Written evidence submitted by Rosemary
Foot, St Antony's College, University of Oxford
CHINA'S SECURITY STRATEGY AT THE START OF THE 21ST
CENTURY
STRUCTURE AND
SUMMARY
China's security strategy for the short to medium
term has four main inter-related goals:
(a) to become, as the Chinese would put it,
"an all-round affluent society" and to achieve recognition
as a world power;
(b) to sustain access to the resources needed
to sustain high levels of growth;
(c) to ensure that the Chinese Communist
Party (CCP) remains unchallenged politically and remains in power;
and
(d) to ensure that the Chinese leaders' focus
on domestic development goals are not diverted or undermined by
regional and/or global tensions and conflict.
These points will be developed under four main
headings as follows:
1. The sources of legitimacy for the ruling
Party.
2. The resources necessary to keep its manufacturing
capacities high.
3. The need to develop a policy for its
own region.
4. The need to develop a policy designed
for a US-dominated global order.
CHINA'S SECURITY STRATEGY
INTRODUCTION
China has four main inter-related goals:
1. to acquire what used to be called "comprehensive
national strength" and now is more often referred to as an
"all-round affluent society";
2. to maintain secure access to the resources
needed to sustain high levels of growth—which is linked
to both regime and state security;
3. by regime security I mean that the CCP
is determined to stay in power and this is perceived primarily
to be dependent upon the maintenance of high growth levels; and
4. to develop strategies to deal with traditional
and non-traditional security threats.
China has 14 land and several sea borders. It
has a chequered history with its neighbours; and it has relations
that are complex to manage with the one superpower—the United
States. Its one major irredentist claim is to the island of Taiwan
and the United States is Taiwan's major external protector.
China also faces separatist struggles in Tibet
and Xinjiang which is part of the reason for its unwillingness
to compromise its claim over Taiwan. A sovereignty claim of somewhat
lesser importance is to the islands in the South China sea. This
sovereignty dispute is not as significant to it as the question
of Taiwan, but would become more so if significant levels of oil,
gas and minerals were to be found beneath the sea bed.
And while sources of insecurity from traditional
realms are well understood, it is concerned too about non-traditional
threats especially drugs and crime; transmission of disease; terrorism.
The consequences for Asian economies of the SARS epidemic were
a salutary experience.
1. The CCP and regime security
The Chinese Communist Party has ruled China
since 1949 and it has no intention of giving that up. In the past—the
first 15-20 years of its existence as the ruling party—it
derived its legitimacy from two main factors:
(a) having helped unify the country and expel
"imperialists" from its territory—Japanese, Americans,
Europeans.
(b) Marxist-Leninist ideology was projected
as an ideological creed that would lead China out of poverty and
ensure a more egalitarian society. Leaving poverty behind would
eventually result in China's emergence as a great power.
Now legitimacy cannot come from adherence to
Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideology—China has long since joined
the capitalist world. It is an authoritarian country and thus
it derives its legitimacy, its authority to rule, not from being
a representative state, but from being able to guarantee continued
high levels of growth from which important sectors of society
benefit. It also claims that the Party alone is capable of keeping
the country reasonably stable—or having the appearance of
reasonable stability. The Party/State has also benefited domestically
from a growing respect for and acceptance of China's rising power
from its neighbours and some major states.
Beijing now states that it wants to be recognised
as a "responsible great power". The great power status
is also linked in Chinese perceptions with the reclaiming of Taiwan
as a part of Chinese territory. To quote one Chinese "many
Chinese feel that China's revival would be meaningless and unreal
if the mainland failed to reunify with Taiwan."
2. Access to resources
China has become represented as the manufacturing
power house of the global economy. As it has been put, it is a
workshop of the world but it needs electricity to run those factories.
In order to keep this going it requires access to a variety of
resources, and it has become a resource hungry country for oil,
natural gas, water, inputs for export processing, home construction
and manufacturing. 1993 was the last year in which it was an oil
exporter. Currently it is the world's number two oil importer
and in 2004 accounted for 31% of the global growth in demand.
At the moment just over 45% of China's oil comes from the Middle
East with Iran accounting for about 11%, Saudi Arabia 14% and
Oman 13%.
These kinds of resource needs drive a lot of
its foreign policy. Eg in Africa: China is Sudan's leading trade
partner and leading foreign investor in its oil industry. It has
a 40% stake in Sudan's Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company.
China has also made efforts to develop close relations with other
oil producing countries on the African continent: Algeria, Angola,
Nigeria as well as Sudan. Two-way China-Africa trade stands at
over $18 billion representing a 100% increase in five years.
China is looking for secure access to energy
and commodities. And looking to diversify suppliers.
One other goal with African countries is to
compete with Taiwan for diplomatic recognition. It wants to further
isolate Taiwan which currently is recognised as an independent
state by countries such as Chad, Gambia, Senegal, Malawi. China
wants to reverse those recognitions.
Economic growth and social and political stability
require a peaceful regional and global environment. It is only
in these circumstances that China can concentrate on its domestic
development goals. This means it needs good relations with the
US, which is important to it economically and politically. The
US is a major source of FDI, and the US has long taken between
30 and 40% of its exports. It requires good relations with neighbours—and
there are several examples of where relations have been very difficult
and conflictual in the past: India, the former Soviet Union, Japan,
Vietnam. China has described the first twenty years of this century
as a "period of important strategic opportunities" that
China should "grasp tightly" in order to accomplish
its development goals. So it needs a security strategy that will
reduce its vulnerabilities and contribute to its growing strength,
but not alarm other states in the system.
3. China's Strategy: China's policy responses
towards the region
To recap: since the start of the 1979 reform
period in China, the Chinese leadership has described its key
goal, the bed-rock of its strategy, as being to focus on its development
process in order to achieve an "all-round affluent society"
and sustain domestic stability. It has also constantly argued
that, in order to be able to concentrate on this goal, it requires
a peaceful regional and global environment.
4. Regional Policy
From about 1996-97, China's policy in response
to this set of requirements became more apparent and active rather
than reactive. Beijing's main goal has been to convince its neighbours
that its rise is going to be peaceful and not disruptive. China's
rise will not be like the rise of Japan and Germany in the 1930s,
it claims.
Why was there this shift in policy around 1996-97?
In its initial stages, this shift in direction was prompted by
the Chinese leadership's realization that its own rise, and assertive
regional policies in the early to mid 1990s with respect to Taiwan
and the South China Sea, had alarmed its neighbours putting in
jeopardy one of its key goals of establishing regional calm. Its
behaviour had given substance to the "China threat"
argument and thus raised the prospects that containment of a rising
China would become both a more determined US and Asian regional
and global strategy.
What did it do? In 1997, Beijing introduced
a "new security concept" which articulated the need
to develop "mutual trust and ties of common interest"
as necessary for the promotion of genuine security. It also called
for the replacement of the "outmoded" mentality of power
politics and old-style bilateral military alliances that had been
lingering on since the cold war. Thus, it began promoting cooperative
security ideas in the region, an agenda that fit closely with
the desires of the Southeast Asian states.
During the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98,
Beijing moved swiftly to offer economic assistance and announced
that it would not be devaluing its own currency as a response
to the crisis. This was a means of demonstrating that its economic
decisions were beginning to matter significantly to the region
and that it could behave responsibly and helpfully towards its
neighbours.
China started to engage far more actively with
Asian multilateral security and economic organisations such as
the ASEAN Regional Forum and APEC. In addition, it put its weight
behind the creation of a new Asian-only economic grouping, the
ASEAN Plus Three (APT) arrangement, (the three being China, South
Korea and Japan) and more recently has played a role in the creation
of East Asian summitry.
ASEAN was especially wooed, China signing a
framework trade arrangement with this sub-regional body designed
to establish by 2010 an ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement; signing
ASEAN's Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, the provisions
of which rule out the use of force for settling issues in dispute.
It also signed with this same grouping a Declaration on the
South China Sea which again eschews using violent means of
dealing with disputed sovereignty claims in these waters. Northeast
and Central Asia similarly received attention. The Shanghai Cooperation
Organisation involving China, Russia and five central Asian countries
has also witnessed China taking a more active role in its deliberations.
It is important to China because of geographical location (it
borders China's restive province of Xinjiang), energy needs, and
because Central Asia has seen a larger US presence since 11 September
2001.
North East Asia has not been neglected. China
started to play a leading role on the Korean peninsula in recognition
that nuclear weapons' proliferation and instabilities associated
either with North Korea's collapse or a US attack on the North
would be seriously destabilising to the region, would undermine
Beijing's determination to focus on domestic development, and
damage its economic gains. It would also lead to a restructuring
of the security architecture for this part of the world in a way
that China would find threatening.
Bilateral ties were to be improved as well.
China signed "cooperative strategic partnerships" or
"cooperation agreements" with many of its neighbours,
including former enemies Russia, India, and Indonesia. Only with
Japan has this strategy fallen well short of its objectives, despite
strong economic ties. China is fearful of the Japanese Government's
decision to strengthen its ties with the United States in conjunction
with Tokyo's generally more assertive strategic posture.
China's more active regional and global diplomacy
is meant to underline that not only is China a rising power, but
it is also a responsible great power in world politics. Thus,
while there are many continuities with earlier eras, President
Jiang Zemin and his successor Hu Jintao have moved on to emphasise
the importance of economic globalisation, the multidimensional
nature of security, and the need to recognise the great powers',
including China's, responsibility for maintaining global order.
5. China's America policy
How does China's American policy fit into this
more activist framework? It has been an essential part of it,
starting first with the attempts to establish a similar "constructive
strategic partnership" during President Jiang Zemin's summit
in Washington in October 1997, and then more realistically as
a result of a significant rise in tensions between 1999 and 2001,
in a search for a reasonable working relationship based on "constructive
and candid" discussion. After the terrorist assaults on US
territory in September 2001, China seized the opportunity to build
a common counter-terrorist stance. Even over the March 2003 US
intervention in Iraq, it criticized but acquiesced and basically
let Germany and France take the bulk of the US criticism. Within
the G20, it has been a part of the coalition but has not taken
the lead.
Overall, Beijing's aim has been to accommodate
where possible and to seek coincidences of interest with the US.
Only over the Taiwan question and US criticism of its human rights
record, now more prominently involving the matter of religious
freedom in China, has Beijing consistently taken a firm stand.
Beijing's leaders believe it is better to cooperate
with the US because they believe that the US could do it serious
harm if relations were to deteriorate. The United States remains
important to it economically. Moreover, it accepts that the US
provides a degree of regional order in China's neighbourhood.
Many of China's neighbours have formal and informal security ties
with the US and this gives them a sense of stability and confidence.
Thus, China seeks to accommodate US interests
where it can. However, China's strategy also contains an important
"hedging" element, through which China seeks to secure
its future. If necessary, China can try to use its newly-formed
bilateral and multilateral relationships to offset any serious
deterioration in relations with America. Strong ties around the
world help to ensure that cold-war style containment of China
simply could not occur in this era of interdependence. They also
assist in making it more difficult for the US to cut China off
from access to resources important to its development goals.
Does China want to do more than this? Is it,
as some (particularly US) commentators allege, trying to expel
the US presence from its neighbourhood and trying to balance US
power via the formation of anti-American coalitions? True, China
has put efforts in developing the Asian-only APT, and the East
Asian Summit at the end of 2005 was held without US participation.
In addition, its relationship with Moscow has matured to the point
where they have embarked on joint military exercises and there
is no doubt that they share similar perspectives on a number of
global issues and on the drawbacks of a US dominated global order.
Yet, Beijing also realises that many of those
Asian neighbours are likely to remain close to the US or in actual
military alliances with Washington. Neither can Russia be entirely
relied upon since China understands that Russia will put its own
immediate development needs above other less tangible, medium
term benefits that might be associated with Sino-Russian attempts
to balance US power.
Finally, is China trying to build up its own
military resources so that it can mount a real military challenge
to the US? There is little evidence for this despite significant
increases in Chinese military expenditure. First, it accepts that
the US military lead is so great that it will either never be
surpassed or only at some distant point; and secondly, China's
concern with domestic development has led it to reject the idea
of engaging in the kind of arms race that the Soviet Union embarked
upon in the last years of the cold war.
Undoubtedly there has been an acceleration in
the Chinese conventional military buildup since 1999 and changes
in doctrine in order for China to be in a position to fight high-tech
local wars and to project power in the Asia-Pacific region. Weapons
purchases from Russia have been a regular feature of China's military
procurement. But the main prompts for the short- to medium-term
relate to the issue of Taiwan, the specific goal being to coerce
Taiwan into reunifying with the mainland while deterring the United
States from intervening on Taiwan's side, were China to decide
to use force in response to a Taiwanese call for independence.
The longer-term is less certain. In the longer
term, China may well seek to challenge other states such as India,
Japan, Russia and the United States itself. But that outcome is
not pre-ordained and is contingent on events.
China also has embarked on modernisation of
its nuclear weapons programme. However, the impetuses behind this
seem to relate to:
1. The need to replace aging weapons systems;
2. to respond to the shifting postures of
traditional nuclear powers and to emerging nuclear powers (India
in particular);
3. worries about the credibility of its
nuclear deterrent, especially relevant in the context of US missile
defence policies.
CONCLUSION
China's security strategy tends primarily to
be focused on or shaped by its relationship with the US. It hopes
to be able to operate and advance its goals within a US unipolar
order and continue to pursue its prime objectives of development,
increased affluence, domestic stability and great power statehood.
Since its ability to do this is under challenge
and the relationship with the United States difficult to manage,
prudence is in order. This means establishing a web of relationships
that could serve to provide China with a degree of leverage were
this to prove necessary; or were relations to deteriorate significantly
with the US.
China has become a more significant actor at
the Asian regional level and its policies here seem to have been
successfully pursued. The one major exception is Japan where relations
are tense and rightly are of great concern to analysts and peoples
in the region.
Its relations with the US are difficult to handle
because while there are coincidences of interest there are also
conflicts, and undoubtedly many in Congress, and in the US Defence
Department have sought a tougher approach. There is always a volatility
to the US-China relationship—and this is the case on both
sides. Much of what happens in China's policy is contingent on
how Washington behaves towards it—not on what power the
US has, but on how the United States uses that power. A major
question in Beijing revolves around how the US will deal with
a rising China.
China has been undergoing a fundamental transition
the outcome of which remains uncertain. Governments have to think
hard about how they might best encourage its rise as a responsible
state and, especially, how they might help it overcome some of
the difficult governance issues that it faces. A fragmented, chaotic
China is not a welcome prospect any more than is the prospect
of a rising China that uses violence or other forms of coercion
to settle domestic or international disputes.
Rosemary Foot
St Anthony's College
University of Oxford
January 2006
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