Call it a venture in coercive diplomacy. Critics of the Bush administration -- primarily arms-control advocates -- have portrayed China's anti-satellite missile test as Beijing's way of prodding Washington into negotiations on a treaty banning deployment of weaponry in space. The administration has long resisted a ban, calling it premature and unnecessary. In the arms controllers' view, Beijing shot down an old weather satellite to show the US a space arms race would be ruinous.
There's a certain logic to this account of Beijing as a militant proponent of arms control. But it's probably wrong nonetheless. A space arms accord would lock in the US' current superiority -- and with it Chinese inferiority -- in this critical domain. This would be anathema to Chinese military strategists, many of whom believe the US military is poised to develop space weaponry, if it hasn't already. They beseech China's top leadership to match US efforts aloft.
If not arms control, what motivates China's military space program? Taiwan is an immediate, overriding priority. Beijing must deter or defeat US naval intervention to prevail in the Taiwan Strait. Space warfare represents the high-altitude component of Chinese naval strategy in the Strait, which deploys "niche" capabilities -- mines and submarines, to name two -- to deny US Navy forces access to these waters despite overall inferiority.
Offsetting superior US military might is a must. As they gaze seaward and skyward, Chinese thinkers have embraced the concept of the "assassin's mace," which envisions negating a superior enemy's advantages by landing a single, sharp blow. The kind of blow that Chinese forces might strike against US warships with sea mines or stealthy submarines, or against satellites with ground-based interceptors or lasers.
The US military's performance during the 1990 to 1991 Gulf War impressed Chinese military analysts. But these analysts also came away convinced that space would come to represent an Achilles' heel for US troops should they come to depend on high technology -- as they did. Chinese strategists are convinced -- and their US counterparts privately agree -- that "networked" US forces would find detecting and targeting Chinese units nearly unthinkable without satellite communications and sensors.
"Battlespace awareness" -- tracking friendly and enemy assets during conflict -- would suffer without satellite surveillance. The accuracy of weaponry such as Tomahawk cruise missiles and Joint Direct Attack Munitions would be elusive without Global Positioning System satellites. The ability to disable or destroy US satellites would thus bolster China's capacity to thwart naval intervention in the Taiwan Strait.
But Taiwan isn't the only factor driving China's military space program. Strategists are looking beyond a Taiwan contingency, and what they see spurs them on to even greater exertions in space. Beijing regards the seas and skies adjacent to China's coasts as a "commons" through which commerce, shipments of raw materials and military power can flow freely. A rising China is increasingly reluctant to entrust the security of this commons to uncertain US goodwill.
A China-US space race is not in the offing -- yet. But Beijing's endeavors in space are a product of stark realpolitik, and they engage vital interests. As the People's Liberation Army enters the high frontier, a cycle of Chinese challenge and US response could dominate the bilateral relationship. Blocking this cycle should be of utmost concern to both governments.
And Taiwan? China now brandishes a potent assassin's mace. Taipei should assume the worst -- that the PLA can hold off US naval forces in wartime -- and tend to its own defenses.
James Holmes is a senior research associate at the University of Georgia's Center for International Trade and Security.
The People’s Republic of China (PRC) has over the past few months continued to escalate its hegemonic rhetoric and increase its incursions into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone. The US, in turn, has finally realized how its “strategic ambiguity” is increasingly wearing thin. Similarly, any hopes the US had that the PRC would be a responsible stakeholder and economic player have diminished, if not been abandoned. Taiwan, of course, remains as the same de facto independent, democratic nation that the PRC covets. As a result, the US needs to reconsider not only the amount, but also the type of arms
Taking advantage of my Taipei Times editors’ forbearance, I thought I would go with a change of pace by offering a few observations on an interesting nature topic, the many varieties of snakes in Taiwan. I will be drawing on my experiences living in Taiwan five times, from my teenage years in Kaohsiung back in the early sixties, to my last assignment as American Institute in Taiwan Director in 2006-9. Taiwan, with its semitropical climate, is a perfect setting for serpents. Indeed, one might say serpents are an integral part of the island’s ecosystem. Taiwan is warm, humid, with lots of
China constantly seeks out ways to complain about perceived slights and provocations as pretexts for its own aggressive behavior. It is both victimization paranoia and a form of information warfare that keeps the West on the defensive. True to form, China objected even to the innocuous reference to Taiwan at April 16’s summit meeting between US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. Neither leader’s prepared remarks even mentioned Taiwan, out of deference to the Japanese side. Biden’s opening statement was modest: “Prime Minister Suga and I affirmed our ironclad support for US-Japanese alliance and for our shared security.
There is no ambiguity when it comes to war. Ambiguity begs for certainty and a lack thereof has historically led to war. History is full of examples: Europe’s and the US’ ambiguity as to how they would respond to Hitler’s growing territorial expansion in Europe was certainly a contributing factor to World War II. In the same vein, US ambiguity toward Japan’s expansionist militarism in the 1930s clearly led to the Pearl Harbor attacks that started the war in Asia in 1941. Ambiguity in a world with leaders like Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) will inevitably
RSS