China Building Military at Pace Last Seen in 1930s Germany

HUMAN EVENTS ^ | May 24, 2006 | Jed Babbin

[neverdem]

From ancient Rome's destruction of Carthage to the Soviet Union of the late 1940s, nations' rise to great power status has almost always been on a tide of war. China -- both economically and militarily -- is on the verge of regional superpower status and aiming at the global equivalent.

Despite President Hu Jintao's "peaceful rise" sloganeering, China is building its military at a pace last seen in 1930s Germany, arming itself with things such as anti-satellite weapons that have no defensive purpose. America faces two great challenges in this decade: to defeat the terrorists and to help shape China's rise. No nation has managed the great power emergence of another. But we must. If we fail, we will be at war with China within the next decade.

America expects more of its military than does any other nation. We expect it to be able to fight and win. That it does, with incredible skill and courage. But we call on our troops to build schools in Iraq, to drill oil wells in Djibouti and do hundreds of other jobs that they don't learn in basic training or in college. Whether or not they think it's their job or smart for them to be doing it, they always answer, "can do."

But just as the military isn't comfortable in some civilian roles -- nation-building is one -- civilians often don’t trust the military to do some of the things it does best. One issue in the fight over Gen. Michael Hayden's nomination to head the CIA is whether the Pentagon should dominate the intelligence arena. (That issue is important only to those who are more concerned with bureaucratic turf wars than whether the best result obtains). That discomfort with the military has concealed, for hundreds of years, one of the military’s most important and least-used talents: diplomacy.

Military diplomacy is not an oxymoron. NATO didn't become the most effective peacetime alliance in American history because the Foggy Bottom striped-pants crowd made it so. It was the result of decades of shared training and teamwork among the militaries that grew to know each other personally. Military diplomacy works just as well among adversaries as among friends. One reason the Cold War stayed cold is that the Soviets saw, first-hand, who comprised our military and much of what they were capable of. If we are diligent about employing this military talent, the emergence of China as a superpower can be a peaceful one.

We have to employ our military diplomats to accomplish gains with China's neighbors as well as with China itself. With China, we already have two good examples to follow.

First was last year's trip to China by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. There is a message we send when we announce that the Secretary of State is going to a nation, and an entirely different one when the Secretary of Defense is the chosen emissary. In an interview last November, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Affairs Peter Rodman said that Rumsfeld spoke quite openly with the Chinese on a host of issues. Rodman said the lesson is that you can be firm with the Chinese and frank with the Chinese and yet have a very constructive relation with them. Adm. William Fallon's visit to Beijing this week -- his second since taking command of U.S. forces in the Pacific -- is the other example.

According to a Washington Post report of the trip, Fallon said his goal was to push China for more contacts, "…to see more things and different things, and to be more open and transparent in military matters." Because China's military buildup is being carried out in such secrecy that even its military budget is hidden whatever threat China may or may not pose is also hidden. This secrecy increases tensions enormously, especially among American allies and within the White House. Fallon, by pushing the Chinese for openness, is helping reduce that tension.

What Fallon is doing is paralleled by military diplomacy with China’s neighbors. These nations -- Malaysia, Vietnam, Japan and South Korea to name only a few -- are justly frightened by China’s growing strength and ambitions. The last time China built a "blue-water" navy was about the same time Christopher Columbus was sailing to the Americas. And when that Chinese fleet sailed, it was to demand tribute from nations as far away as Africa. Today's China will demand the modern equivalent, the oil and gas its neighbors possess.

To China, we can show that openness pays and secrecy has a price. Among China's neighbors, our military can gain trust at a personal level civilian diplomats can't. We should send our defense officials, admirals and generals to visit them often to tell these nations that we will help them defend themselves while working with them to remain on peaceful -- if often adversarial -- terms with China.

The White House is overly anxious to avoid calling our policy toward China "containment." The administration fears being accused of reviving Cold War images and rhetoric. We will not be able to contain China as we did with the Soviet Union. But with effective deployment of our military diplomats, we may be able to make Hu Jintao's "peaceful rise" less a slogan and more a fact.

[Mike Darancette]

At the rate China is arming our biggest problems may not be either Muslims or Mexicans.

[308MBR]

Do any of the so-called conservapoots, um, er, socialatives,...... Soldouticans..... Republicayellowdefecators....

I give up on what passes for having an "R" after their names means, but the real fact of the matter is NOT ONE SOUL IN THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA HAS THE TESTOSTERONE PRODUCING GLANDS TO SIMULTANEOUSLY STAND UP FOR THE SECOND AND TENTH AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION WHILE RESISTING THE ADVANCES OF CHINA INC.

Sorry about all the yelling. I shall endeavor to persevere to maintain low tones, for the rest of the day anyway.

[TheWasteLand]

I think China is certainly the real threat to the West, in the long run. What the President is doing with India is helpful, but is no substitute for aggressive American deterrence.

I think the honeymoon with China (especially wrt trade) is nearly over.

[catbertz]

I have always believed that while the muslims are a threat, the greatest threat we face is China. They are forming a worldwide proxy front against us, using the muslims, South Americans, NK and even Africa. They hope to avoid the mistakes of Japan/Germany.

[Zhang Fei]

China is building up. But many analysts are jumping the gun. Pre-war Germany had some of the best weaponry in the world. It was also one of the world's top industrial powers, having just revolutionized the chemical industry by inventing the Bosch and the Haber processes.

China's weaponry is crap - a small amount of it is overrated garbage imported from Russia, but most of it is Chinese-made junk - modified 50-year old Soviet designs. China is also one of the more backward countries in the world. Don't just take my word for it - go there sometime and experience it for yourself.

Go to any internet military forum with US veterans on it, and they'll tell you that the Chinese military would be flattened by the Korean military, let alone the American one. At this stage, China isn't pre-WWII Germany. It isn't even pre-WWII Japan - a much weaker power than the Germany of that era.*

China is a paper tiger at the moment. And the capabilities gap between the US and China is widening. And will continue to widen, assuming the US military budget remains at around 4% of American industrial output.

* Germany fought all the allies pretty much alone for six years. Uncle Sam devoted 80% of the war effort to fight Germany. It took 4 years to get to Berlin. Three months after 100% of the US war effort was devoted to fighting Japan, the Japanese had surrendered.

[Cindy]

"I think China is certainly the real threat to the West, in the long run."

I agree.

[TheWasteLand]

From what I've read, the Chinese have had their own problems with Muslims, but certainly you're right that they've been casting around for allies, if that's the right word.

It's important that America start moving strategically to counter China. That's why the President went to India a short while ago, in order to begin the process of aligning India with the West, as a buffer against China. But it is no replacement for purely American deterrence (ie. missiles, navy, air force, anti-ballistic shields, etc.), which has to be the foundation.

[yankeedame]

China is building up.

And there's the rub. The more people get, the more people want,i.e. they get electricity, next thing you know they want a steady supply of electricity, then a steady supply 24/7.

At some point, in order to retain control, the State will have announce, "The 'build up' stops here." For you can't give people a little bit of choice, wee bit of build up, or a smiggen of freedom - of any kind - and than expect them to say "That's all? Oh, okay."

You can stop them from outwardly expressing the desire but only by beating them into the dust a la Mao or Stalin via a 'built up' military ordered to fire on its own neighbors.

[The Duke]

China is a paper tiger at the moment.

Yeah, and all the Japanese manufacture is cheap toys! </sarcasm>

[Lurker]

The situation isn't so simple. China is comprised of hundreds of ethnic groups most of whom speak different languages.

During the Tianeman Square incident, troops were brought in from regions far away from Beijing precisely so they would have very little problem with shooting 'chinese'.

China likes to present to the world that it is one big happy family, but that really isn't true. The Hans don't much like the Manchurians who don't much like the Mandarins, etc etc. The CCP stays in power largely by playing one group off the other and trading in favors to the ruling classes.

Believe me the CCP would gladly starve 1/10th of their population to death in order to hold on to power. They've done it before and they won't hesitate to do it again if they must. All that matters to them is The Party.

The CCP has convinced itself that without the Party there is no China. That is a very dangerous mindset indeed.

L

[Carry_Okie]

At the rate China is arming our biggest problems may not be either Muslims or Mexicans.

If China offered the Southwest to Mexico the latter might be part of the same problem. IMHO, they are.

[mkjessup]

"China Building Military at Pace Last Seen in 1930s Germany"

Somehow all those masses of Red Guards with their arms extended and screaming "SIEG HU!! SIEG HU!!" don't have the same impact.

(as some little Chinese peasant on the sidelines sez
"What Hu talkin bout Rillis?"

[jpsb]

Thanks alot free traders. Keep shopping at wal-mart folks.

[jpsb]

"The White House is overly anxious to avoid calling our policy toward China "containment."

This is a joke right, this administration is giving China our factories, our jobs, are technology and are money. All in the name of Free trade. Containment, that was the old policy before NAFTA. GATT and the WTO.

[Mr. Jeeves]

If China offered the Southwest to Mexico the latter might be part of the same problem. IMHO, they are.

Sure. That's the real impetus for letting so many illegals in: here, they are productive and under our influence - send them home poor and unemployable and they are likely before long to become revolutionary soldiers under the influence of Chavez, Castro, and, from afar, China.

Latin America is already in play, and our betters have apparently determined that an open border is the best way to spread the influence of American capitalism and blunt the advance of socialism there.

And they are quite annoyed at us for focusing so much attention on the attendant societal disruptions of illegal immigration, for they consider those things short-term and irrelevant. ;)

[EQAndyBuzz]

"At the rate China is arming our biggest problems may not be either Muslims or Mexicans."

What are they going to do with a military that vast? Unless they plan on expansionism like the Soviets did(we saw how that went) there is nothing for them to do.

Of course it can be to move North which may be something that they are conspiring with the Russians on. Or they can attack Taiwan which would start a bigger war, unless they are betting the US will not intervene.

My bet is if Democrats win in 08, China is attacking Taiwan.

[Carry_Okie]

Sure. That's the real impetus for letting so many illegals in: here, they are productive and under our influence - send them home poor and unemployable and they are likely before long to become revolutionary soldiers under the influence of Chavez, Castro, and, from afar, China.

Looks to me like their kids are more under the effluents of our publik skools and communist universitariat La Razoids than anybody. As such, they may be more of a threat. They could either be convulsing their own countries (where they threaten "investors") or ours.

And they are quite annoyed at us for focusing so much attention on the attendant societal disruptions of illegal immigration, for they consider those things short-term and irrelevant. ;)

So what "they" do is undermine our ability to sustain ourselves long-term, babbling meaningless pap like "peace and security through interdependence."

Yeah, okey dokey. BLOAT-WWSC.

[robowombat]

Unfortunately the Chinese have another strategy which involves rolling up huge dollar holdings and then leveraging them either openly or covertly to buy effective control of the US. They recognize that all they have to do is become the largest holder of equity in some interest not at all the majority holder to effectively control the entity. As they do this with businesses which can then be turned into reliable sounding boards for deliberately not doing anything to offend China and for legally funding foreign lobbying campaigns through their American surrogates they can also use the same strategy covertly on Congress and much of the US policy making elite.

For Congress the mechanism will be semi-open 'soft money' contributions from their various controlled organizations here in CONUS combined with sophisticated illegal contributions and expensive gifts and funding whatever perversion it is the Congresscritter prefers. Thus they will come to own enough Congresspersons to effectively control both chambers.

For the so-called policy making and foreign policy-defense policy elites the same mechanism of funding their efforts through lots of soft money fronts and lots of remuneration for participating in a host of 'conferences and policy workshops' at the priciest resorts in the Pacific Basin.
Flat out bribery and 'gifting' these people will also work to make a large part of the blabbocracy reliably sinophil stooges.

It is going to be very hard if at all possible to resist this wave of subversion by people who already have many agents in place and who know how to exploit every loophole in laws and regulations.

[Mike Darancette]

Unfortunately the Chinese have another strategy which involves rolling up huge dollar holdings and then leveraging them either openly or covertly to buy effective control of the US.

Like the Japanese in the 80's?