The World Needs an Assertive China

[Ray]

The World Needs an Assertive China

By THOMAS J. CHRISTENSEN | FOREIGN AFFAIRS
Published: February 21, 2011

In a departure from the largely successful policy of reassurance it adopted in the late 1990s under the slogan "peaceful rise," in the past two years China has damaged its relations with the United States and most of its neighbors.


Mistrust of Beijing throughout Asia and in Washington is palpable. Observers often claim that China has become more assertive, revising its grand strategy to reflect its own rise and the America's decline since the financial crisis began in 2008. China's counterproductive policies are better understood as reactive and conservative rather than assertive, and Beijing should be encouraged by the United States and its allies to return to the more assertive but more constructive policies Beijing adopted in the two years just before the financial crisis.

In that period China was actually more innovative, proactive and assertive than it is today. By softening its traditional prohibitions on interference in the internal affairs of other states, Beijing was able to play a constructive leadership role in addressing global problems and improve U.S.-China relations in the process.


In late 2006 and early 2007 Beijing pressured North Korea multilaterally and bilaterally into agreeing to disable the nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, the only concrete progress in the six-party talks. Beijing also changed course on Darfur, from simply shielding Khartoum from international pressure to backing the United Nations' peace plan in late 2006 to committing in 2007 to send the first non-African peacekeepers to the region. In late 2008, China also agreed to send a naval contingent to the Gulf of Aden to assist in international antipiracy efforts under a U.N. resolution that permits hot pursuit of pirates into Somalia's territorial waters.

Unfortunately, since 2009, China has lost this positive momentum by reacting abrasively to events driven by others, hardly the stuff of an assertive and confident new grand strategy.

Early last year China adopted a rhetorically strident posture in response to long-held policies of the United States relating to Taiwan, Internet freedom and Tibet. In July 2010, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi responded to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's innovative multilateral confidence-building initiative for the South China Sea by warning Southeast Asian neighbors in caustic terms against coordinating with outside powers in managing territorial disputes with Beijing.

Later that year, Beijing demanded an apology and compensation from Tokyo even after Japan, under Chinese pressure, had released a Chinese captain whose fishing boat had collided with a Japanese coast guard vessel. After two severe military provocations by North Korea and a clear violation of Pyongyang's existing nuclear commitments, China not only refused to condemn Pyongyang directly, it prevented the U.N. Security Council from doing so. Instead, Chinese officials twice warned the United States and South Korea against conducting naval exercises in nearby international waters. Chinese leaders thereby alienated many in the international community, especially South Korea, Japan and the United States.

Beijing's new more truculent posture is rooted in a strange mix of confidence on the international stage and insecurity at home. Since the onset of the financial crisis in 2008, Chinese citizens, lower-level government officials, and media and Internet commentators have often exaggerated China's rise in influence and the declining power of the United States, insisting that China push back against perceived slights and reduce international cooperation with the United States and its allies.

According to my Chinese interlocutors, top officials in Beijing have a much more sober assessment of China's global position and of the development challenges ahead. Yet those nationalist domestic voices have created a heated political environment. Party elites are acutely concerned about long-term domestic stability and hope to avoid criticism along nationalist lines, a theme that has the potential to galvanize the many otherwise disparate local protests against Chinese officials into a national movement. Particularly during the leadership transition that will culminate in the Communist Party's selection of President Hu Jintao's successor in 2012, individual officials need to foster their reputations as protectors of national pride and domestic stability.

Fortunately, those same interlocutors report that there are real policy debates in Beijing, particularly about North Korea. In order to influence these debates, Washington and its partners need to consistently offer China an active role in multilateral cooperative efforts on North Korea, Iran, etc. But they must also emphasize that, while Chinese cooperation is greatly preferred, they will react to provocations with or without Chinese cooperation and that China's interests will suffer if it obstructs those efforts or even stands on the sidelines.

In 2010 the Obama administration responded well to this challenge. It is a gross exaggeration to say the United States has "returned to Asia" under Obama, but Washington's engagement in the region has been intense, including many high-level visits. More concretely, the U.S.–South Korean military exercises in the Yellow Sea and the trilateral meeting of Japanese, Korean and U.S. security officials in Washington demonstrated that the United States and its partners have diplomatic and security options regarding North Korea even without China's active cooperation.

Beijing is unlikely to look with favor on the prospect of greater U.S.-Japan-South Korea security coordination on issues such as missile defense, anti-submarine warfare, searching of North Korean ships as part of the Proliferation Security Initiative, or the potential development of Japanese offensive strike weapons to counter North Korean missile threats. All the more reason for China to return to a more creative, assertive and reassuring set of policies to address the problem.

To date, Washington's approach has had a positive, albeit limited effect. Beijing sought to improve bilateral relations in the lead-up to President Hu Jintao's visit to the United States in January, for example, by restoring military-to-military dialogue and hosting U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates in Beijing. There are also signs that China is beginning to reach out to ASEAN member states to address ongoing security concerns that were exacerbated by Beijing's bullying at the July ASEAN Regional Forum. China may also have played a constructive role in preventing North Korea from carrying through on its military threats against South Korea in response to the latter's artillery exercise in December 2010.

However, we have not seen a return in Beijing to the proactive and assertive mind-set exhibited in 2006-2008. For the United States and its allies and security partners, securing this kind of Chinese cooperation in the future may be the highest hurdle to clear but will be essential in addressing problems from proliferation to financial instability to climate change. In this one important sense, the United States needs a more assertive China.

Thomas J. Christensen, a former U.S. deputy assistant Secretary of State, is professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University and the author of "Worse Than a Monolith: Alliance Politics and Problems of Coercive Diplomacy in Asia." A longer version of this essay appears in the March/April issue of Foreign Affairs.

Assertive China

China's new tack of being aggressively active in her neighbourhood has indeed left the US uncomfortable since it would be mean interactivity of the US in the Asia Pacific realm. It would also mean avoidable expenditure, be it to maintain a military deterrent in the region or wooing prospective 'allies' through aids and concessions that may not be in the US' financial interest. US is hardly in a position to squander its monies.

Therefore, US would be most comfortable if China could be coaxed into its earlier avatar of 'peaceful rise'.

But, a Tiger that has tasted human blood, will it stop being a maneater?

Should China return to the policies of the era of her 'Peaceful Rise'? How will that be beneficial to her, when in actuality, she is on the threshold of becoming a cogent power that can challenge the US supremacy?

And why should she?

 

[niharjhatn]

From an Indian perspective, it does not really matter. The main issues regarding border, relationship with Pakistan etc. have been there even throughout the 'peaceful rise' years.

The US no doubt would want a return to these earlier years as public perception was that despite all the advancements, the US was still far ahead of China. This has literally turned on its head now, with common perception being China making an almost unstoppable surge to the 'top spot' whilst the US tries desperately to hang on to its glory years.

The main advantage would be other nations view of China, especially in South-East asia. China's ability to dominate that region will determine how powerful she really gets, but this will only be done through an atmosphere of mutual benefit, and not fear (think of the US policy of different spheres of influence and how they monopolised influence of South America - I see the same thing happening).

Unfortunately for China, this has not been the case, with historic issues surrounding Japan and South Korea, and I even see nations like Malaysia and Indonesia sharing more with India rather than China if she continues on this aggressive outlook.

 

[Ray]

The main advantage would be other nations view of China, especially in South-East asia. China's ability to dominate that region will determine how powerful she really gets, but this will only be done through an atmosphere of mutual benefit, and not fear (think of the US policy of different spheres of influence and how they monopolised influence of South America - I see the same thing happening).

Unfortunately for China, this has not been the case, with historic issues surrounding Japan and South Korea, and I even see nations like Malaysia and Indonesia sharing more with India rather than China if she continues on this aggressive outlook.

China has risen from her age of isolation, graduating from an international pariah to a nation that is grudgingly recognised as a rising power because of its growing economic and military clout, she has now apparently shed her isolation insecurity and is raring to go to avenge her years of 'shame' (the Chinese communists have this 'years of shame' as an agenda to whip up nationalism).

Japan is obviously high on their agenda to avenge since China has been brutally humiliated and even 'raped' by Japan and considers Japan as the main contender to China's supremacy in Asia. China has common ethnicity with many of the countries on the fringe of China's periphery like the Hmongs who inhabit the mountainous regions of China, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. Hmong are also one of the sub-groups of the Miao ethnicity (苗族) in southern China. Then, the claim Arunachal of India claiming that they are of Tibetan origin and hence Tibetans. This theory is ripe ground to renew China's historical Han quest for empire building.

Therefore, China's 'peaceful rise' or otherwise is a threat to Asia.

Malaysia is a racially divided nation and Malaysians of Indian origin are not too well placed to influence Malaysian politics, majority being blue collar workers. On the other hand, the Malaysian Chinese are in a position to do so since they are Malaysia's economic Tsars. Therefore, hoping that Malaysia will enter the Indian sphere of influence may not be quite kosher. Indonesia, owing to strategic requirement and because of a dislike for the Chinese, will be more ready to align with India, provided India becomes either an economic or a military force to reckon with.

While it is immaterial what the US's position vis a vis China, it will be in the interest of all concerned in Asia to encourage the US to act as a counterbalance to China's hegemonic pursuits.

 

[cw2005]

I think this article is the typical American hypocrisy. If my memory did not fail me, USA was threatening to go to war with Soviet when the later shipped missiles to her backdoor. Now when the American plays war game right at China's front door, she demands China to keep quiet.

Japan, a country refuses to say sorry for starting the Pacific war and killing millions of innocent Asian, is well known of aggressive with all her neighbors for lands including Korea, Russia and China. In the Chinese eyes, the American wrongly handed over Chinese islands to Japan at the end of the 2nd world war to comfort Japan for their misdeed of atomic bombing Japan. And the American did it at the time when China was too weak to say no.

Just imagine if China and Pakistan conduct war game right in front of India, would it be proper to request India to accept and remain silent?

 

[Ray]

I think this article is the typical American hypocrisy. If my memory did not fail me, USA was threatening to go to war with Soviet when the later shipped missiles to her backdoor. Now when the American plays war game right at China's front door, she demands China to keep quiet.

Japan, a country refuses to say sorry for starting the Pacific war and killing millions of innocent Asian, is well known of aggressive with all her neighbors for lands including Korea, Russia and China. In the Chinese eyes, the American wrongly handed over Chinese islands to Japan at the end of the 2nd world war to comfort Japan for their misdeed of atomic bombing Japan. And the American did it at the time when China was too weak to say no.

Just imagine if China and Pakistan conduct war game right in front of India, would it be proper to request India to accept and remain silent?

I find this demand of analogies rather droll.

How can apologies change the the crimes committed?

China is already committing aggressive unfriendly acts in the Indian backyard - Coco Islands and Gwadar. Has India done anything?