Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

Rumsfeld: China's Military Buildup a Threat

I have again listed some of the ways in which the United States is threatening China at the end of this text.

-Am

Updated 2:16 AM ET June 4, 2005


By MATT KELLEY

SINGAPORE (AP) - China's military buildup, particularly its positioning of hundreds of missiles facing Taiwan, is a threat to Asian security, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Saturday.

Rumsfeld rebuked China at a regional security conference here, saying it was pouring huge resources into its military and buying large amounts of sophisticated weapons despite facing no threat from any other country.

The Pentagon chief's remarks signaled a harder line against China from the Bush administration, which has criticized Beijing over trade and human rights issues but not directly challenged its military buildup.

The director of the Asia bureau of China's foreign ministry, Cui Tiankai, was in the audience for Rumsfeld's speech and reacted strongly.

"Since the U.S. is spending a lot more money than China is doing on defense, the U.S. should understand that every country has its own security concerns and every country is entitled to spend money necessary for its own defense," Cui told The Associated Press after Rumsfeld's remarks.

Rumsfeld said the Pentagon's annual assessment of China's military capabilities shows China is spending more than its leaders acknowledge, expanding its missile capabilities and developing advanced military technology.

China now has the world's third-largest military budget, he said, behind the United States and Russia. He did not say how large the U.S. believes China's military budget is.

"Since no nation threatens China, one must wonder: Why this growing investment? Why these continuing large and expanding arms purchases?" Rumsfeld said at the conference organized by the International Institute of Strategic Studies, a private, London-based think tank.

Cui responded sharply to Rumsfeld during a question-and-answer session.

"Do you truly believe that China is under no threat by other countries?" Cui asked. "Do you truly believe that the U.S. is threatened by the emergence of China?"

Rumsfeld said he does not think any country threatens China and that the United States does not see China as a threat.

Central to the disagreement is Taiwan, a self-governing island Beijing regards as a renegade territory.

China has said it will attack Taiwan if the island tries to declare independence, and it repeatedly calls on the United States to stop selling weapons to Taiwan. Beijing denounced a joint U.S.-Japan statement earlier this year saying the two allies shared the objective of a peaceful resolution of the Taiwan issue.

The United States is urging the European Union to keep in place its ban on selling weapons to China. Washington argues that any European weapons sold to China could be used in a conflict over Taiwan.

"I just look at the significant rollout of ballistic missiles opposite Taiwan, and I have to ask the question: If everyone agrees the question of Taiwan is going to be settled in a peaceful way, why this increase in ballistic missiles opposite Taiwan?" Rumsfeld said.

He also questioned China's government, saying political freedom there has not kept pace with increasing economic freedom.

"Ultimately, China will need to embrace some form of a more open and representative government if it is to fully achieve the political and economic benefits to which its people aspire," he said.

The defense secretary, who has said he would like to visit China this year, also pressed Beijing to use its influence with North Korea to restart six-nation talks over Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program. North Korea has stayed away for a year from the talks with China, the United States, South Korea, Japan and Russia.

Rumsfeld said the United Nations may need to decide what to do about the nuclear threat from North Korea, which declared in February that it has atomic bombs. North Korea says it needs a nuclear deterrent because of what it calls Washington's "hostile policy" against it.

Rumsfeld said North Korea is a worldwide threat because of its record of selling missile technology and other weapons. "One has to assume that they'll sell anything, and that they would sell nuclear weapons," he said.

Similar U.S. criticism of North Korea has sparked an angry response from Pyongyang. The state-run Korean Central News Agency this week called Vice President Dick Cheney a "bloodthirsty beast" for saying that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il was irresponsible.

President Bush and other administration officials say the U.S. has no intention of attacking North Korea.

Tensions between the two nations have been rising in recent months. Last week, the Pentagon suspended its only contact with North Korea efforts to search for the remains of missing servicemen from the Korean War. U.S. officials said they could not guarantee the search teams' safety in remote areas.

http://dailynews.att.net/cgi-bin/news?e=pri&dt=050604&cat=news&st=newsd8agkelo1&src=....



We are threatening China by attempting to control the flow of oil and by military means.

-Am

In a world that runs on oil, the nation that controls the flow of oil has great strategic power. U.S. policy-makers want leverage over the economies of competitors -- Western Europe, Japan and China -- that are more dependent on Middle Eastern oil.
#msg-4798276

According to a Chinese white paper, Beijing sees “new negative developments” in the Asia-Pacific region. These include a strengthening US military presence and bilateral military alliances in China’s neighbourhood, and US development of a theatre missile defence system and plans to deploy it in Asia. “The Taiwan Straits situation is complicated and grim,” the white paper states.
#msg-4383869
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_18-10-2002_pg3_8

Add to the following the 90 nukes at the Turkish base of Incirlik and you will still have only a partial list of the weapons, troops, bases and nukes with which we are threatening Russia, China and other countries.

In recent weeks, Washington also has sent 17 Stealth warplanes to South Korea as part of a series of steps to increase pressure on the North.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/GF04Ak01.html

In mid-April of this year, the Japanese government agreed to let the US Army's 1st Corps transfer from Fort Lewis, Washington, to Camp Zama near Yokohama.

Besides the recent decision to re-deploy the 1st Corps, the US is busily building up Guam as a "power projection hub", with, in the words of Pacific Commander Admiral William Fargo, "geostrategic importance". The US is also trying to shift Guam-based bombers to Yokota airbase near Tokyo. Christopher Hughes of Warwick University, an expert on the region, told the (British) Guardian, "The ramifications of this would be that Japan would essentially serve as a frontline US command post for the Asia-Pacific and beyond."

A number of Bush administration sounding boards, such as neo-conservative Charles Krauthammer, have openly advocated Japan going nuclear as a way to offset the growing influence and power of China. Acquiring nuclear weapons would be relatively easy for Japan, which has plenty of fuel to reprocess, as well as missiles and satellite targeting systems.
#msg-6547899

In the first step toward erecting a multibillion-dollar shield to protect the United States from foreign missiles, the U.S. Navy will begin deploying state-of-the-art destroyers to patrol the waters off North Korea as early as next week.

The mission, to be conducted in the Sea of Japan by ships assigned to the Navy's 7th Fleet, will help lay the foundation for a system to detect and intercept ballistic missiles launched by "rogue nations." - Sep. 25, 2004
#msg-4129889