Another look at US’ China Policy

By S.p.SETH

China is looming large in the reformulation of the US’ policy toward the Asia-Pacific region. Using the forum of East-West Center in Hawaii, Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, recently stressed that the United States was keen for active engagement with Asia.

And it would like to be actively involved in building up Asia’s security and economic structures and for collaborative action on issues like nuclear proliferation, climate change and food security.

At the same time, she emphasized the important role of regional forums in these matters.

Without mentioning China, she pointedly said that no country, including the US, should try to dominate regional institutions. But emphasized the beneficial role of US engagement in the region.

In other words, the United States is back in Asia to re-engage with the region.

What exactly has led the US Secretary of State to reassert US engagement with Asia?

First, under the Bush administration, the US preoccupation with Iraq, Afghanistan and generally “the war on terror”, led to a slackening of interest in Asia.

The Obama Administration is keen to dispel that view, which has gained increasing currency.

Second, the Bush presidency was more given to unilateral initiatives in preference to multilateral forums, like the ASEAN, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, the East Asia Summit, United Nations and so on.

China, on the other hand, had reversed its aversion to regional forums, having earlier feared their domination by the United States.

With their new economic and political clout, they found these forums very useful for expanding their regional role.

In other words, the US pre-occupation with Iraq and Afghanistan, and indifference to the potential of Asian regional cooperation, proved a blessing for China.

In the process, China was able promote and expand its role as a ‘benign’ power supportive of regional institutions.

For instance, China has been able to cobble together a free trade area with the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN).

It is, timely, for the US to be showing new interest in engaging with Asia.

Until now, the Obama Administration seemed to be focusing mainly on forging a new regional and global partnership with China.

The underlying assumption was that China’s partnership was necessary to resolve tricky issues like nuclear proliferation in North Korea and Iran, climate change, global financial crisis, and the undervalued Chinese currency.

But there apparently has been a growing sense of frustration with China’s cavalier and arrogant response, climaxing at the climate change conference in Copenhagen.

The US feels that China sabotaged the conference, and humiliated President Obama.

And now has come the Google affair. So far, the Internet giants like Google, Yahoo and others have been toeing the Chinese line in censoring their contents as required by the Chinese authorities.

But when the Chinese hackers started attacking the Gmail accounts of human rights activists and stealing source code and data from Google (and 33 other technology, industrial and chemical companies), the Google decided to blow the whistle.

Its legal officer David Drummond said on the company’s blog: “We have taken the unusual step of sharing information about these attacks with a broad audience not just because of the security and human rights implications of what we have unearthed, but also because this information goes to the heart of a much bigger debate about freedom of speech.”

Which has “…led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China.”

Google has thus put this issue in a larger context of freedom of speech and human rights. And they have the support of the Obama Administration.

Robert Gibbs, Obama’s spokesman, said, “We support Google’s action. Our concern is with actions that threaten the universal rights of a free Internet.”

And now Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, has come out strongly in favor of Internet freedom.

She recently said, “Countries that restrict free access to information or violate the basic rights of Internet user, risk walling themselves off from the progress of the next century.”

China obviously takes a different view. According to the State Council Information Office, “Our country is at a crucial stage of reform and development and this is a period of marked social conflicts.”

As a result, “Properly guided internet opinion is a major measure for protecting Internet information security.”

This is an interesting admission that China is undergoing acute social conflicts.

In other words, despite President Hu Jintao’s slogan of a “harmonious society”, China is going through unpredictable social crisis.

What it means is that despite all the hype about China’s uninterrupted and on-going rise, its future is subject to the vagaries of how this crisis is managed and resolved.

Considering that China is a top-heavy one-party state, it lacks the political shock absorbers and the process of political mediation exercised through popular elections, combined with alternative political structures and necessary constitutional forums.

No wonder, the Party sees Internet as a serious threat to the Communist Party rule and will go to any length to disrupt and control it.

But, the Internet will always remain a challenge because of the multiple ways in which determined users can find ways around the official censoring of its contents.

Google’s threat to pack up their bags in China has created a serious strain in US-China relations.

It has come on top of persistent attempts by Chinese hackers to get into the Pentagon and other US agencies in an on-going cyber warfare of sorts, with serious implications.

It has led the US and some other Western countries to beef up their security systems against such intrusions. Australia is the latest country to set up a separate agency to deal with it.

The extent of Chinese hacking is widespread. According to some reports, the FBI has estimated that as many as 180,000 Chinese are engaged in hacking and they attacked the Pentagon systems 90,000 times in 2009 alone.

The US is the most prized target of Chinese hackers.

China’s cyber army (irrespective of Beijing’s denial of any official link) is part of a wider strategy to wear down the United States, at a time when it is overstretched militarily, financially and, to some degree, psychologically.

Having followed Deng Xiaoping’s advice to bide its time and build its strength, China appears to believe that its time has come to assert its power as the new Middle Kingdom.

And it is in Asia that it is building up its military power to challenge the United States in the next decade or so.

It is developing weapons systems to deny the US access to some of the waterways in Asia, like South China Sea.

There have already been some naval incidents in the South China Sea between China and the US.

China is developing a whole set of weapons to not only deter the US but, if necessary, to even take it on. These include submarines, new generation of combat aircraft, cruise missiles, and even ballistic missiles to target US aircraft carriers.

It is about time, therefore, that the US is going to actively engage with Asia.