Re: Japanese Defence Minister: Helicopter & DDG "locked on" by Chinese Frigates' Ra
I just want to comment that ever since WWII and especially after the collaspe of USSR, people had been opitimisitic about the prevention of large scale conflict by human rationality. That seem to me a huge misinterptation. What really took place is that the world had been stuck in a one-pole power structure for so long that it forgot what a real war taste like. The conflict of interest and the resentment between people of different states and differet classes had not decreased, nor had human rationality been imporved. What we see in the heating up of Diaoyu and SCS are but a prologue to much larger and intense conflicts as the world strays further from the order that was established for it after WWII.
China had been acquiring a mordernized navy and intended to use it to defend its "oversea national interest". The next natural step would be getting out of first island chain, establishing oversea naval bases and began its "power projection". What this signals is that China is developing itself into a neo-colonial power. I cannot help but to wonder how could that ever sit well with the current neo-colonial powers a.k.a. the western alliance.
The truth was that China and Chinese had never accepted the place the western world had once assgined to them. They kept quiet when they needed to but it was a state of silent resentment. What happened In SCS and Diaoyu was that those resentments had found powerful outlets. As China gains confidence and assertiveness, there would be continuing friction between China and those she considers to be "western puppets" until she felt confident enough to go for the "puppetmaster".
I'm not war-mongering in any sense. This is comment geared towards those who thinks that a new Sino-Japan war is unrealistic. They have that impression only because the word "war" had enstranged itself to them. It's been so long since we had real wars but that's not at all a good reason to doubt they would happen again. Remeber what they had called the First World War? They called it "the war to end all wars"
A well thought out piece, but one which is fundamentally flawed by the common, but ultimately baseless and wrong assumption that China will act and behave in the worst way the west had done in the past if given the slightest chance.
The charge that China is developing into a neo-colonial power is completely without foundation. Having been a victim of the worst excess of colonialism, China is far more conscious and sensitive to how a weaker nation might perceive being pressured by a stronger one. That is where China's much criticised non-interference policy comes from and what it is supposed to guard against.
It often amuses me just how out of tough China's critics usually are with reality that they have the nerve to bash China for its non-interference policy as if it was designed to spite and undermine western efforts to 'civilise' the Africans, yet accuse China of engaging in Colonialism a moment later for trading with African countries.
You do make a good point that China is unhappy with its position, and even with the world order the west has constructed, and is starting to push back to improve its positions and maybe even change the rules of the game.
However, your assertion that China will ultimately go after the 'puppet masters', is unfounded and unreasonable.
China wants a better deal, and a fairer system, but it does not want to obliterate the west. So long as the west is able to be flexible and reasonable and accept that the world has changed and adjust to the new reality of world power, China would be more than happy to never fight anyone.
China is investing in a strong military because it remembers well that it was the lack of the ability to defend itself against foreign aggression that brought it low before, and I think your average Chinese take national security as seriously as your average Israeli, in that very few people would object to healthy defence spending to build a top military for China even at the expense of higher taxes and/or forgoing worthy social security perks.
America's clumsy sabre rattling and military misadventures in the past and present is only reinforcing the perception that strong military power is the only guarantee of one's safety and prosperity.
China's military power is overwhelmingly for defence, and it is only big by necessity since the enemy it feels it needs to be able to guard against happens to spend more on arms than the next ten biggest spenders on the planet combined, or something to that effect.
China is building a strong navy as a first line of defence, so that if hostilities break out, it will be fought out in the ocean rather than over China's economic, manufacturing and population centres on its East Coast. The secondary mission of the navy is to protect China's now global supply lines. China is no longer self sufficient in energy and raw materials, and so it needs to guard against its sea based supply lines being cut. Up to now, it has guarded against that by inter-linking its economic fortunes with that of the rest of the world's and with America's in particular, so that if anyone tries to cut China's sea based supply lines, they would hurt the world economy and America as much as it hurt China. However, America will only go so far in the name of money, and it was always a gamble to bet that American greed will outweigh any and all reasoning for America to want to cut China's supply lines. As such, it is only natural that China would wish to takes its security and destiny in its own hands as soon as possible.
Only with the third mission for the PLAN of helping to safeguard Chinese citizens and national interests abroad would any sort of power projection be on the horizon. But the only likely scenarios involve evacuation of Chinese nationals, and the PLA would only actively engage in combat without a UN mandate if some leader was stupid enough to order the targeting and mass killing of Chinese nationals by their military.
If we rule out such an extreme scenario, China's LPDs and future LHDs would only realistic see action in evacuation or humanitarian assistance missions.
War is far from inevitable or even likely, and the ball is in the west's court when it comes to how China will view and treat them. The on,y sure fire way to make war more likely and China and enemy is to treat China as an enemy.
