Posted on 9/4/2002, 5:58:21 PM by xsysmgr
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov recently concluded a visit to China with unusual declarations concerning key strategic areas. Moscow and Beijing are trying to keep American security initiatives in check.
Kasyanov's responsibilities normally include the economy, not defense, which is President Vladimir Putin's purview. Nevertheless, the Russian premier and his Chinese counterpart, Zhu Rongji, have signed a declaration opposing the militarization of space and supporting a key role for the U.N. Security Council in the fight against terrorism.
"The declaration is a follow-up on the June 27 joint proposal before the U.N. Conference on Disarmament in Geneva for a new international treaty to ban weapons in outer space," says Col. Larry Wortzel (U.S. Army, Ret.), a former U.S. military attaché in Beijing. Wortzel points out that this treaty, if approved, will deny the Bush administration a key component for ballistic-missile defense: space-based interceptors, similar to the Reagan-era Brilliant Pebbles system. However, it is certain that the U. S. would veto the treaty, Wortzel says.
China and Russia are challenging U.S. predominance by highlighting the role of the U.N. — and their own veto power at the Security Council — in the war against terrorism. Moscow and Beijing also oppose space-based missile defense, which, from their point of view, would give Washington policymakers a great advantage.
Unlike the old days of Sino-Soviet friendship of the early 1950s, when Moscow led and Beijing followed, today China is no follower. And arms sales are the lifeblood of the relationship. After all, cash infusions from China (and Iran) are crucial to the ailing Russian military-industrial complex.
Sources in Moscow tell NRO that Kasyanov has signed arms-sales agreements with Beijing worth billions of dollars. But as of this past June, President Putin classified all arms-transfer statistics with China at the request of Beijing; so no official announcements were made during Kasyanov's visit to China.
Today, China is Russia's number-one arms buyer, responsible for close to 40 percent of the lucrative $4 billion-a-year trade. Last year alone China bought 40 Sukhoi fighters, and is now negotiating the purchase of eight Kilo-class submarines worth $1.6 billion, as well as building a helicopter-manufacturing joint venture in Harbin.
Russia is also selling China a wide array of technology needed to build up its nuclear arsenal, from warhead designs to uranium-enrichment technology. In addition, Russia is building two civilian nuclear reactors in China and hoping to sell more.
"The good news is that China is incapable of developing these military technologies and production on its own," Wortzel says. "Their own defense industry is incapable of sustaining a modern war… It is essentially a one-time-use military, which may be extremely dangerous at the start of a war, but will be unable to continue to fight."
Most of the systems that China buys extend her power-projection capability, enhancing the range and deadliness of her air force and navy, and protecting her military from American retaliation. For example, the AWAC planes Beijing wanted to buy from a Russian-Israeli joint venture would have given it command-and-control superiority against Taiwan, while Russian destroyers and subs armed with supersonic anti-ship missiles can be deadly against U.S. naval-battle groups in the South China Sea. It is highly symbolic that during his visit, Kasyanov voiced full support of China's position on Taiwan and Tibet, positions that the U.S. does not share.
A Russian military analyst who requested anonymity tells NRO that the Russian military ran war games and concluded that China would win in any conventional war against Russia. And Moscow is not willing to contemplate a nuclear annihilation. As a result, Russia will sell China almost anything to appease Beijing.
However, this is a marriage of convenience, not a steamy romance. Russia and China have their share of disagreements. Moscow is concerned about the great numbers of Chinese migrants in the sparsely populated Russian Far East. It is also worried that China is aggressively linking its support of Russian membership in the WTO with free entrance of Chinese labor for Russian employers and access to Chinese goods and services in Russian markets. In addition, Beijing insists that Russia tie its Siberian oil exports exclusively to China by building a pipeline into Manchuria. Russia wants to build the pipeline to the Pacific port of Nakhodka, allowing it to diversify its customer base and export to Japan, Korea, and the U.S.
The bad news is, Russia still possesses a world-class military-industrial complex, inherited from the Soviet Union, and wants to sustain it by selling arms to China, India, Iran, and other countries. Russia's military-security elite will try to keep it afloat at all costs regardless of Washington protests.
Thus, Russia is likely to continue to sell weapons to its neighbors, sowing the seeds of regional instability in the process. It sold to both sides during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, and will supply the Vietnamese and North Koreans with modern aircraft and tanks, while selling the same to China and South Korea.
As the specter of 9/11 recedes into the past, business as usual takes over. Old mischief is here again.
—Ariel Cohen is a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation and author of Russian Imperialism: Development and Crisis.
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