The Clinton administration and a bevy of China experts want to
portray
China's recent threats against Taiwan as empty bluster. Top
intelligence and
military officials say the Chinese don't have the wherewithal to
launch an
invasion of Taiwan, and won't for some time. President Clinton,
ever the
politician, says that Beijing is just playing hardball to try to
influence
this week's Taiwanese presidential elections. According to CIA
director
George Tenet, "our hope is that after the election this all
settles down and
that the normal pattern of peaceful dialogue between the two
countries
resumes." Who knew the CIA was in the hoping business?
In fact, a major conflict is looming. China's White Paper on
Taiwan signaled
a new phase of impatience in Beijing, and it wasn't the only
sign. President
Jiang Zemin has declared in recent months that he intends to
make
reunification of the motherland his legacy. According to veteran
China-watcher Willy Wo-lap Lam, that means a resolution of the
Taiwan issue
must be achieved, at the latest, by the 17th Communist Party
Congress in
2007, when Jiang will be 81 and on his way out of power. Senior
Chinese
military officials now speak openly about a "fixed timetable"
for
reunification.
Meanwhile, one of the Pentagon's top experts on the Chinese
military believes
Beijing has figured out a way to force Taiwan's capitulation
without an
invasion. According to Mark A. Stokes, a massive, coordinated
air strike
employing hundreds of short-range ballistic missiles could
cripple Taiwan's
air defenses and early warning systems, destroy its command,
control and
communications centers and demolish Taiwan's eight primary
airfields, thereby
neutralizing the Taiwanese air force as well as its naval ports.
Beijing's
own military analysts write that China could achieve air
superiority over a
paralyzed Taiwan within 45 minutes, suffering few casualties. It
could then
force the Taiwanese to sue for peace on Beijing's terms.
This strategic plan explains China's massive buildup of
short-range ballistic
missiles across the strait from Taiwan. In 1995 China deployed
only 40 of the
M-9 missiles. By the end of last year, it had 200 and was
increasing its
stockpile at a rate of 50 missiles per year. The Pentagon
estimates that
China could have 800 missiles by 2005, all aimed at Taiwan. And
thanks to
China's acquisition of U.S. technology--both by theft and by
purchase from
American corporations--those missiles will be highly accurate.
Ask a Pentagon official how the United States would respond to a
Chinese
missile attack on Taiwan, and you get a blank stare. The U.S.
military has no
capability and no plans for defending Taiwan in such a scenario,
even though
it is more likely than a full-scale invasion. An invasion would
require a
massive and therefore easily detectable mobilization of Chinese
forces,
giving the United States some time to move forces to the region
and try to
interdict the assault. But a massive missile strike comes with
little or no
warning, and by the time U.S. forces arrived on the scene
Taiwan's military
would be rubble. What would U.S. aircraft carrier battle groups
do? Launch
retaliatory attacks against missile bases on the mainland of
China? Chinese
military officials may gamble that an American president would
not want to
escalate a war with China with so little prospect of undoing the
fait
accompli on Taiwan.
The Clinton administration's conviction that the Chinese would
launch a
Normandy-style invasion to seize and hold Taiwan is both
convenient and
reflects American-style thinking about war. A recent RAND study
notes that
the Chinese historically have taken a different view of the use
of force.
Their 1950 intervention in Korea, their 1962 attack on India and
their 1979
incursion into Vietnam did not aim to take and hold territory
but to "achieve
a political effect," to force the adversary to "make a radical
reevaluation
of its goals and to acquiesce in a new status quo."
Nor are the Chinese daunted by American military superiority. As
former
Pentagon official Michael Pillsbury notes, Chinese strategists
are developing
tactics of "asymmetrical" warfare that allow an inferior power
to prevail
against a stronger enemy in a "local war under high-tech
conditions."
Surprise is a critical factor in Chinese strategic thinking.
If the Chinese are contemplating a missile attack on Taiwan
sometime in the
next few years, what can the United States do to prevent it?
Clinton
officials pray that the March 18 elections will produce a
government in
Taiwan willing to accommodate Beijing's demands. That is
unlikely. Polls show
a majority of Taiwanese oppose reunification: A growing
percentage no longer
even consider themselves Chinese. The next Taiwanese president
will probably
maintain the status quo that Beijing considers unacceptable.
What then? In the absence of diplomatic or political solutions,
the only way
to avert a future Chinese attack on Taiwan is to deter it right
now, and that
may require some tough decisions. The Taiwanese are begging the
Clinton
administration to sell them four guided missile destroyers
equipped with the
Aegis radar system, which would give Taiwan early warning of an
attack and
significantly improve its ability to knock out incoming
missiles. So far the
administration has opposed the sale on the grounds that it would
offend
Beijing.
The United States also needs to convince Chinese leaders that
Washington will
not just twiddle its thumbs when an attack begins. Right now,
the U.S.
military conducts no exercises with Taiwan, engages in no joint
planning and
cannot even communicate with the Taiwanese military in a crisis.
This
preposterous legacy of America's normalization of relations with
China more
than two decades ago has become a positive invitation to war.
But the Clinton
administration opposes remedying the problem, because that too
would offend
Beijing.
In its classic form, the psychology of appeasement convinces
peace-loving
peoples that any effort to deter a future conflict is too
provocative and
therefore too dangerous. The appeasing nation comes to believe
that defenseles
sness and lack of preparation for a conflict is not only safer
but a sign of
maturity. And then the war starts.
Robert Kagan, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for
International
Peace, writes a monthly column for The Post.
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