China faces numerous challenges if it wants to maintain its rise. The U.S. should stop acting as if tensions – or worse – are inevitable.
Having achieved little and lost much in Iraq and Afghanistan, the White House and Pentagon in 2012 are turning their focus to the Asia-Pacific region. Top U.S. leaders seem to believe that the world’s oldest major democracy must confront the world’s oldest civilization and most populous country. Washington orphans engagement and upgrades containment. A tough line toward China may buttress President Barack Obama’s prospects in this November elections, but could also jeopardize long-term U.S. and world security. Washington risks becoming trapped in a self-fulfilling policy. Expecting and preparing for a confrontation with China, U.S. policies may push China to the very behaviors Washington would like to prevent, and toward a collision that no sane person could welcome.
Obama explained the new orientation in U.S. foreign policy to the Australian Parliament on November 17, 2011: “As we plan and budget for the future, we will allocate the resources necessary to maintain our strong military presence in this region.” While administration officials insist that this new policy isn’t aimed specifically at China, the implication is clear enough: From now on, the primary focus of U.S. military strategy won’t be the once fertile crescent or the global “war on terrorism” but China.
K. Shanmugam, the foreign minister of Washington’s long-time partner, Singapore, warned in February that U.S. domestic pressures and election pressures “have resulted in some anti-China rhetoric in domestic debates. Americans shouldn’t underestimate the extent to which such rhetoric can spark reaction which can create a new and unintended reality for the region.”
Here we have a classic security dilemma: the U.S. sees China modernizing its armed forces and decides it must beef up U.S. assets across the Pacific Ocean. In response, China believes it must do still more to counter the U.S. buildup. The pattern of action and counteraction could come to resemble the U.S.-Soviet arms race – dangerous, expensive, and, some would say, pointless.
In recent years, many U.S. analysts have told Washington policymakers to prepare for the rise of a more aggressive China and the end of a unipolar world. Alarmed by China’s rise, some believers in America’s decline call for retrenchment to a Fortress America in economics and world affairs. Instead of free trade, they urge a neo-mercantilist stance. Instead of leadership for peace and stability, they call for the U.S. to limit its military and political presence around the globe. Hawks go the other way. They demand a military buildup to contain China. Both perspectives are ill advised. Neither the retreatists nor the hawks see the world as it is.
Both declinists and hardliners worry that if China’s torrid economic growth continues, its gross domestic product (GDP) will exceed the United States’ in several decades. Rising powers, they warn, clash with declining hegemons. They note that Beijing brashly makes extensive claims in the South China Sea; that China continues to advance in space and other technologies with military applications; and that its missiles menace Taiwan, a friend of America for more than 60 years.
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Brearbear
@ george…
“Since Taiwan is originally part of China”…
Taiwan people have chosen long ago not to be a part of Communist China.
Let Taiwan choose their destiny!
May Taiwan always be free!
Frankie Fook-lun Leung
A country is not a teenage gangster. She does not go out to pick fights for fun. When conflict starts, there must be issues to be resolved.
Frankie Fook-lun Leung
Remember what Lord Palmerston said: we have no permanent friends or enemies, but only permanent interest. If is not a matter of why pick a fight with whom. It is what is the national interest a country seeks to protect, whether by diplomacy, military actions or whatever course of action appropriate.
WRabbit
Professor Clemens writes a balanced, well-backgrounded piece that of course cannot be 100% perfect. (Clemens says the Soviet Union went down without a peep; I believe there was an incident in the 1980s when the Union briefly considered a nuclear strike on the US). With calm, rationality, reasonability on his side, now anonymous woodworkers come out with extreme opinions to challenge him.
Unfortunately, a draw down from S. China Sea and E. China Sea is definitely what is called for. Fortress American can… and will!… be defended!
Leonard R.
Maybe Professor Walter C. Clemens Jr. has it backwards. Maybe China has already picked a fight with the US? Is that possible professor?
If false equivalencies and straw-man arguments were fishes and loaves, Professor Walter C. Clemens Jr. would be feeding multitudes here. But he offers more than
that. He also gives us sloppy conclusions with scant evidence to support them.
But this article is a banquet for the hawks. Here are some of the items on the menu.
1. The straw man & an unsupported conclusion:
There is more than one to choose from. But in this one paragraph, we get two for the price of one.
—
“Proponents of “containing” China recall America’s triumph in the Cold War with the Soviet Union. America’s military programs, they say, not only deterred but also bankrupted the Soviet regime. Yes, nuclear weapons were useful to deter Soviet expansionism, but, at least since Mao Zedong, China’s leaders have shown no appetite for expanding beyond what they see as China’s historic borders….”
—
a. The straw man:
Professor, consider the possibility that Americans who advocate military preparedness against the PRC and other hostile foreign powers, are not trying to ‘contain China’. Maybe they just want to protect America. Is that a worthwhile goal?
b. The unsupported conclusion,
Are you referring to the entire coast-line of the Philippines professor? Is that what you mean when you write ‘what Beijing sees as China’s historic borders’? Is there any evidence that the PRC’s demands on the Philippines maritime areas have any merit at all?
‘So what’ Professor Clemens might ask. That’s not America’s fight.
OK. Is Guam America’s fight professor? It’s America’s territory. Is it worth fighting for? If so, how would you propose to defend Guam if the Philippines loses its coast-line to the PRC?
2. The Good News:
This article is not all straw men. And it’s not all unsupported conclusions and false equivalencies. The professor brings us good news as well. He writes:
—
“More “good” news: Given the lethality of modern weapons, war is almost unthinkable between major powers. China’s steady advances in military weaponry, beginning with a nuclear bomb in 1964, are impressive but not surprising for a country with millennia of technological innovation – and with long borders and vulnerable sea lanes to maintain.”
—
The professor thinks it is “good news” that the PRC is developing weapons of mass destruction that can kill millions of Americans.
With all due respect, if that’s your idea of good news professor, I’d hate to see what your idea of bad news is. And I’m scratching you from my cocktail party invitation list. (But you’ll do just fine in Beijing, Boston & Berkeley).
The professor assumes with scant evidence, that a balance of terror will make war between the PRC and the US ‘unthinkable’, his word. That’s not surprising given his background in Russian studies.
But here is a word to the wise professor, Chinese are not Russians. Be careful what you wish for here. You assume without evidence that there is firm civilian control over the PLA, as there may have been back in the days of the USSR and the Red Army. But is it possible the PLA is internally corrupt with a cracked chain of command and ownership of a growing arsenal of increasingly lethal weapons of mass destruction?
3. The false equivalencies:
—
“Yes, China stridently claims huge parts of the South China Sea, but so do Vietnam and other neighboring nations.”
—
Those other nations you mention do not have generals who have threatened the United States with nuclear destruction, do they professor?
They have not launched massive cyber attacks against US facilities, have they professor?
They are not developing weapons specifically designed to sink American aircraft carriers, and kill tens of thousands of American military personnel, are they professor?
They have not attacked US ships and downed US aircraft within the last two decades, have they professor?
They have not laid waste to America’s industrial heartland with predatory currency policies, have they professor?
—
Reading this article, I wonder if Professor Walter C. Clemens Jr. believes anything is worth fighting for, beyond tenured professorship of course.
As I said in the beginning. The professor may have it backwards. Perhaps the PRC has already picked a fight with the United States. But even if one views it differently, it’s very clear to me that military preparedness is not the same as picking a fight.
Antarctica
Very insightful and nicely put, Leonard R!
Observer
@ Leonard R.
Nice write up.
I want to add a few titbits.
Other nations which also have claims in the South of china Sea did not capture, beat up, steal fishes, and demand ransome money from poor and unarmed fishermen as china.
Other nations did not invade neighbors and claim them by ridiculous “historic evidences” as china.
george
By the way, PRC didn’t claim South China Sea, but the ROC (today controls Taiwan) in 1947. China didn’t invade neighbors. Vietnam captures more islands than China does. Vietnam is aggressive, last week they sent their troops near Taiwan-control Taiping Island. Vietnam said Taiping Island is theirs. But the name “Taiping” is actually from the ship that ROC sent to get the island in 1947.
Please learn some history.
george
All the confrontation between China and US is mainly because of Taiwan. Since Taiwan is originally part of China, and US stop China to “take over” Taiwan. If China let Taiwan to be independent, Chinese people would overthrow the government. As a result, China must build military to stop possible US aid to Taiwan. On the other hand, US air force bases are all around China, which is a huge concern to China’s security. Don’t forget, US is still aggressive. US navy controls all important straits.
george
PRC didn’t claim South China Sea, but the ROC (today controls Taiwan) in 1947. China didn’t invade neighbors. Vietnam captures more islands than China does. Vietnam is aggressive, last week they sent their troops near Taiwan-control Taiping Island. Vietnam said Taiping Island is theirs. But the name “Taiping” is actually from the ship that ROC sent to get the island in 1947.
scdad07
Customer is King. The coming 30 years between China and US as Stephen Roach, the former Non-Executive Chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia and now a Senior Fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute of Global Affairs, said the more important issues are trade and market access:
“While China is moving to become a consumer-led economy, the opposite is happening in the U.S. where the consumer is on ice and the country (US) is looking for a new source of growth…The Chinese have enormous appetite for technology, for innovation and goods made in America and I think we need to have a chance to make sure that we crack those markets open….as China rebalances its economy it provides new growth opportunities for the U.S., which should see China for what it’s going to look like over the next 30 years and help it achieve that rebalancing by providing goods and services.”
Plenty will come out after recent trip by H.Clinton and T. Geither.
Somewhere, there is talk on ‘Why US needs a new bomber’ to threaten her best customer.
Jupiter
“China’s leaders have shown no appetite for expanding beyond what they see as China’s historic borders.”
How unfortunate for the surrounding nations that China interprets their historic borders to include massive swathes of other country’s territory. Not to mention the entirety of a de facto independent and sovereign nation. The United States aims to pressure China into being a productive global power, an outcome which will benefit both nations and the Asia Pacific region as a whole. If China feels ‘contained’, it’s probably because their belligerent maritime behavior has left them with only a single ally (North Korea) and a lot of potential enemies.
马可 (@factsaboutchina)
China understand and respects power and abhors and abuses those who are weak. If China’s rise is peaceful it would create only a defensive military, not wade into the waters of power projection. Any attempt by the CPC to claim its rise is meant as a peaceful one is an outright lie. The US should not work itself into a Cold War style arms race alone; a 5 nation, NATO style organization should be developed to push back against China’s military aspirations – Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, and The United States. As long as China continues to modernize its military those on the Pacific/South China Sea should prepare. China has only itself to blame for anti-China rhetoric and military pivots into the Pacific.
Ron Wagner
China is attempting to intimidate the rest of Asia, and some of these countries are our allies. North Korea is a puppet state of China. It can do nothing without the support of China. Without America China would do anything it wanted to do in the South “China” Sea. Japan, South Korea, The Philippines, and the other nations of the area need us to help protect their territorial rights in the area. We need them to maintain a balance of power with China. China operates as has Russia. They are both totalitarian states who will get away with whatever they are allowed to.
passerby
frog in the bottom of a dry well..
waving sticks right at their door (spy plane, battleships, etc.), stationed troops in Korea, Japan, Phillipines..and claim “you cannot complain, coz….you just can’t.”…
kill civilians, rape school girls, burn koran, humiliate corpse, gosh, what hv you done?
DPRK is worst, but America? sometimes, really bad.