On China (68 page)

With leaders of any country describing their strategies, a tactical element can never be excluded, as there was with the amendment of the phrase “peaceful rise” to the blander “peaceful development.” In Dai’s article, he specifically addresses foreign skepticism that his arguments may be largely tactical:

But this, Dai writes, is “groundless suspicion”:

Peaceful development, Dai stresses, is a task for many generations. The importance of the task is underscored by the suffering of generations past. China does not want revolution; it does not want war or revenge; it simply wants the Chinese people to “bid farewell to poverty and enjoy a better life” and for China to become—in contrast to the taunting rejectionism of Mao—“the most responsible, the most civilized, and the most law abiding and orderly member of the international community.”
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Of course, however much grander goals might be disclaimed, countries in the region—those that have seen the waxing and waning of previous Chinese empires, some of them stretching further than the current political borders of the People’s Republic of China—find such disclaimers difficult to reconcile with China’s growing power and historical record. Will a country that, for most of its modern period—which in China starts two thousand years ago—regarded itself as the pinnacle of civilization, and that for nearly two centuries has regarded its uniquely moral world leadership position to have been usurped by the rapaciousness of Western and Japanese colonial powers, be content to limit its strategic goals to “build[ing] a moderately prosperous society in all aspects” ?
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It must, Dai answers. China is “not in a position to be arrogant and boastful” because it still faces tremendous challenges domestically. The Gross Domestic Product of China, no matter how large in absolute numbers, has to be spread over a population of 1.3 billion, of whom 150 million live below the poverty line; therefore “the economic and social problems that we encounter can be said to be the biggest and thorniest issues in the world; hence we are not in a position to be arrogant and boastful.”
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Dai rejects claims that China will seek to dominate Asia or to displace the United States as the world’s preeminent power as “pure myths” that contradict China’s historical record and its current policies. He includes a striking invitation from Deng Xiaoping—so contrary to China’s usual insistence on self-reliance—to the effect that the world would be allowed to “supervise” China to confirm it would never seek hegemony: “Comrade Deng Xiaoping once stated: If one day China should seek to claim hegemony in the world, then the people of the world should expose, oppose and even fight against it. On this point, the international community can supervise us.”
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Dai’s is a powerful and eloquent statement. Having spent many hours over a decade with this thoughtful and responsible leader, I do not question his sincerity or intent. Still, granting that Hu, Dai, and their colleagues are stating in full candor their perspective for the next stage in Chinese policy, it is difficult to imagine that this will be the last word on China’s world role or that it will remain uncontested. A new generation of younger Chinese and rising Party and PLA elites will come into office in 2012—the first generation since the early nineteenth century to have grown up in a China that is at peace, and politically unified, that did not experience the Cultural Revolution, and whose economic performance outstrips that of most of the rest of the world. The fifth generation of Chinese leaders since the creation of the People’s Republic, they will, as did their predecessors, distill their experiences into a view of the world and a vision of national greatness. It is on the dialogue with this generation that American strategic thinking needs to occupy itself.

By the time the Obama administration took office, relations had fallen into a distinct pattern. Both Presidents proclaimed their commitment to consultation, even to partnership. But their media and much elite opinion increasingly affirmed a different view.

During Hu Jintao’s state visit in January 2011, extensive consultation procedures were reinforced. They will permit increased U.S.-China dialogue on issues as they arise, such as the Korea problem, and attempts to overcome some lingering issues, such as the exchange rate and differing views on the definition of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.

What remains to be dealt with is to move from crisis management to a definition of common goals, from the solution of strategic controversies to their avoidance. Is it possible to evolve a genuine partnership and a world order based on cooperation? Can China and the United States develop genuine strategic trust?

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NUMBER OF COMMENTATORS, including some in China, have revisited the example of the twentieth-century Anglo-German rivalry as an augury of what may await the United States and China in the twenty-first century. There are surely strategic comparisons to be made. At the most superficial level, China is, as was imperial Germany, a resurgent continental power; the United States, like Britain, is primarily a naval power with deep political and economic ties to the continent. China, throughout its history, was more powerful than any of the plethora of its neighbors, but they, when combined, could—and did—threaten the security of the empire. As in the case of Germany’s unification in the nineteenth century, the calculations of all of these countries are inevitably affected by the reemergence of China as a strong, united state. Such a system has historically evolved into a balance of power based on equilibrating threats.

Can strategic trust replace a system of strategic threats? Strategic trust is treated by many as a contradiction in terms. Strategists rely on the intentions of the presumed adversary only to a limited extent. For intentions are subject to change. And the essence of sovereignty is the right to make decisions not subject to another authority. A certain amount of threat based on capabilities is therefore inseparable from the relations of sovereign states.

It is possible—though it rarely happens—that relations grow so close that strategic threats are excluded. In relations between the states bordering the North Atlantic, strategic confrontations are not conceivable. The military establishments are not directed against each other. Strategic threats are perceived as arising outside the Atlantic region, to be dealt with in an alliance framework. Disputes between the North Atlantic states tend to focus on divergent assessments of international issues and the means of dealing with them; even at their most bitter, they retain the character of an interfamily dispute. Soft power and multilateral diplomacy are the dominant tools of foreign policy, and for some Western European states, military action is all but excluded as a legitimate instrument of state policy.

In Asia, by contrast, the states consider themselves in potential confrontation with their neighbors. It is not that they necessarily plan on war; they simply do not exclude it. If they are too weak for self-defense, they seek to make themselves part of an alliance system that provides additional protection, as in the case with ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. Sovereignty, in many cases regained relatively recently after periods of foreign colonization, has an absolute character. The principles of the Westphalian system prevail, more so than on their continent of origin. The concept of sovereignty is considered paramount. Aggression is defined as the movement of organized military units across borders. Noninterference in domestic affairs is taken as a fundamental principle of interstate relations. In a state system so organized, diplomacy seeks to preserve the key elements of the balance of power.

An international system is relatively stable if the level of reassurance required by its members is achievable by diplomacy. When diplomacy no longer functions, relationships become increasingly concentrated on military strategy—first in the form of arms races, then as a maneuvering for strategic advantage even at the risk of confrontation, and, finally, in war itself.

A classic example of a self-propelling international mechanism is European diplomacy prior to World War I, at a time when world policy was European policy because much of the world was in colonial status. By the second half of the nineteenth century, Europe had been without a major war since the Napoleonic period had ended in 1815. The European states were in rough strategic equilibrium; the conflicts between them did not involve their existence. No state considered another an irreconcilable enemy. This made shifting alliances feasible. No state was considered powerful enough to establish hegemony over the others. Any such effort triggered a coalition against it.

The unification of Germany in 1871 brought about a structural change. Until that time, Central Europe contained—it is hard to imagine today—thirty-nine sovereign states of varying size. Only Prussia and Austria could be considered major powers within the European equilibrium. The multiple small states were organized within Germany in an institution that operated like the United Nations in the contemporary world, the so-called German Confederation. Like the United Nations, the German Confederation found it difficult to take initiatives but occasionally came together for joint action against what was perceived as overwhelming danger. Too divided for aggression, yet sufficiently strong for defense, the German Confederation made a major contribution to the European equilibrium.

But equilibrium was not what motivated the changes of the nineteenth century in Europe. Nationalism did. The unification of Germany reflected the aspirations of a century. It also led over time to a crisis atmosphere. The rise of Germany weakened the elasticity of the diplomatic process, and it increased the threat to the system. Where once there had been thirty-seven small states and two relatively major ones, a single political unit emerged uniting thirty-eight of them. Where previously European diplomacy had achieved a certain flexibility through the shifting alignments of a multiplicity of states, the unification of Germany reduced the possible combinations and led to the creation of a state stronger than each of its neighbors alone. This is why Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli of Britain called the unification of Germany an event more significant than the French Revolution.

Germany was now so strong that it could defeat each of its neighbors singly, though it would be in grave peril if all the major European states combined against it. Since there were only five major states now, the combinations were limited. Germany’s neighboring states had an incentive to form a coalition with each other—especially France and Russia, which did so in 1892—and Germany had a built-in incentive to break the alliances.

The crisis of the system was inherent in its structure. No single country could avoid it, least of all the rising power Germany. But they could avoid policies that exacerbated latent tensions. This no country did—least of all, once again, the German empire. The tactics chosen by Germany to break up hostile coalitions proved unwise as well as unfortunate. It sought to use international conferences to demonstratively impose its will on the participants. The German theory was that the humiliated target of German pressure would feel abandoned by its allies and, leaving the alliance, would seek security within the German orbit. The consequences proved the opposite of what was intended. The humiliated countries (France, in the Moroccan crisis in 1905; and Russia, over Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908) were reinforced in their determination not to accept subjugation, thereby tightening the alliance system that Germany had sought to weaken. The Franco-Russian alliance was, in 1904, joined (informally) by Britain, which Germany had offended by demonstratively sympathizing with Britain’s Dutch settler adversaries in the Boer War (1899–1902). In addition, Germany challenged Britain’s command of the seas by building a large navy to complement what was already the most powerful land army on the continent. Europe had slipped into, in effect, a bipolar system with no diplomatic flexibility. Foreign policy had become a zero-sum game.

Will history repeat itself? No doubt were the United States and China to fall into strategic conflict, a situation comparable to the pre–World War I European structure could develop in Asia, with the formation of blocs pitted against each other and with each seeking to undermine or at least limit the other’s influence and reach. But before we surrender to the presumed mechanism of history, let us consider how the United Kingdom and German rivalry actually operated.

In 1907, a senior official in the British Foreign Office, Eyre Crowe, wrote a brilliant analysis of the European political structure and Germany’s rise. The key question he raised, and which has acute relevance today, is whether the crisis that led to World War I was caused by Germany’s rise, evoking a kind of organic resistance to the emergence of a new and powerful force, or whether it was caused by specific and, hence, avoidable German policies.
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Was the crisis caused by German capabilities or German conduct?

In his memorandum, submitted on New Year’s Day 1907, Crowe opted for the conflict being inherent in the relationship. He defined the issue as follows: