As Taiwan gears up for more Chinese military maneuvers to follow Chen Shui-bian's
These assessments are perfectly rational. However, because of the current dynamics of China's political-military leadership, they may also be perfectly irrelevant to the chances of China choosing the military option.
The shortcomings of the PLA are well known. Hopelessly obsolete equipment manned by poorly trained, inexperienced conscripts earns the PLA the title of what one recent analyst called a "junkyard army." And, many officers see these limitations as prohibitive, preferring to wait a decade or more to revamp their fighting capabilities.
It is a mistake, however, to assume that the PLA leadership is unified as an institution on this point. The war in Kosovo revealed acrimonious debate in the PLA, as its focus on air and missile strikes was directly relevant to an attack on Taiwan. Those that warned of PLA limitations saw Kosovo as confirmation of what they already knew: China is not ready for war.
More conservative commanders, however, saw Serb tenacity as flying in the face of US technological superiority, and several PLA journals described this as a victory of Maoist "people's war" that emphasizes the human superiority over technology. This had, in their minds, important implications should the US intervene in their efforts to subjugate Taiwan.
A third group emphasizes an "assymetrical" approach to leap-frog China's military weakness: the use of everything from computer viruses to drawing the US into multiple two-front conflicts to compensate for its superior military power.
hardliners gaining influence
It is these latter two conservative groups that see victory as possible, even with US intervention, that have increasing influence on Chinese foreign and military policy. As Jiang Zemin
In this political environment, the rational assessment that such leaders should recognize their limitations, as many in the west assume, often has little bearing on events. Indeed, many states in history have launched wars and lost, but none did so assuming defeat. Thus, would such an irrational war be a disaster for all involved? Of course. Could it still happen any-way? More easily than reason would suggest.
The second reason for arguing that war is unlikely lies in the economic consequences to China of attacking Taiwan. Sanctions would immediately be imposed, and western confidence in the stability of China's investment environment would deteriorate.
Sanctions would, however, be an insufficient deterrent to Beijing. Such a war would usher in a leadership in China that has supported slowing down China's integration with the world economy for years anyway, even if sanctions were actually implemented.
Historically, sanctions have failed in virtually every case. Violations are impossible to prevent, and the west's short memory of and impatience with the sanctions imposed in 1989 would easily reassure China of the west's half-hearted determination. Before the blood was even dry after Tiananmen, political and business leaders scrambled to find ways to circumvent the sanctions that the demands of domestic political consumption had forced them to publicly support. Since then, the belief in China's economic importance has increased tenfold. Should China invade Taiwan, would western leaders be more resolute in their rejection of the use of force? Perhaps. Have the last seven years of "engage-ment" caused Chinese leaders to believe that western leaders place moral outrage above economic interests? That remains to be seen, but lies at the center of Beijing's calculations.
US Help unlikely
US intervention is also seen as giving China pause before considering an invasion. However, much evidence suggests that Beijing is confident the US is not enthusiastic about entering such a conflict. During the missile tests of 1996, a Chinese official made the threat of nuclear war should the US intervene, saying that Beijing knew the US would never "sacrifice LA for Taipei." Given China's nuclear inferiority to the US, such threats would seem like empty boasting. But can the US president be so absolutely certain of this bluff that he's willing to take the risk for an island most in his country have never heard of? What if such attitudes, however irrational, actually do represent Chinese leadership thinking in a crisis?
The domestic factor also ties the hands of the US. Senator Earnest Hollings recently expressed his grave reservations about entering a conflict with China over Taiwan, comparing it to past quagmires like Vietnam. Hollings represents a widespread attitude that would quickly lose patience with a war with the most populous nation on earth. It would not be a two-week rain of cruise missiles and no US casualties before China surrendered. Given the fact that since the end of the Cold War, popular sentiment has an increasing influence on foreign policy, support for such an effort would be very difficult to sustain regardless of American strategic interests.
The top-selling book in Europe just prior to World War I argued that war itself was obsolete, given the intolerably high costs to all involved. Reason dictated that man would step back from the brink. The murderous lesson of the war that followed was that man's ability to use reason when it counts most is often wanting. As Beijing's invective sharpens and its aggression intensifies, we would be wise to remember that because the unthinkable shouldn't happen doesn't mean it won't.
Brian Shea (
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