make them such deadly instruments of war to dangerous rogue states that support terrorism--threaten U.S. national security and our vital foreign-policy interests. China's 20-plus nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles threaten the continental United States. And China's threats against Taiwan could embroil U.S. forces in a military conflict.

But don't flee from your house and move into a bomb shelter yet. The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) is not about to send millions of soldiers across the Pacific Ocean to land on U.S. shores, and its nuclear-missile force can be deterred. Still, China's international behavior is worrying. Through a combination of effective diplomacy, good alliances, ballistic-missile defense and strong conventional and strategic military forces, the United States can meet the challenges and threats posed by this behavior.

There is some encouraging evidence that the U.S. strategy of engagement and trade with China is working. A middle class is forming in the country and, as people begin to own homes and businesses and travel for pleasure, they increasingly are less supportive of Beijing's military policies, including the Chinese Communist Party's insistence that Taiwan be taken (by force, if necessary).

Some U.S. national interests conflict with what China sees as its own fundamental national interests. The United States seeks to preserve itself as a free and independent nation, with its values and institutions intact and its people secure. In the Asia-Pacific region, it is a vital U.S. interest to preserve the freedom of the seas and airways for commerce and navigation, ensuring unimpeded access to markets. Promoting democracy, preserving strong alliances with countries that share democratic values and respect for human rights, and preserving the democracy of Taiwan from China's threats of force are also important interests of the United States.

Chinese military officers have reminded Americans that China's nuclear capabilities could be used in the event the United States comes to the aid of Taiwan, should China decide to attack the island democracy. These threats were conveyed at one point in a signed article in the PLA's newspaper, Jiefangjun Bao. The author of that article, Senior Col. Zhu Chenghu of China's National Defense University, was subsequently promoted to major general.

The security of the American people is threatened by China's proliferation to other nations of WMDs and their delivery means (or the technology to produce them). China's sales of missiles and WMD technology to, and cooperation with, North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya and perhaps even Egypt, threaten fundamental U.S. interests and increase the threat to the American people. CIA Director George Tenet highlighted such behavior by China in his testimony to the Senate on Feb. 6, and the Department of Defense discussed China's proliferation in its report, Proliferation: Threat and Response, published in 2001. The tools to deal with China's weapons proliferation are strong diplomacy and public laws that call for punitive sanctions either against companies or the government of China. According to the Heritage Foundation's U.S. and Asia Statistical Handbook 2001-2002, China exports more than $85 billion in goods a year to the United States, making it somewhat reliant on that trade. Thus, U.S. trade relations with China also provide some leverage when U.S. officials seek to address proliferation.

China's aggressive behavior in the pursuit of what Beijing defines as its regional interests poses a threat to U.S. military forces. The crash between a Chinese fighter aircraft and a U.S. Navy EP-3E reconnaissance aircraft over the South China Sea in April 2001 also demonstrates how easy it is for an incident to turn nasty. China's 1992 "Law on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone" makes claim to virtually all of the South China Sea and East China Sea as sovereign territory, despite the fact that they are considered either to be disputed or international waters (and airways) under the U.S. interpretation of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea. China's expansive claims would prevent the passage of U.S. and allied military vessels through these waters, China's provocative behavior and dangerous interception of the U.S. reconnaissance aircraft over international waters demonstrates how China's use of military force to back up its territorial claims poses a threat to U.S. forces and commerce.

Finally, there is the Republic of China on Taiwan (ROC). The ROC is a thriving democracy of more than 23 million people with a market economy. It is the seventh-largest trading partner of the United States. The Taiwan Relations Act of 1979 mandates, among other things, that the president of the United States provide appropriate defensive services to Taiwan to meet the military threat from the People's Republic of China (PRC). Helping that democracy remain safe from the military forces of communist China is in the political and security interests of the United States. And China continues to rely on the threat of force to keep Taiwan from even running a poll to determine if the Taiwanese people want to be part of China.