Political and Military Analysis on China

xywdx said:

That article does bring up some good points, but parts of it is serious comical, especially the conclusion where it essentially says "China will be hostile to Australia if Australia blockades China's sea lanes". No duh genius.

Click to expand...

Yep this part is pretty funny but overall he present a balanced view on the relation between china, asia and the US.

The Limits of “Assertive” Behavior: U.S.-China Relations and the South China Sea


Throughout 2010 and into 2011, disputes in the South China Sea were at the forefront of regional tensions involving China, the United States, and neighboring countries. The focal point of such tensions was the 2010 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Regional Forum where the United States along with ASEAN countries confronted China over its “assertive” behavior in the South China Sea. This episode demonstrated clearly the troubled situation in the South China Sea and the potential for conflict in East
Asia. Robert D. Kaplan, writing on how the issue will be a major challenge for the future, states that “Just as German soil constituted the military front line of the Cold War, the waters of the South China Sea may con-stitute the military front line of the coming decades.”

The Limits of Chinese–Russian Partnership


Since 1996, Russia and China have been united in what both call a ‘strategic partnership’. There is a good deal of presentism – the infinite extrapolation of now – in Western analyses of the relationship. But as English historian A.J.P Taylor said of the lessons of history, the only visible pattern to the relationship between Moscow and Beijing over the past six decades is that there is no pattern. The current stage will more than likely give way to another that could surprise us, as previous ones have. The direction of such shifts has
generally defied expectations. The explanations – China’s dependency on Russia, ideological bonds, animosities rooted in history and race – adduced to predict the course of Russia–China relations repeatedly proved invalid. The relationship was never as solid as it seemed, nor as dangerous. The policies of third countries did influence its course at times, but the prime movers were the principals themselves.

Between ‘China Threat Theory’ and ‘Chindia’: Chinese Responses to India’s Military Modernization


Since India’s nuclear tests in 1974 and 1998 and China’s 1989 Tiananmen Square incident, the two countries have faced the flow and ebb of western sanctions. Under these controls, China and India’s initial development occurred largely within a military supply vacuum that resulted in an early dependence on Russian, and later Israeli cooperation, increasingly supplemented and in some cases replaced by domestic production. In 2000, however, this pattern began to undertake a marked shift.
It was during this year that then US President Bill Clinton made the first visit by a sitting US president to the subcontinent since that of Jimmy Carter in 1978. This momentous occasion set analysts talking about the potential lifting of United States sanctions against India. Within a year, and with the lifting of sanctions, the US–India strategic partnership became a reality. In 2001, the United States conducted a large-scale removal of Indian companies from the US Entity List and in 2005 came the announcement of US–India intent to engage in civil nuclear cooperation.
This article explores the impact of these two once similar and increasingly divergent military modernization and procurement trajectories. Given that India has become the primary beneficiary of this shift, this article will quantitatively and qualitatively measure changing Chinese perceptions of India’sforces in the wake of sanctions lifting on the part of the West and the military procurement imbalance it left behind.

The Instability of China–US Relations

The Dilemmas of the Rise of China


Why are there such contrasting perceptions on China’s rise between the Chinese and the rest of the world? What dilemmas is China beginning to face in the context of these different perceptions about its rise? What ways out of these dilemmashas China been seeking? This essay will explore these thought-provoking questions and present an academic analysis on China’s strategic thinking about its rising dilemmas.

Moving the Enemy:Operational Art in the Chinese PLA’s Huai Hai Campaign


This extensive and detailed study of the Huai Hai Campaign addresses a doctrinal concept that is of growing importance to the US Army—operational art. It does so by looking at a campaign that occurred over a half century ago on a relatively unsophisticated battlefield on the other side of the world. For some, that distance from the so-called modern battlefield may make this study seem almost irrelevant. I would argue that, to the contrary, it increases its relevance to the challenges we face today.

This study has great relevance because in this time of expanding commitments and deployments around the world, it is more and more important that we increase our understanding of how other people think. This is important politically, socially, economically, and, of course, militarily. As Dr. Bjorge correctly points out, operational art is not about technology. It is a product of imagination and creative thought, and this is where we can learn from the Huai Hai Campaign. This campaign contains examples of commanders who were imaginative and creative. More important even, the campaign, as the author argues, shows non-Western classical Chinese military thought as an important inspiration for that creativity.

Reading Sun Tzu’s (Sunzi’s) The Art of War has been in vogue in the Army for years. For too many readers, however, this book never becomes more than a collection of aphorisms—pithy to some, trite to others, but without much applicability to their real-life challenges. This study looks at the Huai Hai Campaign from the perspective of The Art of War and shows that many of Sunzi’s concepts and precepts were part of the campaign vision and the operations that were conducted during the campaign. By doing this, the study not only increases our understanding of the nature of operational art, it increases our understanding of the thought contained in one of China’s great military classics. We commend it to you for your education and enjoyment.

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Unfazed by the U.S.'s blunt strategic refocus in the Asia-Pacific Region and its apparent goals in forging a clout against the world's fastest growing economies, a veteran Chinese diplomat said China will remain consistent in its foreign policies of non-interventionism and good neighborly relations.

"Current events in Asia-Pacific are merely a prelude to a changing situation in the region which would probably be shaped over a century," said Zhang Jiuhuan, a CPPCC member and former Chinese ambassador to Singapore and Thailand. "It requires China to look at the long term big picture, and not be affected by temporary disturbances."

China already faces delicate situations in territorial disputes in the South China Sea and Diaoyu Island. Yet the involvement of the U.S., brought front-and-center by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to South Asia and U.S. President Barack Obama's projected deployment of 2,500 Marines to Australia, is complicating things even further.

Obama has more than once stressed the importance of the Asia Pacific Region to his country, saying it is now a "top priority" of U.S. security policy. Although the U.S. has cut its Pentagon budget amid sagging domestic economy, Obama said: "The reduction of U.S. defense spending will not come at the expense of the Asia-Pacific."

The military strategy only represents one part of the shifting U.S. strategy toward the Asia Pacific. Its stimulus for the expansion of Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership (TPP), which may cause the influence of Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) to wane, is now in its full swing with impending negotiations with Japan. Furthermore, its alternative sanction and conciliation with South Asian countries, such as Vietnam and Burma, are leveraging the countries' ongoing political reforms. The Burmese Aung San Suu Kyi's election for a seat in Burma parliament is one such example.

"We called the U.S. political move as ‘color infiltration,'" said Zhang. "The United States is trying to encircle China with its economic, political and military strategies."

However, Obama denied these recent policies were containment policies against China in an interview with Time magazine in January. He said that he "specifically rejected that formulation" that Chinese scholars have put forth suggesting recent U.S. diplomatic activities were to contain China. He explained that his strategies are made to persuade China to "play by the same rules."

Contrary to Time's compliment for Obama's talents as a diplomatic strategist, Chinese diplomats and scholars believe his policies are nothing different from those of his predecessors.

"His current Asia Pacific strategy was planned as early as 10 years ago by a group of think-tank in the U.S. government," said Zhang. "However, the devastating Sept. 11 attack shifted [former U.S. President George W.] Bush's attention to anti-terrorist fights."

With China's decade-long peaceful rise that made it into the world's second largest economy, the U.S. redirected its attention after withdrawing its military forces from Iraq and Afghanistan. But Sino-U.S. relations expert Jin Canrong said the U.S. is currently financially incapable of realizing its ambitions.

The associate dean of Renmin University's School of International Studies said the U.S. displeased the Burmese government with its unfulfilled commitment of a financial assistance worth US$10 billion.

"The U.S. only fulfilled US$1.23 million [of the sum], and many of the funding was channeled to the oppositions," he said. "How would the Burmese government be pleased with that?"

Jin also took Singaporean Foreign Minister K. Shanmugam 's recent remark as an example that Asia is cautious in dealing with the U.S.'s high-profile "pivot."

Shanmugam raised a warning against anti-China rhetoric during his recent tour to Washington, saying, "Such rhetoric can spark reactions that [would create] a new and unintended reality in the region."

"Containment does not work, will not work…once you get into Cold War rhetoric, then you get everyone else into a Cold War framework," he said.

Shanmugam's remarks were particularly applauded by China, who reiterated its peaceful development as well as its consistent foreign policies.

As a former ambassador to Singapore, Zhang said Singapore pays special attention to the balance of power in the world.

When referring to China's countermeasures to the U.S.'s current belligerence, Zhang said the struggle would always be there, but so would the cooperation.

"We need to look at foreign relations in a rational and panoramic view, keeping on our development without being interfered," he said. "Any furious retaliation stirred up by temporary insults is worthless and unwise."

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China's diplomacy is very active recently to explore the solution to the Syria issue. After Ambassador Li Huaxin, representative of the Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, visited Syria, Assistant Foreign Minister Zhang Ming began to visit Saudi Arabia, Egypt and France. Some foreign media named China’s move as “turning from the defensive to the offensive”.

Using "offensive" and "defensive" to describe Chinese diplomacy means that what they see are just changes in trend. The more important possibility is China does not only unswervingly safeguard the basic principle of political solutions to similar problems she adheres to, but is trying to find a roadmap of solving similar problems through political approach.

The world situation today is changing dramatically, but paths to solve problems similar to the Syria’s have not changed much. The solution roadmaps are more dominated by the West, who always adopts the old routine of military or economic sanctions. Facts have proved that such routines will not only hurt civilians seriously but also leave the bad results of long-term turmoil and even secession.

Doesn't the West realize that these routines have seen the end of their rope? Of course no. in fact, the ability to maintain the old routines is directly related to the dominant position of the West in the existing international order. This is why some western countries become more and more impatient and more and more reckless on the sanction issues.
　
The intense game that appears during finding the path to solve the Syria issue, in essence, is the problem of who dominates the adjustment direction of the "international rule" in the conversion of the old and new patterns, which is directly related to the international political trend in the future.

A new way to maintain peace of a multi-polar world and solve the local or a country's internal unrest in such a world is necessary and an irresistible trend. China's adhering to her position of peaceful settlement and efforts of seeking for a method to have all sides involved into a conflict sit down at a negotiating table is to conform to the general trend.

Today's China enjoys a very different position in the world stage than before, which is irreversible. Many difficult issues exist in the world. China must take a stand explicitly and even participate in solving these issues actively, even if they have no direct relations with China. This is the world’s expectations to China and also the responsibility of China as a big power.

China must come up with a roadmap to solve these problems and promote these issues to be solved in accordance with her way, if she wants to assume more important responsibility in the future international pattern and play a more important role. Doing this is not only to create a more conducive international environment for China’s peaceful development but more to make the multi-polar world pattern can have a more rational and more just order in the future.

From this viewpoint, China's diplomacy is still facing severe challenges. Besides team construction, theory formulation, resource consolidation, and longer-term strategic planning, the top priority right now is to introduce innovation to the resolve of intractable problems, and transform passivity into initiative. Efforts should also be made to make a norm the positive stance that China has shown in the Syria issue and enrich it with greater foresight.

Diplomacy is a chess game. Skillful players can anticipate many steps. If the opponent predicts two moves and you can do three, four or even five, then you outsmart your rival and have a higher chance of success. However, the game is subject to changes and tricks, so predicting requires stratagem, courage and insight.

We must be equal to the crisis when it occurs, and more importantly, we should go further to equip ourselves with strategies of being brave and skilled in mobilizing the overall situation. Some problems in the world do not evolve unpredictably. If we move earlier, we can guide the development of the situation. Passive defense or counterattacks are not always accompanied by narrow survival. But early moves sometimes do have the potential to change the whole game.

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Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Wednesday that China needs not only economic reform but also political reform, especially the reform of the leadership system of the Party and government.

Wen warned at a press conference after the conclusion of the annual parliamentary session that tragedies like the Cultural Revolution may happen in China again should the country fail to push forward political reform to uproot problems occurring in the society.

The country risks losing the results of the reform and opening up over the past three decades without further reforms, as new problems such as unfair income distribution, lack of integrity and corruption, have not been resolved.

"Reform has now come to a critical stage," Wen said, adding reforms must go forward, rather than stand still or even go backward.