Arm Thine Enemy

What is truly amazing is how the media play down how China is getting its military capabilities. The congressional commission’s report identifies the American, European, Japanese and, most ironically, Taiwanese, chip-making firms that are providing China with “state-of-the-art” semiconductor fabrication technologies. The Commerce and State departments are approving the export of new wafer fabs with technology levels equal to the industry standard in the U.S. without any coherent export control policy. As American businesses increase their investments in China, the commission sees a danger of America’s defense industrial base becoming ever more dependent on Chinese-controlled companies.

Retired Taiwanese officers are defecting to China because they receive offers of higher rank, better pay and housing for families. The plan named “using Taiwan to conquer Taiwan” is designed to obtain valuable Taiwanese military operators as well as inflict psychological damage on morale. They are teaching tactics on how to invade the island in China’s military academies. China has been practicing an attack on Taiwan that is aimed at killing or capturing the island’s leaders in a “decapitation” action modeled on the U.S. action in Iraq to capture Saddam Hussein. Computer simulation games in military academies in China, Taiwan and the U.S. all show how Taiwan can be captured in a few days.

At the dawn of the 21st century, the number of mainland projects with Taiwanese investment topped 50,000, with the value of contracted investment at $60 billion. In 2001, indirect cross-strait trade totaled $32 billion. In 2002, indirect two-way trade, mainly via Hong Kong, reached $240 billion. Taiwan is now the mainland’s fifth-largest trading partner. The mainland is Taiwan’s largest export destination and the greatest source of Taiwan’s trade surplus.

If Taiwanese military personnel are joining the island’s capitalists and business people in building China’s military and economic capability, shouldn’t the U.S. political establishment be doing the same rather than provoking and again siding with the loser? U.S. business icons like Motorola, Intel, Kodak, General Motors, Nike and countless others are invested in China to the tune of $40 billion to $50 billion. China has also amassed more than $471 billion in foreign reserves, much of which it has invested in U.S. treasuries. Classifying Taiwan as “a major non-NATO ally,” which allows it to enjoy the same treatment as Japan, New Zealand and Australia, is suicidal. As George Strait says, you can’t put it all on the line unless you’ve got an ace in the hole. Under current U.S. policy, what is America’s ace when it is in the hole?

Lin Chong-pin, Taiwan’s deputy defense minister, said: “The PLA may start to surpass what we have in 2005 or between 2005 and 2008” militarily. The years “2010 to 2015 [will be] when the PLA will have such a supremacy in both qualitative and quantitative comparison of forces that it may feel confident to move,” Lin added. So what is the point of America continuing to waste political capital on arming Taiwan and going to its defense? “Failure to support Taiwan could call into question U.S. global commitments,” David O’Rear interjected as another fierce debate on the wisdom of U.S. support of Taiwan got into full swing at the FCC Main Bar. As usual, nobody changed anybody’s mind.

America is poorly served by a fragmented, inconsistent and superficial China policy, wielded in compulsive secrecy and plagued by dismal crisis management, a bipartisan congressional commission warned. The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said in its first annual report that U.S.-China relations, often testy and tainted by mutual suspicion, suffered from an uncoordinated approach among the branches of the U.S. government: Richard D’Amato, chairman of the commission set up by Congress, said: “U.S. policy toward China has been and is fragmented, lacking consistency and depth. It has often been driven solely by commercial interests, or by specific human rights issues, or by a particular military crisis – rather than by a comprehensive examination of all the issues which impact this relationship.” Is this any way for the U.S. government to be doing business with China?

Retired U.S. Colonel Al Wilhelm was among the first uniformed officers sent to the mainland at the height of the Cold War in the 1980s to provide both advice and weaponry to the People’s Liberation Army. Wilhelm is still on a mission of peace. “China is going to become a superpower. What the hawks say about China having the potential to threaten America is true. The key is how we find a way to coexist.

“Unless we develop mutual trust and friendship, it’s likely my eight grandchildren will be fighting in a war against China,” Wilhelm said in an interview in Hong Kong. I concur. In my case my grandchildren will be fighting each other.

The two-China policy the U.S. is trying to straddle is doomed to fail. China is determined to become a major power again, and will. The U.S. cannot stop this geopolitical reality. America’s Taiwan policy is only fueling, expediting and facilitating China’s military machine. America must embrace the one-China policy and work with China as a partner and welcome it as its Pacific partner like it has done on the Atlantic front with Europe.

Why can’t America withdraw its support of Taiwan in exchange for China withdrawing support to North Korea to help bring about nuclear disarmament and stability to the region? Why should China encourage North Korea to disarm without U.S. reciprocity?

America has shown that when it acts decisively and brings its full military capabilities to bear others will listen and follow. However, let’s not get overconfident and too cocky for our own good when it comes to China in the 21st century. “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting,” Sun Tzu, the Chinese military strategist wrote in 400 B.C.