2007 - China's Quest for a Superpower Military

China's Quest for a Superpower Military

John J. Tkacik

Introduction

            On March 4, China’s National People’s Congress announced that it would increase the country's military budget 17.8 percent in 2007 to a total of $45 billion.1  It was the biggest-ever single annual increase in China's announced military spending2 and the Chinese government went out of its way to reassure the world that this spending hike was normal and need not worry anyone. "China is committed to taking a path of peaceful development and it pursues a defensive military posture,” a spokesman said.3

            As the Chinese aphorism goes, "listen to what they say, but observe what they do," and what Beijing is saying is quite a bit different from what it is doing. 

            The resources that Beijing now devotes to its armed forces already put it in the top stratum of global military powers.  With China's 2006 gross domestic product in excess of $2.5 trillion or, about $10 trillion in "purchasing power parity" terms, and with military spending estimated by the Central Intelligence Agency at 4.5 percent of China's GDP.4  China's military spending is more accurately pegged in the realm of  $450 billion dollars – 4.5 percent of $10 trillion -- than $45 billion.5

While China's declared military budget primarily includes personnel costs (and a 17.8 percent military pay hike is reasonable), the declared budget is only a small part of overall Chinese military spending.  The exact methodology that U.S. intelligence agencies use to arrive at their 4.5% “guesstimate” for the military’s share of China’s GDP is classified, but it reportedly takes into account the fact that the budget figures do not include foreign arms purchases, subsidies to military industries, any of China’s space program (which is under the absolute command of the Central Military Commission), costs of the 660,000-man “People’s Armed Police” or the provincial level militias and reserve forces.6 It appears that defense spending in some sectors not counted in the defense budget is increasing at a rate much faster than the official military budget itself.  The "2006 Defense White Paper", for example, noted that:

In 2005, the output value, added value and gross revenue of the entire spectrum of defense-related science, technology and industry increased by 24.3 percent, 20.7 percent and 21.6 percent, respectively, over the previous year.7

  The Chinese military budget does not include the bulk of the "defense-related science, technology and industry" sector, nor overseas military procurement.  Nor does it include provincial spending on militias or reserves.

            Despite the Chinese Communist Party leadership’s espousal of China’s “peaceful rise”, the facts speak for themselves.  This unprecedented peacetime expansion of China’s military capabilities can no longer be viewed agnostically as though it were still possible that some benign force animates it.  Calls for "transparency" in China's military expansion are misplaced.  China's military expansion is already sufficiently "transparent" to discern Beijing's intention – in the name of "anti hegemony" and promoting a "multipolar international system" – to challenge the United States in the Western Pacific and establish itself as the predominant military power in the region.

 China’s Rise as a Military Power

            Chinese leaders are not seized by self-doubt about the direction of their regime.  The declared strategy of the Chinese leadership has been to turn its economic growth, via the "Four Modernizations" (agricultural, industrial, science and technology, and military) and the "Prosperous Nation, Strong Military" (fu guo, qiang bing) model, into military power.  Ironically, with the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union – China’s only existential threat – China’s military spending increased while the United States and virtually all U.S. allies immediately set about reaping a “peace dividend,” with U.S. defense expenditures dropping over ten percent (from $298 billion in fiscal year 1992 down to $268 billion in fiscal year 1997).8   In the same period, Chinese defense spending sustained annual double-digit increases. That pace of Chinese military spending increases persist to this day.  The Pentagon estimates total defense-related expenditures in 2005 to be between $70 and $105 billion, which would China third in nominal dollar defense spending after the United States and Russia.9

American intelligence analysts in both Republican and Democratic administrations have been surprised in recent years at the breathtaking pace and scope of China’s military development.10  As the 2006 Department of Defense report on “The Military Power of the People’s Republic of China” notes, the transformation of the People’s Liberation Army has included new doctrines, reform of military institutions and systems, improved exercise and training standards, and the acquisition of new foreign and domestic weapons systems. Already, China’s military expansion has altered regional military balances. The long-term trends in China’s military have the potential to pose credible threats to modern militaries.11

            Nuclear Forces: The most ominous of China's military advances has been in the People's Liberation Army's (PLA) strategic rocket forces ("Second Artillery") which combine its nuclear and conventional ballistic missile commands as well as its anti-satellite units. In the mid-1990s, the Second Artillery embarked on a modernization program designed to bring the reliability, survivability, response times and accuracy of its ballistic missiles to state-of-the-art standards, and since 1996, has more than doubled and in some years tripled the annual production of solid-fuelled short range ballistic missiles (SRBMs).12   In addition, China currently deploys at least 40 intercontinental ballistic missiles targeted on the United States homeland. The road-mobile DF-21 medium range ballistic missile (MRBM) has been operational since 1996, and the PLA Second Artillery is now introducing road-mobile ICBMs such as the DF-31.

[13]

  DF-31As with a range of 10,000 kilometers are expected to be in initial operational capability by 2008.

[14]

   Given the known rapid growth in SRBM production, there is every likelihood that MRBM-IRBM and ICBM manufacturing is expanding at the same rate – that is, by 2006 DF-31 output could easily have been 10-20 new missiles a year. China's current Xia-class ballistic missile submarine is already loaded with the Julang-1 (JL-1) solid-fuel missiles, and a longer-ranged JL variant SLBM with a range of 8,000 km will be deployed on China's new Jin-class (Type-094) nuclear ballistic missile submarine in three years.

[15]

 

            In addition, the PLA will have "several new conventional and nuclear variants of MRBMs and IRBMs for regional contingencies and to augment its long-range missile forces."

[16]

Logically, the strategic aim of this rapid expansion of China's nuclear force, particularly with the deployment of the DF-31s and DF-31As and the emergence of a durable submarine-based nuclear capability, is to reduce substantially China's nuclear vulnerability and develop a robust nuclear deterrent focused on the United States.

While Beijing purports to have a nuclear “no first use” (NFU) policy, some U.S. experts believe that the Chinese leadership reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in a first strike against Taiwan or Taiwan’s defenders – the unmistakable implication being that U.S. forces defending Taiwan would be targets.

[17]

  This position was explicated on the record by a senior Chinese strategist in 2005.

[18]

  There are indications that the PLA is contemplating the use of a high-altitude nuclear detonation to generate a powerful “electromagnetic pulse” that would “fry” micro-circuitry in U.S. weapons systems during a conflict.

[19]

  Rather than trying to reduce instability in such a strategic environment, internal PLA military writings treat NFU as a constraint on nuclear operations and reflect considerable resistance to NFU in the PLA.

[20]

Hence, China’s NFU declaration appears intended primarily for propaganda advantage and possibly to inject complaisance into the decision making of American adversaries.  At least one study shows that Chinese nuclear doctrine seems to make little distinction between how conventional ballistic missiles and nuclear-armed ballistic missiles are deployed and used.

[21]

Another serious facet of China's nuclear doctrine is the fact that the Central Military Commission deploys nuclear and conventional warheads on the same classes of ballistic missiles and co-locates them near each other in firing units of the Second Artillery Corps.  This doctrine is apparently designed to shorten an escalation fuse in an effort to further complicate a U.S.-Japan responses during a crisis.

[22]

   

Moreover, this modernized and sophisticated nuclear force is clearly well in excess of any mere "Taiwan contingency."  It involves new power projection capabilities which give Beijing both "area denial" strength by holding forward deployed U.S. forces in Japan, Korea, and even Guam, at risk and as well as coercive diplomacy instruments to resolve other territorial disputes, for example, in the East China Sea with Japan, and the South China Sea with other ASEAN claimants.  Indeed, China's new nuclear weapons systems in and of themselves present grave implications for U.S. power projection in the Western Pacific, for the security of America's allies and friends in democratic Asia, and for regional military balances in general.

The United States must pay far more attention to another serious China nuclear weapons conundrum:  China’s tacit direct and indirect support for nuclear weapons programs in Pakistan, Iran and North Korea, and Libya.  Strategic planners in Washington must ask whether China calculates that a nuclear strike launched by North Korea or Iran on the United States (or in the case of North Korea, on Japan) might actually be in China’s ultimate interests.  The September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States weakened the United States, distracted policy-makers from Asia, and diverted foreign investment flows from the U.S. to China for several years thereafter.  A scenario in which Iran or North Korea inflicts major damage on the United States or its allies with a nuclear device may be an underlying motivation for China to give rogue states diplomatic support against U.S. and European pressures to abandon their nuclear programs.

Chinese advances in rocket technology will also place at risk America's forward deployed forces in the Western Pacific as conventional warheads are refined to include new guidance capabilities.  For example, U.S. carrier battle groups may well face theater ballistic missiles with maneuverable reentry vehicles (MaRVs) capable of hitting moving ships at sea.

[23]

  The hyperspeeds of these reentry vehicles make them virtually impossible to defeat with current missile defense technology.

Chinese advances in land attack cruise missiles (LACM) as well as theater ballistic missiles, too, will place U.S. forces in Japan, Korea, and even Guam within their range.

[24]

 

            Anti-satellite Weapons: Given the American military’s highly advertised reliance on space systems, an equally unsettling development is the PLA Second Artillery's experimentation with various anti-satellite (ASAT) systems, capabilities targeted exclusively on United States space assets.  On January 12, 2007 (Beijing time), a Chinese DF-21 missile lifted a kinetic kill vehicle (KKV) into an intercept track for the orbit of a Chinese Fengyun 1-C weather satellite in polar orbit over 500 miles above China.

[25]

  The missile warhead then fired the KKV at the satellite (perhaps guided by illumination from a ground-based targeting laser) and successfully destroyed it.  U.S. space trackers had monitored at least two previous KKV/ASAT tests, the first in October 2005 (in which the KKV was maneuvered into close range of the FY-1C satellite, but suddenly veered away) but had never publicized them.

[26]

 

            Given the grievous risks to low orbit satellites presented by a debris cloud from a Chinese spacecraft shattered in a KKV test, why the U.S. did not confront the Chinese following those earlier tests remains a mystery.  No doubt some administration officials did not want to antagonize China’s space efforts.  In April 2006, shortly before Chinese President Hu Jintao's official visit to Washington, China's deputy space agency administrator, Luo Ge, evidently found a receptive audience in the White House for his proposals of joint U.S.-China space cooperation.  Mr. Luo requested the U.S. agree to Chinese participation in the International Space Station, including making modifications on the orbiting station that would allow Chinese spacecraft to dock.  Indeed, Presidents Bush and Hu discussed Chinese participation in the ISS and cooperation in a future Lunar landing effort -- an initiative that might explain some of the U.S. hesitation.

[27]

  Some observers speculate that U.S. officials were holding out the prospect of space cooperation to get China to accept space launch “rules of the road”.  In fact, China’s People’s Daily touted U.S. interest in lunar mission cooperation with China, an obvious propaganda ploy, but the PLA rejected Washington’s “rules of the road” initiatives.

[28]

Some enthusiastic support for U.S.-China space cooperation certainly persisted in the White House even as late as August 2006 when the PLA attempted to blind (or “illuminate”) a U.S. reconnaissance satellite, but that support was resisted in the Pentagon and NASA and by Undersecretary of State Robert Joseph.

[29]

  By the end of September, NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin was expressing deep frustration that the PLA had blocked any reciprocal access to Chinese space launch facilities or engineering centers.  Without transparency in China’s programs, and especially in China’s refusal to coordinate launch information and space debris data, cooperation remained impossible.

[30]

While senior U.S. military commanders debated on China’s ASAT intentions even into October, 2006, all but the most ardent apologists admitted that China simply was not prepared for serious international cooperation in space.

[31]

The Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party approved a September 28, 2006, commentary in Beijing’s Huanqiu Shibao that declared “The United States’ exaggeration of China’s counter-satellite technology is only an attempt to seek an excuse to justify its development of space weapons.”

[32]

In retrospect, however, whatever the United States was doing regarding China’s counter-satellite technology, “exaggerating” wasn’t part of it.  That China was interested solely in propaganda points and not in space cooperation was irrefutably confirmed by the January 12 ASAT test, as China did not seem to feel any obligation to give international notification that it intended to fill a polar orbit 530 miles up with tens of thousands of particles of space debris, each piece of which could damage or destroy latitudinal orbital space craft at and below that altitude.

[33]

 

The following week, the State Department filed a demarche with the Chinese government to protest the ASAT test, but received no response.  A week later, the Pentagon briefed journalists on the test.  It was the first time the Department of Defense had reported on China’s KKV-ASAT although DoD had described other Chinese ASAT efforts in its annual China “Military Power” reports.”

[34]

  Subsequently, the Chinese foreign ministry, while not publicly admitting that the test was an ASAT weapon had taken place, observed dryly that Beijing has shown a "responsible attitude" by offering “explanations” to the U.S. and Japan, and insisted Beijing has all along "upheld the peaceful use of outer space." "China opposes the weaponization of space and any arms race," the foreign ministry added, and gave the reassuring pledge that "The test is not targeted at any country and will not threaten any country.”

[35]

 Judging from the clueless reaction of China’s foreign ministry to angry demarches and complaints from several space nations, few outside the PLA’s chain of command or the Communist Party Politburo were informed of the tests ahead of time or were briefed on them afterwards.

[36]

This does not mean that Beijing’s foreign ministry does not have a vital role in China’s ASAT program.  Chinese diplomats have the important mission of getting the United States to adhere to a Chinese draft statement “Preventing an Arms Race in Outer Space” (PAROS) that Beijing has circulated in the United Nations.  Although U.S. negotiators have tried to engage Chinese counterparts on Beijing’s thoughts on verification of a PAROS regime, the Chinese have uniformly insisted that the U.S. first sign a PAROS agreement and then China will mull over verification issues.

[37]

  These lessons, however, seem lost on most of America’s allies.  China and Russia managed to isolate the US 160:1 in the last meeting of the United Nations First Committee on the PAROS statement, Israel abstained, while Japan, Britain and Australia all voted for it.  Certainly the United States must be wary of the disastrous potential for a public-relations wedge-driving campaign by Beijing on the PAROS.

[38]

In this, the Chinese have learned much from Soviet arms control negotiators who, by the 1980s, realized that they didn’t have to put much reliance on verification when dealing with the United States.  Once the U.S. signed an arms control agreement, it was self-enforced via America’s democratic processes.  Moreover, as evidenced by the Soviets' construction of the Krasnoyarsk ABM battle-management radar in direct contravention of the ABM treaty, the Soviets could openly cheat, deny inspections, and confound verification, without fear that the U.S. would abrogate the treaty.  China, likewise appears intent on violating a PAROS by forming covert ASAT units in the Second Artillery.

[39]

   

Since the January 12 test, U.S. media reports from the Pentagon reflect alarm among U.S. space strategists over several other Chinese space weapons initiatives including ground based lasers and radio frequency weapons.

[40]

  But they are particularly concerned about the launching of small Chinese satellites into orbits very close to key U.S. intelligence, reconnaissance and communications spacecraft.  Such “parasite” micro-satellites are presumed to be “time bombs” that could blind and cripple American military operations and financial communications.  “These things aren’t being sent up there to be space rocks,” one military source said.

[41]

  All these programs bespeak an anti-satellite development program that is very broad and sophisticated.

While official U.S. government speculation that China’s political leaders may not have known of the ASAT tests

[42]

are incredible, it is certainly PLA practice to withhold information from civilian departments – the PLA’s refusal to inform health authorities about the 2003 SARS epidemic is a clear example of this.  It is possible that the PLA believed that the January 12 ASAT test would go unnoticed, although the Pentagon had, for eighteen months, a standing invitation to Chinese Second Artillery commanders to visit U.S. StratCom to discuss the dangers of space debris and how the U.S. tracks it.

[43]

  Few doubt that the PLA is fully aware of StratCom's and USAF SpaceCom’s space tracking capabilities or fully appreciates that U.S. technical platforms would see the debris cloud immediately after a successful ASAT test.  While low level officials in China's foreign ministry have admitted they knew nothing of the PLA's ASAT tests, most observers agree that the civilian party and government leadership at least at the Politburo level get extensive briefings on important military advances -- though their eyes may glaze over.

[44]

            Naval Forces:  Space is not the only theater in which China seeks to challenge American supremacy.  China is now the world's largest commercial shipbuilder and its naval ship production has slipstreamed behind the civilian sector.

[45]

As Chinese Communist Party leader Hu Jintao's front-page banner-headline speech to the PLA Navy on December 27, 2006,

[46]

made clear – if not explicit – China is preparing to confront the United States at sea and under the sea, and China's navy is also preparing to upgrade its naval aviation and power projection capacities.  China's naval modernization, Hu reported, "has made great strides, comprehensive combat capabilities have strengthened visibly, and we have achieved new heights and made new contributions to the various missions which the Party and the people have bestowed."  A few days later, China's so-called "Defense White Paper" declared that "the Navy aims at gradual extension of the strategic depth for offshore defensive operations and enhancing its capabilities in integrated maritime operations and nuclear counterattacks."  China has already assembled a modern subsurface navy, with a fleet of 29 advanced diesel-electric submarines, including 12 super-quiet Russian-made Kilo class subs

[47]

and 14 Chinese-made Song and Yuan class boats. At least 10 more conventional and nuclear submarines are in China's shipyards, with another five new nuclear ballistic missile and attack subs on the drawing boards. China's surface fleet is undergoing a similar modernization, and the PLA Navy is refitting the former Soviet aircraft carrier Varyag for sea duty – at the very least as a training platform for naval pilots.

            Submarine force:  Chinese submarines slip out to open seas from underwater tunnels and are virtually undetectable.  In 2004, U.S. intelligence officials admitted that the development of the Yuan-class submarines was concealed from American satellites because they were constructed in an underground drydock facility in south-central China.

[48]

 One day in September 2006, China’s top submarine officer and vice chief of staff of the PLA Navy, Rear Admiral Ding Yiping, arrived at the Yulin Naval Base on the South China Sea island of Hainan, just weeks before a Chinese Type-039A Song class submarine from the South Sea Fleet's 32nd Submarine Squadron slipped out to sea.  The PLA Navy’s Song submarines are stealthy diesel-electrics equipped with long-range wake-homing torpedoes designed to sink aircraft carriers, and Admiral Ding had sent this particular boat on a mission to hunt an American carrier.  On October 27 (October 26 Washington time), the submarine surfaced in waters off Okinawa within torpedo range of the U.S. carrier Kitty Hawk where it was seen in the Kitty Hawk’s wake by an F-18 pilot as he vectored to land on the carrier.

[49]

  The Chinese submarine was undetected by the carrier battle group’s anti-submarine systems apparently because it had laid in wait, submerged and stock-still, for at least one day as the task force approached the area.  Beijing’s state-controlled media reported that Admiral Ding had “personally commanded” the entire operation (he may even have skippered the submarine himself) and predicted the success of his mission would lead to a promotion.

[50]

  

The official Chinese press noted the PLA high command’s confidence in Admiral Ding, ample evidence of their pleasure at the success of the 32^nd Squadron boat’s mission against the Kitty Hawk.  Like the January 12 ASAT test, the October 27 submarine maneuver was a clear message to the United States that China is the rising power in the Pacific. The Chinese foreign ministry’s protest that the vessel had not “stalked” the Kitty Hawk was likely the literal truth  indicating that the submarine simply waited in the water until the U.S. flotilla sailed over it.

[51]

  The ease with which the 32nd Squadron submarine maneuvered unseen into Japanese waters and evaded U.S. and Japan Self Defense Force submarine sensors suggests that China's large submarine fleet engages in far more sea patrols than the U.S. has any hope of tracking.

[52]

            China’s submarine fleet is now considered the PLA Navy’s most “potent strength.”

[53]

  Since 1995 the PLA Navy has commissioned about 31 new submarines, including two nuclear powered submarines, all based on advanced Russian technology.

[54]

  Eight submarines, both Chinese and Russian-built, were commissioned in 2005 alone, and seven in 2006, including new Song-class vessels and a Yuan class boat heavily inspired by Russia’s AMUR technology with its anechoic tile coatings and a quiet seven-bladed skewed propeller.

[55]

  The reported incorporation of “air-independent propulsion” systems that permit submarines to operate underwater for up to 30 days on pure battery power, would make new Chinese Song and Yuan submarines virtually inaudible to existing U.S. surveillance networks.

[56]

In addition, China has three new nuclear-powered submarine construction programs, the Type-093 Shang class nuclear attack boat and the Type-094 Jin class nuclear ballistic missile submarine, under way at present -- with at two Shang attack submarines deployed and three now under construction, at least five Jin class ballistic missile submarines under construction, and five "Type-095" submarines – a larger version of the Shang/Jin hull, under development.

[57]

Together with China’s ongoing procurement program for improved Russian-made Kilo-class submarines, China has at least five new submarine programs under way simultaneously, a submarine development campaign that is unprecedented in peacetime.  China will have at least 34, and some analysts expect as many as 50 to 60, advanced submarines deployed in the Pacific by 2010 (presuming those in shipyards now will all be completed in three years) but certainly well over 60 by 2020.

[58]

            Meanwhile, the United States has three submarines under construction today, is downsizing submarine shipyards and is laying off expert technicians needed for submarine construction.  The US Navy's total submarine force, under current construction/decommissioning schedules, will dip to 48 boats in 2020, 17 percent below the Pentagon's own stated requirement of 48 -- a level which certainly cannot provide more than 60 percent of the US Navy's existing submarine mission requirements, and will fall below 40 boats by 2027.

[59]

 

Surface combatants:  But it is not as if China has placed its large naval construction budget solely at the disposal of the subsurface fleet.  The PLA Navy is lavishing financial resources on its surface fleet as well.  The PLAN received its second of two Russian-made Sovremennyy II guided missile destroyers in September 2006, fitted with advanced anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCMs) and sophisticated, wide-area air defense systems, a qualitative improvement even over China’s two advanced-technology Sovremennyy ships acquired in 2000.

[60]

  In 2005, the PLA Navy (PLAN) launched its newest ships, Luzhou-class (Type 051C) guided-missile destroyers equipped with Russian SA-N-20 air defense systems and a “Tombstone” phased-array radar which doubles the range of current PLA Navy air defense weapons.  The Luzhou destroyer complements ongoing developments of the Luyang I (Type 052B) guided missile destroyers (similar to the Sovremennyy) and Luyang II (Type 052C) guided missile destroyer. The Luyang I is equipped with the Russian SA-N-7B “Grizzly” air defense missiles and YJ-83 anti-ship cruise missiles. The Luyang II is also fitted with indigenously-produced HHQ-9 air defense missiles.

[61]

 The PLAN's deployment of eight new classes of Chinese-built destroyers and frigates since 1994, and the launching of 13 new frigates since 1998 are, as one Congressional analyst notes, "an undertaking with few parallels by any country in recent decades."

[62]

 

There are two other intriguing aspects of China's naval buildup:  aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships, both designed for region-wide projection of power, soft and hard.  These are not fleets that would be particularly useful in a Taiwan Strait scenario given the fairly short over-water distances between Taiwan and the Chinese coast.  Rather, they appear intended to project China's military force out into the East Asian and Pacific region in crises or confrontations where they would not be challenged by hostile submarines.

The Varyag aircraft carrier:  For over a year, the PLA Navy has been more or less open about China's eventual deployment of an aircraft battle group, and in fact China has all the elements of a battle group in place -- except for the carrier -- according to Lieutenant General Wang Zhiyuan of the PLA General Armaments Department.

[63]

  China's first aircraft carrier will be completed by 2010 -- according to an unnamed Lieutenant General, probably General Wang again.

[64]

And it appears that the first carrier will be the former Soviet carrier, Varyag.

China's once secrecy-shrouded naval aviation program now appears under way at full steam.  At its center is the massive 67,000-ton ex-Ukrainian aircraft carrier which the Chinese government extracted from the Black Sea in 2001 after considerable costs in both treasure and political capital with Turkey.

[65]

  In March 2002, when the Varyag finally completed its 15,200 mile odyssey to its home port in the Chinese port city of Dalian, it was immediately impounded under "heavy security" at the PLA naval drydocks.

[66]

 

China reportedly has already negotiated a contract for 48 Sukhoi-33 jet fighters, the carrier-based version of the Su-27 with a forward wing canard, and is now preparing the Varyag's flight deck for flight operations.

[67]

  There are also reports in the PRC media that China will configure its new Jian-10 fighter for naval-air deployments.

[68]

  At a reported maximum take-off weight of about 42,000 pounds, the Jian-10 is one-third lighter than the Russian Su-33 and, like the Su-33, its forward canard enables a lower take-off speed suited to the Varyag's "ski-jump" deck.

[69]

 

The PLA Naval Air Force (PLANAF) schedule apparently envisions developing a carrier-ready naval aviation air wing by the time China is able to launch its own aircraft carrier

[70]

– all this despite official Beijing's continuing protestations that while "China already is capable of building an aircraft carrier, a final decision on construction has not yet been made."

[71]

Amphibious Landing Vessels:  A carrier force is only half of a power projection capability.  The ability to land a significant ground force on a distant shore is the other half.  Since 2003, China has built three new classes of landing craft, including 19 amphibious ships and 10 amphibious landing craft, which have kept three or four shipyards busy on a full time basis.

[72]

  On December 20, 2006, China launched the PLA Navy's largest-ever combat amphibious assault ship, an indigenously-designed "amphibious landing dock" (LPD) identified as the "Type 071" similar to, but a bit larger than, the U.S. Whidbey Island class LPD.

[73]

 Designed in Tenth Five-Year Plan (2001-2005), the ship was built in about six months in the latter half of 2006 and appears to be the first of four.  The 071 appears to be designed to deliver between 500-800 troops, 25-50 armored vehicles and supplies ashore on 15 landing craft or several large hovercraft, and to base at least two Changhe Z-8 size helicopters each capable of ferrying 30 soldiers inland beyond a beachhead.

The prospect of being able to assemble a significant show of military and naval force during some future instances of anti-Chinese upheavals in Southeast Asia or the Pacific islands rather than chartering evacuation flights, is no doubt attractive in the Politburo.  One or two instances of Chinese military intervention in regional Asia-Pacific unrest, with an aircraft carrier and a few LPDs carrying a brigade or so of PLA special forces troops, would establish China's identity as the preeminent Asian power – and one which is ready to defend its émigrés in any country in Asia.  As Hu Jintao exhorted the PLA Navy last December, "China is a great maritime nation, in the defense of national sovereignty and security, and protecting our nation's maritime rights, the navy's role is important and its mission is glorious."

            Air forces: Although the modernization of the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) has taken a back seat to China's nuclear, space and naval development, it nonetheless is a much more modern fighting force in 2007 than it was in 1997.  It now boasts about 450 advanced fighter aircraft, including about 300 Russian-designed fourth-generation Sukhoi-27 Flankers/Chinese-assembled Jian-11s, and 76 Su-30MKK fighter-bombers which display substantial ground attack capabilities and are armed with Russia’s most advanced air-to-air missiles.

[74]

            In January 2007, the PLAAF unveiled its new Chinese-produced Jian-10 multi-role fighter jet (based on the Israeli-designed Lavi airframe, itself an evolutionary offshoot of the F-16).  The PLAAF is said to have deployed 60 Jian-10s as of March 2007, with a total production run estimated to number around 250.

[75]

  Although the forward wing canards are a novelty among Chinese-designed fighters, the most remarkable characteristic of the Jian-10 is its midair refueling module which was featured in a January 2007 Chinese state television video clip showing the Jian-10 refueling with the HU-6 aerial tanker version of the Tupolev-16 medium bomber.

[76]

  The PLAAF has been practicing in-flight refueling since at least 2005 with both Su-27 and older Chinese-designed Jian-8 fighters.

[77]

  And following the joint Chinese-Russian "Peace Mission 2005" military exercise in China's Shandong peninsula, China contracted for between six and ten IL-78's configured as aerial refueling platforms and 30 Illyushin-76 cargo aircraft configured for paratroop drops.

[78]

 

The increasing size of China's fourth generation fighter fleet,

[79]

heavily armed with the latest Russian and Chinese designed air-to-air missiles, fire control systems and refueling modules now gives the PLAAF the technological as well as numerical edge in the Taiwan Strait.  The Pentagon estimates that China has deployed more than 700 fighters in the Taiwan Strait theater.

[80]

  While Taiwan has roughly 320 fourth-generation fighters of its own (56 Mirage-200-5s, 146 F-16s and 128 Ching-kuo IDF indigenously developed fighters), Taiwan's opposition parties in the legislature have limited funding for Taiwan's fighter armaments. 

For example, Taiwan only has 120 AIM-120 missiles for its 146 F-16's, meaning that Taiwan's F-16s can shoot only once and, as one anonymous U.S. official privately commented, "if they want to bring down a second Chinese Su-27, they have to crash into it."

[81]

  This presumes, of course, that the Taiwan fighters aren't first shot down by the Su-27s' weaponry, by the PLA's SA-10 and SA-20 missiles, or by the sophisticated Russian S-300PMU2 air defense missiles that can provide effective coverage over most of the Taiwan Strait area.

[82]

The goal of the PLAAF's buildup is quite transparent.  According to Beijing's 2006 "Defense White Paper", the PLA "Air Force aims at speeding up its transition from territorial air defense to both offensive and defensive operations, and increasing its capabilities in the areas of air strike, air and missile defense, early warning and reconnaissance, and strategic projection."

[83]

Ground Forces:  China's standing army is the largest in the world at 2.3 million men, and it is now undergoing a comprehensive modernization.  Hoping to persuade the outside world that "downsizing" the PLA's ground forces is a key component of China's military modernization, Beijing's "2006 Defense White Paper" makes much of the demobilization of over 200,000 PLA troops between 2003 and 2005 bringing the size of the regular army down from 1.84 million men to 1.64 million.

[84]

  However, it appears that the demobilization's main effect is to move the downsized troops off of the PLA's roles and reassign them to provincial militias and reserve units or to change their status to "non-active duty" contract personnel (feixianyi renyuan and wenzhi renyuan) whose salaries are not carried in the published national military budget.

[85]

            But this is not to say that China is neglecting its ground forces in favor of nuclear, naval and air services.  The sole thrust of ground troop reductions is to construct a more effective fighting force.

[86]

 

While PLA ground force modernization includes important organizational, training, doctrinal and logistical reforms, none of it would be much use without a significant upgrading of its equipment.  For example, the PLA's workhorse Type 96 main battle tank is gradually being replaced by state-of-the-art Type 98 MBT – a weapon that arguably outclasses its U.S. counterpart, the M-1A2 Abrams MBT.

[87]

  The PLA is also being outfitted with a new amphibious light tank, the Type-63A, described as "the most heavily armed amphibious tank in the world," with 400 to 600 now deployed with PLA Amphibious Army and PLAN Marine units.

[88]

  But PLA ground force equipment modernization is broad, including new helicopters (both Russian export versions and Chinese-manufactures), unmanned aerial vehicles, self-propelled guns, mobile surface-to-air missiles and launchers, multiple rocker launchers, small all-terrain vehicles for special operations forces, and a panoply of new small arms.  And the PLA is developing a new class of amphibious assault hovercraft which appears designed to carry 60 to 75 tons of cargo or one an Abrams size main battle tank.

[89]

Cyberwarfare forces:  Perhaps the most prominent "buzzword" in China's "2006 Defense White Paper" is the word "informationization" (xinxihua) and the PLA ground forces organized their first cyberwarfare units (zixunhua budui) in early 2003.

[90]

  They have since become a highly active element in China's ground force organization, no doubt working off the expertise developed in the late 1990s by China's police and state security services which themselves are well-trained and equipped in using the internet and cell phone networks to monitor, identify, locate and censor cyberdissidents.  New PLA doctrine indicates that "computer network operations" (CNO) are now seen as a force multiplier in any confrontation

[91]

with the United States and other potential adversaries, including Taiwan, Japan, South Korea,

[92]

and even the United Kingdom.

Since then, PLA cyber units seem to have been both active and highly sophisticated, and they are apparently the only PLA units that regularly attack enemy targets in the course of their duties.

On November 1st, 2004, Beijing time, PLA cyber warfare troops "sat down at computers in southern China and set off once again on their daily hunt for U.S. secrets." Pentagon computer security sleuths had monitored their operations since 2003 when the unit began their attacks on U.S. government networks, part of an "information operation" that U.S. investigators have codenamed Titan Rain.  Using a simple but elegantly modified "scanner program" the PLA's Titan Rain cyber warriors identified network vulnerabilities in scores of Pentagon systems, including the critically important computers at the U.S. Army Information Systems Engineering Command at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, the Defense Information Systems Agency in Arlington, Virginia, the Naval Ocean Systems Center in San Diego, California, and the Army Space and Strategic Defense Command in Huntsville, Alabama.

[93]

 The attacks were traced to a network in China's Guangdong province, and according to one expert, the software and hacking techniques identified it as a professional military operation.  The hackers, he said, "were in and out with no keystroke errors and left no fingerprints, and created a backdoor in less than 30 minutes. How can this be done by anyone other than a military organization?"

[94]

            Throughout December 2005, British Parliament offices in London were surreptitiously penetrated, also from computers using the Guangdong ISP network.  Britain's National Infrastructure Security Coordination Center (NISCC) investigators told reporters, "these were not normal hackers . . . the degree of sophistication was extremely high. They were very clever programmers." The Chinese hackers were searching files in offices of the British government dealing with human rights issues - "a very odd target", opined one UK security official,

[95]

unless of course, the hackers had been tasked by the Chinese government.  The attacks on British parliamentary offices were well-funded and well organized.  The software used was highly sophisticated and the operators had authorization to develop websites in China to which information was directed by emails. A British network security expert opined, "it costs money to be able to mount an operation of this complexity."

[96]

            The UK attacks involved "Trojan" emails specifically targeted on unique victims. "One email was targeted at one company in aviation. It was a Word document that had a Math/cad component. If you did not have math/cad on your computer it would not open," said one expert. "The point was to find documents that had been written in that particular program and then send them back."

[97]

PLA cyber penetrations of Japanese organizations used Microsoft "zero-day vulnerabilities

            The PLA cyber warfare units no doubt discovered all these software and hardware vulnerabilities in key global operating systems and business programs when they gained full access to Microsoft source codes via the Chinese State Planning Commission.  The SPC signed a memorandum with Microsoft in June 2002 in which Chinese government access to source codes was a condition of Microsoft's future China investments.

[98]

            One British academic has pointed out that "hacking in China carries the death penalty . . . you also have to sign on with the police if you want to use the internet. And then there is the Great Firewall of China, which lets very little through - and lets [the Chinese government] know exactly what is happening."

[99]

Consequently, there was little doubt that these cyber attacks were part of a deliberate Chinese government-sanctioned campaign. 

While the Pentagon managed to shore up its cyber defenses after the 2004 attacks, other U.S. government agencies remained lackadaisical.

[100]

  In 2006, at least four separate U.S. government computer networks were covertly attacked by Chinese cyber forces.           Sometime in the spring of 2006, State Department computers were shut down when it was discovered that Chinese hackers had installed software "back-doors" in the department's unclassified networks and were siphoning sensitive data from computers in the Department's offices dealing with China and North Korea.

[101]

As a result, Congressional pressure obliged the State Department to discontinue the purchase of computers from Lenovo, a Chinese firm which acquired IBM's personal computer division in 2005.

[102]

In July, overseas hackers operating from Chinese internet servers penetrated computers in the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) at the Department of Commerce, the office that manages export licensing of military-use products and information.  "Through established security procedures, BIS discovered a targeted effort to gain access to BIS user accounts," according to a Commerce Department spokesman, and Commerce officials admitted privately that Chinese hackers had implanted in the computers covert "rootkit" programs in hopes of masking their presence and enabling them to gain privileged access to the computer system.  When the damage was assessed, said one unnamed official, the agency's information security officers determined they could not salvage the workstations and instead spent several million dollars to build an entirely new system with "clean hardware and clean software."

[103]

In mid-November, computer security officials determined that Chinese hackers had penetrated the computer network at the Naval War College in Rhode Island. Retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Richard Goetze, a Naval War College professor, said the Chinese "took down" the entire Naval War College computer network, an operation that prompted the U.S. Strategic Command to raise the security alert level for the Pentagon's 12,000 computer networks and 5 million computers.  One report hinted that the war college's Strategic Studies Group had begun work to develop concepts for waging cyber-warfare, and that Chinese cyber warriors may have had that program as its target.

[104]

At about the same time, November-December 2006, the computers at the Defense Department's National Defense University in Washington, D.C., were also attacked. The NDU attack was unpublicized although it was well known among academic circles that NDU's e-mail accounts had been shut down for weeks while the penetrated systems were replaced.

No one should be comforted by the fact that some Chinese cyberattacks have been identified.  While PLA cyber warfare units devoutly wish to avoid detection, they also seek to give a false sense of security that all network penetrations can be detected.  One expert told a conference of federal information managers early this year that "The Chinese are in half of your agencies’ systems."

[105]

  U.S. Defense sources say privately that the level of Chinese cyber attacks obliges them to avoid Chinese-origin hardware and software in all classified systems and as many unclassified systems as is fiscally possible.  The high threat levels of Chinese cyberpenetrations to U.S. defense networks will be magnified as the Pentagon loses more and more of its domestic sources of "trusted and classified" microchips. 

A report done in February 2005 warns that "a significant migration of critical microelectronics manufacturing from the United States to other foreign countries has and will continue to occur." The strategic significance of this phenomenon cannot be overstated  because this technology is the foundation of America's ability to maintain a technological advantage in the military, government, commercial and industrial sectors.  Indeed, microelectronics supplies for defense, national infrastructure and intelligence applications are now in peril.

[106]

This is a critical national security issue because America's defense-critical electronics demand "trusted and classified" microchips. The "confidence that classified or mission critical information contained in chip designs is not compromised, reliability is not degraded, or untended design elements inserted in chips as a result of design of fabrication in conditions open to adversary agents" simply does not exist in commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) microchips sourced to overseas foundries. It is an alarming fact, as the February 2005 report explained, that "trust cannot be added to integrated circuits after fabrication; electrical testing and reverse engineering cannot be relied upon to detect undesired alterations in military integrated circuits."

[107]

 

Increasingly, China is the source of COTS microchips, and Chinese foundries and design shops have had direct network access to foundries in other countries, particularly Taiwan, a fact that has become a source of alarm to Taiwan's intelligence agencies.

[108]

  Chinese government pressure is now inducing Intel Corp. to propose construction of a $2.5 billion semiconductor wafer fab in Dalian, China

[109]

despite the fact "that manufacturing costs in China are only ten percent lower than in the United States while manufacturing cost in Taiwan are seven percent lower -- almost all…accounted for by labor costs."  This data, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association, "does not support the hypothesis that … the current migration to China is due to lower construction and operating costs…[Chinese] Government policies are driving this."

[110]

While the U.S. government is very reticent about the vulnerabilities of its databases to Chinese penetration, an example of how widespread Chinese cyberattacks have become came last spring when a certain foreign "coast guard agency" discovered a covert program imbedded in its network that systematically searched for shipping schedules, then forwarded them to an e-mail address in China.

[111]

There is every likelihood that Chinese PLA cyberwarfare units have already penetrated the Pentagon's unclassified NIPRNET (Unclassified but Sensitive Internet Protocol Router Network) and has designed software to disable it in time of conflict or confrontation.

[112]

  And PLA cyber warfare units' access to source codes for America's ubiquitous office software means they have a skeleton key to any networked government, military, business or private computer in America.

           

Geostrategic Implications of PRC Military expansion

 

            One might accept that China is simply a "great nation" that requires a "great navy", but what does Beijing's leadership intend for such a large and increasingly well-equipped ground force?  The obvious answer is in the "2006 Defense White Paper" which declares the PLA's mission is "defending against violation of China's territorial sea and air space, and borders; opposing and containing the separatist forces for 'Taiwan independence' and their activities."

            That is, aside from Taiwan, China has yet other "borders" and "territorial seas" to be defended.  To be sure, China's landmass is vast, and its population is the world's largest.  The PLA's ground force mission, to be sure, includes assembling an invasion force for the "liberation" of Taiwan (unless, of course, Taiwan's leaders submit to an anschluss before then).  China shares land borders with 14 nations, but none of them is in any position to challenge China on land.  Even Russia, whose meager population of 6 million east of the Ural Mountains, is no match for the 120 million Chinese who live in Manchuria alone. Indeed, many Russians believe that, economically at least, China has already taken over the Russian Far East.

[113]

            China's still-unrequited claims on Asian mainland irredenta, including the recent assertion that "the whole of what [India] calls the state of Arunachal Pradesh is Chinese territory and Tawang (district) is only one place in it and we are claiming all of that."

[114]

New Delhi might not entertain Beijing's claims now, but sometime in the future, the appearance of a massive Chinese ground force in the Himalayas may persuade New Delhi that perhaps at least the "Tawang district", where the 6th Dalai Lama was born, could be sacrificed to the Chinese who, after all, only seek to tighten their influence of Tibetan exiles in India.  Beijing has similar territorial concerns with Bhutan.  Kazakhstan and Mongolia, too, would surely be inclined to attend a bit more faithfully to China's desires given the evolution of a modern PLA land army.  China's land army seems already strong enough to intercede in the event of a North Korean collapse to prevent unification of the peninsula.

[115]

  A significant Chinese amphibious infantry force would have a similar effect on the nations of South East Asia and the Pacific.

            The geopolitical impact in Eurasia of an overwhelmingly massive Chinese land army would be one of intense intimidation throughout the region, and Beijing no doubt wants to keep its geographical neighbors calm at least until it can develop a modernized navy and air force to the point that the United States would not be eager to intercede.

            Thus, while China's strategic, space and naval modernization is doubtless targeted on the United States and Japan, and its expanding fighter fleet anticipates a Taiwan Strait contingency, China's ground force modernization looks beyond a possible requirement to occupy Taiwan to the establishment of military predominance on the Eurasian landmass.

 

What the Administration and Congress Should Do

 

            The perception in Asia is that at the top levels of the Bush Administration there is no strategic vision for Asia in general or concern about China's spreading influence in particular, and whatever there might be at working levels of the national security bureaucracy is eclipsed by concerns in the Middle East.

[116]

This perception must inform the Administration's and the Congress's management of the gathering security challenge posed by China's emergence as a rival superpower in the coming century.  This is because any American response requires a new partnership with democratic Asia as well as an attitude change in Washington. 

            The following strategic goals are essential elements of an effective policy toward China:

 

• First, the United States must have a vision for the Asia-Pacific Region.  That vision must be reaffirmed by the National Security Council and should include the following principals: the United States does indeed have a position on differences between despotism and freedom; it does indeed have a stakein the survival and success of Asian democracy, and in ensuring that Asia's democracies are not coerced into acceding to demands from China or relationships with China that they do not want.
• Second, as the preeminent global maritime power, the United States cannot permit America's "Island Asia" lifelines to the Pacific to be compromised by the rise of a new hostile naval power on "Mainland Asia."
• Third, that the United States must, as a matter of national security, maintain its technological supremacy, not just in traditional battle spaces, but also in outer space and cyberspace.  

 

With these goals in mind, an effective policy set structured to manage China's expanding strategic footprint in Asia must include the following elements.

 

• A sense of coherence and consistency in the inter- and intra-agency implementation of policies.  Each cabinet department and agency should have an office devoted to China issues, initiatives and coordination.  In national security agencies, each bureau should have a "China Focal Point Officer" whose responsibility it is to monitor China-related issues on a full-time basis, and brief his/her own bureau principals as well as the East Asia/Pacific Bureau on them.
• A heightened policy commitment to the protection of key defense-critical technologies, equipment, software and intellectual property. 
• A renewed presence in the Asia-Pacific and South Asia regions.  The United States must not only have a commitment to maintaining stability and balance in the region, but must also be seen to have such a commitment.  This requires that top American officials engage key Asian groupings and fora, including the ASEAN heads of state, ASEAN ministerials, the ASEAN Regional Forum and APEC.  Preserve and strengthen U.S. security alliances in East Asia by expanding both bilateral and multilateral strategic consultations and joint military exercises with our treaty allies and other partners on an ongoing basis.
• Renewed commitment to Asian allies and friends. The ancient Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu advises that a most effective way of defeating an enemy is to 'divide him from his allies'
  

  [117]

  and this is assuredly a top Chinese strategic goal in Asia. Washington must therefore be wary of Beijing's stratagem to drive wedges between the U.S. and its partners.  Hence, the U.S. should resolutely support Japan against China's territorial pretensions in the East China Sea, and it should vigorously protest Beijing's missile and naval build-up against Taipei.  China's successful U.N. campaign for a PAROS regime drives a wedge between the U.S. and allies on space policy.  The U.S. must explain to its friends and allies that it views space as a matter of the highest national security priority.
• Reengagement with the Atlantic Community – the European Union and NATO allies – in a robust consultation and dialogue on shared strategic interests and basic values of human dignity and freedoms.  Most NATO allies recognize that proposed E.U. arms sales to China would significantly impact American and Japanese security interests in Asia, but it did take the prospect of termination of, or severely curtailed, defense industrial cooperation to persuade others not to remove the E.U. arms embargo on China.  The fact about the E.U.'s moves to lift the embargo on China was that the United States had simply not engaged Europe in a dialogue on China or Asia.  European leaders were genuinely surprised at Washington's reaction in 2004-2005 to anticipated E.U.-China weapons systems cooperation.”  
• Encouragement of India as a participant in Eurasian geopolitical dynamics; its continued involvement in the East Asian Summit, and in security and consultation with Japan and Australia; and a quiet engagement of New Delhi in a strategic dialogue.

 

Managing an emerging Chinese military superpower also requires:

• A naval and air presence sufficient to maintain strategic supremacy in Asia.  For example, the U.S. submarine fleet must be expanded by building at least two boats per year -- starting now. The heavy costs of nuclear submarines may mean the U.S. Navy must consider conventional submarine platforms for short missions from forward bases, especially for ASW operations. 
• Expansion of forward deployed bases and facilities in the Pacific, particularly Guam, and the allotment of resources needed for secure and uncompromised military construction.
• Strengthened Japanese anti-submarine and anti-mine warfare capabilities in addition to its muscular ballistic missile defense efforts.  Japan will be the most reliable ally in the Western Pacific, and it must have the confidence to stand with the United States as Chinese power grows.  This may also require making available to Japan and Australia F-22 fighter, Aegis, cruise missile, ballistic missile defense, and other equipment as the United States finds its own resources strained in the region.
• Expanded subsea and ballistic missile-related sensors throughout the Western Pacific and littoral East Asia.

           

Conclusion

 

            The Asian perception that the United States is a Pacific power in decline may prove prescient -- even though America's leaders may not now see themselves as presiding over America's retreat.  But there is no question that China is emerging as the preeminent power in the Asia-Pacific region.  Will an engaged America continue and strengthen the current robust "trans-Pacific alignment" knitting the democracies of the Americas with their counterparts along the Western Pacific Rim?  Or will a Sinocentric "Continental Axis" crystallize as ASEAN, Taiwan, Korea and eventually Japan , Australia, South and Central Asia "bandwagon" with China?  The latter promises to make Leninist-mercantilist China the "rule-maker" in Asia -- not just for transnational trade and financial structures, but also for a new Asian security architecture and a new ideology of authoritarian state-mercantilism which defends repressive "development models based on national conditions."

 

            The choices made in Washington, on either end of Pennsylvania Avenue, over the next few years will be a bellwether to the capitals of democratic Asia for their own geopolitical decisions.  How Washington manages the emerging Chinese superpower will determine not only the direction of Asian democracy but the prospects for global freedom for the coming century.