I usually associate the term "arms race" with the Cold War. For that reason it almost feels out of date. My brain automatically links it to the Powerpoint slides and homework handouts from my high school history classes, as though such high-stakes competition was only possible between the US and USSR. But this report makes it clear that China has no intention of being second-best when it comes to military might.
In recent decades the US has
enjoyed military supremacy in the Indo-Pacific, ensuring the security of
shipping lanes and asserting its right to navigate through contested waters
like the South China Sea and the Taiwan Straits. But the report argues that China could soon
reach a level of power at which it could credibly challenge and ultimately
replace the US as the preeminent power projector in the region.
A look at the numbers shows that the US still has
significant advantages on the naval side. The US has 11 aircraft carriers, the backbone
of its naval power, on which it relies heavily to exert its power abroad. China has only one deployed, one on the brink
of deployment, and, according to a recent report from CSIS, a third in the works. The US also has its amphibious assault ships,
basically miniature aircraft carriers that can deploy helicopters and certain
other aircraft; China have no equivalent to this type of vessel. But as the report points out, in conflicts
near China (such as potential action around Taiwan), "the Chinese
mainland would function as a vast, unsinkable aircraft carrier." In such a context, relatively cheaply
produced Chinese missiles known as "carrier killers" could prove
fatal for the hugely expensive US aircraft carriers.
According to the report, the US
navy has 14 Ohio-Class nuclear deterrent submarines, from which it can launch
long-range ballistic missiles distances up to 12,000 km. Meanwhile, China has only four analogous Jin-Class
subs, and the ballistic missiles they launch only have a range of 8,000 km.
These examples of US superiority notwithstanding, China's
PLA navy now has a total of 400 warships and submarines compared to, at the end
of march, the US's 288. According to the
report, "Some American naval experts believe China could achieve
rough parity with the U.S. Navy in numbers and quality of major surface
warships by 2030."
China's progress on its missile capabilities seems to be moving
even faster than its navy. China has a
virtual monopoly on land-based intermediate-range missiles, as the US and
Russia are currently barred from deploying them under the 1988
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty (Trump recently announced the US
would exit the treaty, citing Russian non-compliance). China is on the way to producing hypersonic
missiles which can travel at five times the speed of sound, and the Pentagon
says the US currently has no defense against such weapons. China already has supersonic cruise missiles
such as the YJ-18 (540km range) and YJ-12 (400km range), which can reach speeds
up to three times the speed of sound. To
counter these missiles, the US has Cold War era Harpoon missiles, which have
significantly shorter range (240km) and travel at less than a third of the
speed.
***
The prominence that the Reuters
report gave to naval developments stuck out for a couple of reasons.
First, it's difficult to read this
report and not think about it in the context of historical narratives of China's
century of humiliation (1839-1949).
During these years, China was subjected to invasion and imperialist exploitation
from Western powers and Japan. Western nations
won the First (1839-41) and Second (1856-1860) Opium Wars in large part because
of their naval superiority, and consequently were able to economically exploit
China. After the Second Opium War, Qing reformers
pushed for development of a Chinese navy, and made some progress during the
1860s, 70s and 80s. But when the time
came to test the mettle of China's new navy in the first Sino-Japanese War in
1894, the fleet failed spectacularly and China was humiliated even further.
China had traditionally viewed Japan as a subordinate state, and losing the
first Sino-Japanese war was a new low.
Even after the century of
humiliation ended, China has remained behind other countries, notably the US,
in terms of naval power. This has led to
episodic humiliations, perhaps most notably the Third Taiwan Straits Crisis in
1996, when China fired missiles into waters around Taiwan in an attempt to
intimidate Taiwanese voters during an election.
As a result, the US dispatched two aircraft carrier battle groups and an
amphibious assault ship to the region in order to intimidate China. China did indeed back down and, having lost
face on the international stage, Beijing was freshly reminded of the importance
of naval power.
Now, more than 150 years after the
First Opium War, China's navy is on track to match that of the world's foremost power.
With these chapters of history in
mind, reading reports of China's military advances becomes a bit alarming. The century of humiliation and other recent
shameful episodes still play a role in Chinese public discourse. This is in part thanks to the grip the
Communist Party has over China's media (and increasingly academic) environment,
and the interest the Party has in fomenting nationalism as a way to curry
public support in the face of an economic slowdown.
Second, viewing current trends in
the Chinese military as a creep into an arms race brought to mind the naval
arms race between Germany and Great Britain in the lead up to World War I. Around the turn of the 20th century,
prominent figures in the German government and aristocracy, including Kaiser
Wilhelm, became convinced of the importance of catching up to Great Britain in
terms of naval power. They rightly saw a
navy as key to power projection and world influence, and they made huge strides
in naval development. While they never
did fully match the British, some historians consider the arms race to be an
important cause of WWI (others don't).
It appears that China is investing much time, energy, and
money in its military, in a challenge to the predominant world power. One can understand why certain people would
want to see the fruits of that investment come to some meaningful use. And taking into account the possibility that,
from time to time, unstable or impulsive individuals hold positions of extreme
power, the prospect of war seems frighteningly possible. In the case of WWI, Kaiser Wilhelm of
Germany seems to be such a person. According
to Wikipedia, "Wilhelm
annoyed his ministers by publicly declaring one motive [for naval development] to
be his childhood admiration of the [British] Royal Navy, which he had visited 'with
kind aunts and friendly admirals.'"
I
don't want to overstate the similarities between the current developments and
the pre-WWI arms race. Those who
contributed to the long lead-up to that war hadn't witnessed modern warfare and
had no way of knowing what kind of hell they were going to plunge the world
into. Now, the potential stakes of war
between two great world powers are hopefully sobering enough to prevent even
the most impulsive from making rash decisions.
With that in mind, however, I
wonder what motivates top decision-makers in China to push for full-steam-ahead
military expansion. Desire to replace
the US as number one in the world?
Desire to simply defend China's current interests and nothing more? Desire to check and rollback the US's global
hegemony which serves US political and economic interest? Desire for vengeance against real and perceived
wrongs of neo/imperialism? A general and
directionless sense of patriotism? It
could be any, all or none of these, and that uncertainty alone is rather
disconcerting.
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