[1] John M. Collins, U.S. Defense Planning: A Critique, Boulder, CO:
Westview Press, 1982. This definition is taken from Collins' ideas on
military power. Hans Morgenthau suggested eight components of
national power, all of which may be analyzed as actual or potential:
geography, natural resources, industrial capacity, military
preparedness, population, national character, national morale, and
diplomacy. Perhaps the best commentary on military potential comes
from Samuel Griffith, the U.S. Marine Corps brigadier general who
translated the works of the ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu into
English. In a 1964 essay on the subject of China's military potential
General Griffith told us that:
See also Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for
Power and Peace, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1949, p. 74. See also Philip
Towle, ed., Estimating Foreign Military Power, New York: Holmes and
Meier, 1982; Klaus Knorr, The War Potential of Nations, Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1956; Oskar Morgenstern, Klaus Knorr,
and Klaus P. Heiss, Long Term Projections ofPower: Political, Economic
and Military Forecasting, Cambridge, MA: Ballinger Publishing Co.,
1973.
One need not labor the obvious fact that a nation's military
potential in the contemporary age is a complex amalgam of
many diverse elements. Among the most important are her
size, terrain and environmental situation; her national
philosophy; the number, character, standards of literacy and
morale of her population; her natural resources; the capacity
of her indigenous science, technology and industry to develop
these resources advantageously; the quality of her leadership
at directive levels; the viability of her alliances, the material
and other assistance she receives from allies; her internal
communications, her strategic doctrine, and size nature and
quality of her armed forces, including their supporting
requirements.
[2] Klaus Knorr, Military Power and Potential, Lexington, MA: D.C.
Heath and Co., 1970. In his preface, Knorr makes the point that "a
nation's military potential varies with the forms and purposes of
military power." Some states have great potential for the domestic use of
power, while other states develop strength for external or international
purposes.
[3] For a useful discussion, see Alan R. Goldman and Gerald A.
Halbert, "Will America Be Prepared for Its Next Peer Competitor?,"
Landpower Essay Series No. 98-1, Association of the United States
Army, February 1998. These authors emphasize the importance of the
Gross National Product (GNP) of a nation as an indicator of potential
future power. As I argue in this paper, however, one must assess how a
nation spends its GNP for defense, not only aggregate numbers. See also
"Long Term Economic and Military Trends, 1950-20 10," A RAND Note,
Santa Monica, CA: RAND Co., 1989, pp. 4-32.
[4] Klaus Knorr suggests that there are really three broad categories
of factors that determine potential military power: economic capacity,
administrative competence, and motivation for war. In the case of
China, even if the motivation for war is low, one can safely speak of the
motivation to use the armed forces as an instrument of national power.
Knorr, The War Potential of Nations, pp. 40-42.
[5] See Li JiJun, Junshi Zhanlue Siwei [Strategic Thought], Beijing:
Military Science Press, 1996, pp. 107-118; China's National Defense,
Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of
China, June 27, 1995; Joseph C. Anselmo, "China's Military Seeks
Great Leap Forward," Aviation Week and Space Technology, May 12,
1997, p. 70.
[6] The United States and China announced a de-targeting
agreement similar to the agreement China already had with Russia
during the Clinton-Jiang June 1998 summit in Beijing.
[7] China 2020: Development Challenges in the New Century,
Washington, DC: The World Bank, 1997, pp. 2-11. This figure is not
accepted by all economists and conflicts with China's own growth
estimates. The PRC's official estimates put GDP growth at 9.4 percent
for that period, with higher growth in some sectors of the economy and
lower growth in other sectors. Richard Cooper of Harvard University
believes that Chinese figures are inflated, and that even the World Bank
estimates may be too high.
[8] Richard N. Cooper, "China into the World Economic System,"
September 1997, paper delivered at the Harvard School of Government,
March 13, 1998.
[9] Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro, "The Coming Conflict with
America," Foreign Affairs, March/April 1997, pp. 19-20. See also
Bernstein and Munro, The Coming Conflict with China, New York: A.A.
Knopf, 1997.
[10] David Shambaugh, "Chinese Hegemony Over East Asia by
2015," The Korean Journal ofDefense Analysis, Summer 1997, pp. 7-28.
[11] Denny Roy, "Hegemon on the Horizon? China's Threat to East
Asian Security," International Security, Summer 1994, pp. 149-168.
[12] Frances A. Lees, China Superpower: Requisites for High
Growth, New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997, p. 40.
[13] Nigel Holloway and Matt Forney, citing U.S. intelligence
sources, write that "many feel that China could emerge as a large-scale
regional threat to the U.S. within the next 20 years." Nigel Holloway
and Matt Forney, "That'T'Word Again,"Far Eastern Economic Review,
February 20, 1997, p. 18. 1 believe that we really must frame our
concerns as addressing the latent nature of China's capabilities and
intentions, not as a real threat. I am indebted to Professor Luo Renshi of
the China Institute for International Strategic Studies, Beijing, China,
for this characterization. During a series of conversations on the subject
in Beijing between 1996 and 1997, Professor Luo used the concept of
latent or potential threat, qianzai de weixie, to characterize how China
and the United States tend to view each other. See also Kim Taeho, "A
Reality Check: the 'Rise of China' and its Military Capability Toward
20 10," The Journal of East Asian Affairs, Summer/Fall 1998, pp. 32 1-
363; Joseph S. Nye, "China's Re-emergence and the Future of the Asia-
Pacific," Survival, Winter 1997-98, pp. 65-79; and Stuart Harris and
Gary Klintworth, eds., China as a Great Power: Myths, Realities and
Challenges in the Asia-Pacific Region, New York: St Martin's Press,
1995.
[14] A good example of the type of foresight exercised by strategic
military planners is to examine the war plans of the United States in the
1920s and 1930s. The U.S. Navy began planning for a conflict with
Japan as early as 1906, after the Russo-Japanese War. In the early
1920s, the war plans divisions of the War Department and the Navy
Department drew up contingency plans for what they envisioned to be a
two-theater world war fought in the Atlantic and the Pacific theater. In
PLAN ORANGE, the Pacific Strategic War Plan, U.S. strategists
theorized that there would be a war with Japan over resources and
territory in the Pacific. In PLAN RED, the Atlantic Strategic War Plan,
the strategists theorized that there would be a war with Great Britain.
They did this because England was locked in a strategic alliance with
Japan, the Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902, which was renewed and
lasted until the Washington Conference of 1921-22. American planners
thought that England's imperial reach would bring it into conflict with
the US. Another contingency war plan they developed was the RED-ORANGE PLAN, which hypothesized a two-theater war, seeking to win first in the Atlantic, against England, while fighting a holding battle in
the Pacific, and then defeating Japan. When World War Two broke out,
military and naval planners simply dusted off the old RED-ORANGE
PLAN and substituted Germany for England in the Atlantic Theater.
The broader strategy and the resources to carry it out, including defense
construction and mobilization of reserves, was essentially the same. The
main point to be learned here is that a theoretical planning construct
does not make an enemy of a country. England made a strategic policy
choice at the Washington Conference, deciding to cast its lot with the
United States, and turned out to be a close ally by the late-1930s. But
the RED-ORANGE PLAN stayed on the U.S. Joint Army-Navy Board's
agenda through 1939. Contingency planning prepares forces and a
nation for potential threats. China need not necessarily worry that it is
often treated as a potential "peer competitor" by the United States, and
the United States should not be surprised that, when China's
strategists try to build a credible military force for the future, the United
States is used for planning purposes as the most technically advanced
and formidable potential opponent. See Erik Goldstein and John
Maurer, eds., The Washington Conference, 1921-1922: Naval Rivalry,
East Asian Stability and the Road to Pearl Harbor, Portland, OR: Frank
Cass and Co., 1994; Edward S. Miller, War Plan Orange: US Strategy to
Defeat Japan, 1897-1945, Annapolis, MD: Naval Instate Press, 1991.
[15] Zhang Guochu, "Jiaqiangguofang hejunduijianshe shi guojia
anquan he xiandaihua fianshe de jiben baozhang," [Strengthening
National Defense and Military Construction are the Basic Guarantees of
National Security and Modernization Construction], Qiu Shi No. 1,
1998, p. 24. A good discussion of China's modernization efforts in
English may be found in Joseph C. Anslemo, "China's Military Seeks a
Great Leap Forward," Aviation Week and Space Technology, May 12,
1997, pp. 68-71.
[16] The "Four Modernizations" are agriculture, industry, science
and technology, and defense. Zhou Enlai first called for the emphasis on
the Four Modernizations at the Fourth National People's Congress in
January 1975, when Deng Xiaoping was made chief of the general staff
of the PLA.
[17] Jiang Zemin, "Gaoju Deng Mapping Lilun Weida Qizhi, ba
Jianshe you Zhongguo Tesi Zhehui Zhuyi Shiye Quanmian Tuixiang 21
Shiji" [Hold high the great banner of Deng Xiaoping theory for an all-
around advancement of the cause of building socialism with Chinese
characteristics into the 21st century], a speech at the 15th Party
Congress, September 9,1997, in Qiu Shi No. 18, October 1997, pp. 2-23.
[18] Review: Far Eastern Economic Review, March 26, 1998, pp. 70-
71.
[19] Yeh Chang-Mei, "Reform of State-Owned Enterprises in
Mainland China Since the CCP's Fifteenth Congress," Issues and
Studies, May 1998, pp. 52-78.
[20] Knorr, in Military Power and Potential, reminds us that some
states produce military strength for domestic use. For the reasons
outlined, China is one of these states.
[21] The recent actions by the central government to sell bonds or
stock shares to the employees of state-owned enterprises is an effort to
recapitalize the companies that may not be successful. Some SOEs are
operating on direct foreign investment, but most operate today on loans
from state banks that cannot be repaid. The bank funds come from the
deposits of Chinese citizens, who maintain one of the highest savings
rates in the world. Should there be a run on the Yuan accounts of China's
savers, spurred perhaps by inflation or an attempt to redeem the bonds
because of a lack of confidence in the bonds, it would be a disaster for
China. The state banking system of China is engaged in an elaborate
shell game, but there may not be a pea under any of the shells. China's
central leadership is buying its time with the money of its citizens in a
gamble that the SOEs can be made to work.
[22] China 2020, pp. 26-29; Ian Johnson, "Eco-Threats: Redefining
National Security-China's New Containment Policy: Fighting the Rise
of Megacities," The Wall Street Journal, December 11, 1997, p. A-20.
[23] Ibid., Johnson, The Wall Street Journal, p. A-20; Sen-dou Chang,
"The Floating Population: An Informal Process of Urbanization in
China," International Journal of Population Geography, Vol. 2, 1996,
pp. 197-214.
[24] There are also success stories in the conversion of SOEs to civil
production. In the Mianyang area, along a corridor north of Chengdu,
Sichuan Province, I visited a number of former "third-line" industries
from the electronics and nuclear industries that have been successfully
converted to civil production. Some of these plants manufacture
motorcycles and parts, others consumer electronics. These are small
industries, however; it is the giants like Capital Iron and Steel and those
in the "rust-belt" of Manchuria that create the largest drains on the
economy.
[25] The Economist, September 13, 1997, pp. 23-26; China Engaged:
Integration with the Global Economy, Washington, DC: The World
Bank, 1997, pp. 2-17; China 2020, pp. 26-29, 154, 157.
[26] The Varyag was purchased through a Macao holding company,
allegedly as a floating hotel or casino. More recently, South Korea
which had bought the Minsk from the Russian Far East Fleet for scra~
value, sold the ship to China, also for scrap. Beijing does not need the
steel. Its naval engineers are more interested in studying the
engineering of these ships. Nickolay Novichko, "Russian Arms and
Technology Pouring Into China,"Aviation Week and Space Technology,
May 12, 1997, pp. 72-73; Michael G. Forsythe, "The Navy That Almost
Was," Naval Institute Proceedings April 1997, pp. 51-53. Forsythe's
historical piece is useful in understanding the bureaucratic structures
that restricted China's naval buildup from the 1870s to the 1890s.
Taken with what China is buying from Russia today, the lesson is that
China's navy cannot necessarily absorb and operate what it purchases.
[27] See Qiu Shi, No. 6, March 16, 1998, which carries an article by
Chief of the PLA General Staff Department General Fu Quanyou. Fu
emphasizes the need for the PLA to work to apply high technology,
"especially information technology," to future warfare. He stressed the
application of simultaneous combat power from the sea, air, and land,
combined with the electronic means to manage a joint battle. See also
Jiefangiun Bao, October 11, 1995, p. 1, where two PLA reporters, Ren
Yanjun and Zhang Zhanhui, discuss an exercise in Lanzhou Military
Region. Quoting Deputy Chief of the General Staff Department General
Wu Quanshu, the two reporters discuss how the PLA is concentrating on
electronic warfare, information warfare, and the application of
firepower to use existing weaponry to defeat opponents. By the end of
the exercises in the Taiwan Strait, which took place in March 1996, PLA
leaders assess their ability to conduct "high technology combined
campaigns by ... concentrating on the enemy's vital, weak parts,
interfering with and sabotaging the enemy's command and
telecommunications system; and disrupting the enemy's deployments."
See Jiefangiun Bao, April 30, 1996, p. 6. On the assimilation of Russian
equipment, see Dennis Blasko, "Evaluating Chinese Military
Procurement from Russia," Joint Force Quarterly, Autumn/Winter
1997-98, pp. 91-96. Blasko concludes that China will avoid a prolonged
military conflict while working to exploit the application of technology to
warfare. For useful discussions of asymmetry in warfare, see T.V. Paul,
Asymmetric Conflicts: War Initiated by Weaker Powers, Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1994; Lloyd J. Matthews, ed., Challenging
the United States Symmetricalky and Asymmetrically: Can America Be
Defeated?, Carlisle, PA: U.S. Army War College, Strategic Studies
Institute, 1998.
[28] Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic
of China, China's National Defense, Beijing, July 27, 1998, pp. 25-28.
[29] Except for the "self-strengthening" movement of the late 19th
century and short period in the 15th century when the fleets ofZheng He
plied the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean in search of trading
ports. More on this later, but Zhang He made seven voyages between
1405 and 1433. He sailed with fleets larger than those of the Spanish
Armada, sometimes up to several hundred ships, with 15,000 combat
troops embarked. This can hardly be seen as a simple trading mission.
John Fairbank King, China: A New History, Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1992, pp. 1137-139; Edward Dreyer, Early Ming
China: A Political History, 1355-1435, Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1982; J.V.G. Mills, Ma Yuan: "The Overall Survey of the Ocean's
Shores," London: Cambridge University Press, 1970.
[30] Jiang Zemin, "Gaoju Deng Xiaoping Lilun," p. 9.
[31] David B. Ottaway and Dan Morgan, "China Pursues Ambitious
Role in Oil Market," The Washington Post, December 26, 1997, pp. 1,
A35. See also Dianne Smith, The New Great Game in Central Asia,
Carlisle, PA: U.S. Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, 1996.
[32] See Review: Far Eastern Economic Review, February 26, 1998;
James P. Dorian, Brett Wigdortz and Dru Gladney, "Central Asia and
Xinjiang, China: Emerging Energy, Economic and Ethnic Relations,"
Central Asian Survey, Vol. 16, No. 4, 1997, pp. 461-486.
[33] As Army Attach6 in Beijing, China, I heard this theme repeated
by Chinese generals and strategic thinkers between 1995 and 1997. It
was reinforced for me in meetings at the Academy of Military Science
during an August 1998 visit to China.
[34] China's sensitivity about Mongolia dates back to the Yalta
Conference, which, according to Deng Xiaoping, "divided up China."
Deng told President Bush in 1989 that "Yalta not only severed Outer
Mongolia from China, but also brought the northeastern part of China
into the Soviet sphere." See the conversation between President Bush
and Deng in George Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Transformed,
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998, pp. 94-95.
[35] One of the best discussions of how to selectively import and
employ new, foreign technology within the limitations of the PLA's
capabilities to absorb it is in Qin Yaiqi, ed., Deng Xiaoping Xin Shiqi
Jundui Jianshe Sixiang Gailun [An Outline of Deng Xiaoping's
Thought on Military Building for the New Period], Beijing: PLA Press,
1991. See especially the section on importing new technologies, pp. 98-
107.
[36] For a series of translations accessible to those who do not read
Chinese, see Michael Pillsbury, ed., Chinese Views of Future Warfare,
Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1997. For a
detailed treatment in Chinese, see Li Jijun, Junshi Zhanlue Siwei
[Strategic Thought], Beijing: Military Science Press, 1996; Chen
Liheng, et. al., Junshi Yuce Xue [Military Forecasting], Beijing: Military
Science Press, 1993; Yue Shuiyu, Sunzi Bing/a yu Gao Jishu Zhanzheng
[Sunzi's Military Thought and High Technology Warfare], Beijing:
National Defense University Press, 1998; Xu Yongzhe I Gao Jishu
Zhanzheng Houqin Baozheng [Guaranteeing Logistics in High
Technology Warfare], Beijing: Military Science Press, 1995; Zhu
Youwen, Gao Jishu TiaoJian xia de Xinxi Zhan [Information Warfare
under High Technology Conditions], Beijing: Military Science Press,
1998.
[37] Anselmo, pp. 68-72.
[38] China's performance in that invasion is discussed in King C.
Chen, China's War with Vietnam, 1979: Issues, Decisions and
Implications, Stanford, CA: Hoover Press Publication, 1987. See also
Harlan W. Jencks, From Muskets to Missiles, Boulder: Westview Press,
1982.
[39] China's strategic thinkers argue that the United States is
creating a "China Threat" to sow dissension between China and its
neighbors. See Li Haibo, Beijing Review, March 24-30, 1997, p. 4. See
also Holloway, p. 18.
[40] The concept of hegemony is defined in Webster's Third
International Dictionary, 1971 edition, as "a predominant influence or
authority, especially of a government or a state." This definition is
adapted slightly in an article by David Shambaugh to include
leadership, as exercised by a powerful state. See David Shambaugh,
"Chinese Hegemony over Asia by 2015?," The Korean Journal ofDefense
Analysis, Summer 1997, pp. 7-28. The concept of hegemony as a concrete
description of international power and relations, and as a tenet of
American foreign policy, is discussed by Richard Haass in The Reluctant
Sheriff- The United States After the Cold War, Washington, DC: The
Council on Foreign Relations, 1997. See also Brian Urquhart, "Looking
for the Sheriff " The New York Review ofBooks, July 16, 1998, pp. 48-53;
Robert Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World
Political Situation, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984; and
Edward Luttwak, Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace, Cambridge:
The Belknap Press, 1987. The term hegemony in Chinese, Bachuan, as
distinct from "hegemonism" bachuan zhuyi, does not have the same
connotations as in English. It relates to authoritarian control and
coercion, obtained by strength and, if necessary, force of arms.
Luttwak's discussion of "armed persuasion" on pages 109-207 of
Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace corresponds more to the meaning
of the term in Chinese. Another good discussion of how China applies
power and force in a hegemonic sense is in Scott A. Boorman, The
Protracted Game: A Wei-Chi Interpretation of Maoist Revolutionary
Strategy, London: Oxford University Press, 1969. The United States
uses the term "hegemon" to describe the sort of coercive, despotic, and
authoritarian power that ought to be avoided in international relations.
See A National Security Strategy for a New Century, Washington, DC:
The White House, 1997; and National Military Strategy of the United
States of America-Shape, Respond, Prepare Now: A Military Strategy
for a New Century, Washington, DC: Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1997.
[41] This really is the meaning of "hegemony." The best description of
how China uses its latent military power is in Scott A. Boorman, The
Protracted Game: A Wei-Chi Interpretation of Maoist Revolutionary
Strategy, London: Oxford University Press, 1969.
[42] Christopher D. Yung, People's War at Sea: Chinese Naval Power
in the Twenty-First Century, Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval
Analyses, March 1996.
[43] On the acquisition of the carrier from Ukraine, see Bruce Gilley,
"Scrap Value: Buyers of an Unfinished Ukrainian Carrier Have China
Ties," Review: Far Eastern Economic Review, April 9, 1998, from web
site http://www.feer.com, April 9, 1998. This is a fascinating story
because in 1997, at a diplomatic reception in Beijing, a Chinese
gentleman claiming to represent a Macao holding company, Chin Luck,
approached me to inquire about whether any U.S. carriers were
available for purchase to be used as a gambling casino. After I explained
that all of the U.S. carriers were employed, the gentleman sought out
the British, Russian, and Ukrainian military attaches. See also "Ex-
Russian Carrier Turns Up in China," European Stars and Stripes,
September 3, 1998, p. 16.
[44] Yung, People's War at Sea: Chinese Naval Power in the Twenty-
First Century, pp. 25-26.
[45] Forecast International, August 1997, Market Overview-China,
pp. 2-6.
[46] Several authors cogently make these points. Historically, China
has had a difficult time dealing with innovation. See John King
Fairbank, China: A New History, Cambridge: The Belknap Press of
Harvard University Press, 1992, especially part two, which deals with
"the paradox of growth without development." See also Kenneth G.
Lieberthal, Governing China: From Reform Through Revolution, New
York: W.W. Norton and Co., 1995; Kenneth G. Lieberthal and Shuen-Fu
Lin, Constructing China: The Interaction of Culture and Economics,
Ann Arbor: Michigan Monographs in Chinese Studies, 1998; and John
Bryan Starr, Understanding China, New York: Hill and Wang, 1997,
especially Chapter II, "Patterns from the Past," pp. 42-57.
[47] Jim Mann, Beijing Jeep: How Western Business Stalled in
China, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997. See also Evan S. Medeiros,
"Revisiting Chinese Defense Conversion: Some Evidence from the
PRC's Shipbuilding Industry," Issues and Studies, May 1998, pp. 79-
101.
[48] See Larry M. Wortzel, "United States Export Controls and the
Modernization of China's Armed Forces," in Larry M. Wortzel, ed.,
China's Military Modernization: International Implications, Westport,
CT: Greenwood Press, 1987, pp. 159-192; Larry M. Wortzel, "China
Pursues Great Power Status," ORBIS, Spring 1994, pp. 157-176.
[49] See Fang Lizhi, Bringing Down the Great Wall: Writings on
Science, Culture and Democracy in China, New York: W.W. Norton,
1992; Martin Schoenhals, The Paradox of Power in a PRC Middle
School, Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 1993; Peter S.N. Lee, Industrial
Management and Economic Reform in China, London: Oxford
University Press, 1987. As assistant U.S. Army Attachd to China, I was
the escort for the Defense Science Board delegation to the Changxindian
Armored Vehicle Factory in 1989, and also visited the factory in 1996
and 1997. My interview with the U.S. aircraft industry representative
took place in September 1998, in Virginia.
[50] Zhang Ruimin and the Hai'er Group are profiled in Southern
Weekend, November 14, 1997; see http://www.chinabig.com/cbig/en/
reference/entr-1l.html
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