This backgrounder on China from CFR asks some pretty damn good questions about the state of Sino-American relations and the role of China in the world. One of the most important questions in determining just what kind of threat China may pose centers on how much money is spent on the PLA. Here, Esther Pan cites several different estimates:
Beijing's official estimate of its military spending is currently between $30 billion and $35 billion dollars, which most experts say is lower than the actual figure. Many independent analysts put the real figure at $50 billion to $65 billion, including research and development. The Pentagon's estimates, however, range from $70 billion to a high of $105 billion per year.
More after the jump.
I myself am inclined to believe the independent number between $50 billion and $65, but Willy Lam at Jamestown cites only the DoD estimate and the 'official' PLA estimate in a very fascinating essay on Hu's relationship with the PLA. Not to get too far away from the CFR article but one graf on the purpose of the PLA really stands out here:
Foremost among these four tasks was that the PLA and PAP must "provide forceful guarantee to enable the party to consolidate its ruling-party status." The other three obligations included providing the "security basis" for economic development, protecting national interests and making contributions to maintaining world peace (Xinhua, September 29, 2005). Nowhere in the People's Republic of China (PRC) Constitution, however, is it written that the PLA should devote itself primarily to maintaining the party's supremacy.
Interesting, no?
But back to the CFR report, however. So, what is the official U.S. defense budget? Writes Pan:
In comparison, the U.S. defense budget for 2006 was about $420 billion (PDF), nearly half of the total global expenditure on defense, and roughly equal to the defense spending of the rest of the world combined.
Or almost ten times that of China. That's certainly an order of magnitude beyond the Royal Navy's policy (during its arms race with the Kaiser) that it must be larger than its two nearest competitors.
So, is China a threat to US interests? Does it seek to dominate Asia militarily? Jed Babbin would certainly have you think so, but Pan (and I for that matter) are not so sure. She quotes one China expert as saying:
"I believe China has not made the strategic choice of whether it should challenge the United States for dominance in Asia." In any case, he adds, "Those choices are decades away." Others agree, saying China's economic growth is bringing an expansion of diplomatic and cultural influence—known as 'soft power'—that will preclude the need for Beijing to use force in Asia.
Beijing's soft-power? Is it that powerful? Well, why don't you ask a couple of thousand years worth of North-East Asian nomads, and South-Western Chinese minorities who've become totally assimilated how powerful it is?
Where I do disagree, however, is that the choice is 'decades' away. I'm convinced the choice will be forced on the Chinese (and US) sooner than either are comfortable with by outside events.
Indeed, Chi-hawks, like Babbin and Bill Gertz at the Moonie-Times, would have us asking even more provocative quesitons like, "Is China seeking to project military power outside of Asia?" My answer would be, other than the handful of ICBMs they have as a deterrent, with what would they project their power? A Blue-water navy with carriers? Uh-huh.
How do they get their troops over the Himalayas to attack the Indians? And why would they?
Or how do they get their forces through the jungles of South-East Asia in order to get spanked by the Vietnamese like they did in 1979?
Or how do they get over the Tien-shan to invade the pastures filled with horse-herding Kyrgyz or the more fertile Ferghana Valley, a hot-bed of Salafist ferment?
Not only do they not yet have the capabilities for any of these (their armed forces in all but one theatre has a defensive posture), but I doubt they have the intent.
So, what are we worried about? Well, prudence for starters. After all, 1.3 billion people is a lot. And if past history is indicative of future results (as mutual funds love to insinuate), the integration of new powers into the global power structure (read: Rome, Spain, Germany and Japan) can be (but is not pre-destined to be) very violent.
On the other hand, phantom threats are, well, phantom, as Ted Galen Carpenter says, "It's hard to justify spending half a trillion dollars each year because China might emerge as a security challenge twenty or thirty years in the future."
Pan, for good measure adds:
"Our Pentagon is in charge of seeing a threat and building against a threat. Unless political leadership is out in front, keeping the cooperative elements higher in priority and reassuring the other guys, the self-fulfilling prophecy is in danger of taking hold," he says. "As Joseph Nye says, if we treat China as the enemy, it will become the enemy because of how it perceives what we do."
That being said, Lam sees things a bit differently, putting the onus of possible future conflict on the narrowness of the Chinese leadership and decision-making over the military:
As long as one of the world's most formidable military forces remains accountable only to a select handful of leaders, Hu, Wen and their Politburo colleagues will find it nearly impossible to refute theories about the "China threat."
How does a leader--American or Chinese--responsibly prepare for the worst, yet hope for the best but not perpetuate a self-fulfilling prophecy?
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Comments: 2
All China has to do to be the dominant force on the planet is decide it wants to be a dominant force. In your article you deftly cover the military numbers, but I think that the next global transition will be economic and is already happening. We lay the foundation by turning the US back into a nation that exports its natural resources (to China) then purchases them back as manufactured goods. Our money is going to build China, whereas for the previous century we built glorious America by important raw materials had the world coveting our blue jeans. Moreover, to maintain our glorious appearance in Iraq and Afghanistan we borrow hundreds of billions of dollars from the nation that has it, China, and thereby run the risk our founding fathers, especially Hamilton feared most. That we become so indebted to another nation that they feel they have a say in our foreign policy. That's where China will have us by the balls soon. While Bush talks like a guy who has seen too many Clint Eastwood westerns, it will ultimately be China's decision whether we do something about Iran, or North Korea, because China will be footing the bill.
This administration is not so much dumb – I believe they know all of which we speak – as shortsighted and just plain greedy. Every move they make seems to be based on lining the pockets of their buddies and to hell with Americans 25 or even 10 years from now. The most chilling line in your article points to a reality that is now figurative but I believe could one day soon be literal. As a resident of Seattle I have long watched from the loading docks China conquer the US with large cargo ships. They are far more practical, less flamboyant people than Americans, or our mentors for all thing Empire related, the British. In my novel, The Third Testament: Book One, I have the Chinese doing precisely what you elude: filling thousands of 1000-foot long cargo ships with millions of soldiers. It's like the game Risk. If you can produce an army that is of greater size than the population of the country you wish to attack, you can roll the dice all day long and the only way to defeat you is with a level of carnage that world has never seen, one that would destroy the atmosphere. The threat alone meets Dick Cheney's definition of Shock and Awe. All China has to do is decide global domination is even more fun than becoming really rich.
Curtis J. Scott
The more economic growth they have, the more they can spend like us on their military. I'm sure that Washington has been aware of this for some time, and is of no surprise to them. I believe that we (US) hope the economic ties between China and us will become so crucial to them that the threat of a loss of trade would be too high a price to pay to be in a conflict with the US and it's allies. That kind of stuff can always backfire though.
Good article, thanks.