A better beginning to relations with the new administration than mid-air collision between a US surveillance plane and Chinese fighter jet. Not that it would bode all that well for Taiwan.
[quote=“Agence France-Presse”]China called for stronger military ties with the U.S. on Jan. 20, just hours before Barack Obama was to take power in Washington.
Beijing said there were currently “difficulties” in military relations between the two nations and urged the U.S. to remove obstacles to an improved relationship.
“In this new period, we hope that both China and the US could make joint efforts to create favorable conditions and improve and promote military-to-military relations,” Ministry of Defense spokesman Col. Hu Changming told reporters.
“We call on the U.S. to remove the obstacles to the growth of military relations between the two countries and to create favourable conditions for the healthy growth of military relations.”[/quote]
China just announced an increase of 17% in spending on its military, up to $61 billion (declared spending; many analysts believe the true figure is closer to $200 billion p.a.). They claim that such steps are necessary because of continued and increasing secessionist pressure from separatists and terrorists in the ‘provinces’ of Taiwan, Tibet and the chinese western frontier. Looks like Ma’s belly-exposing appeasement antics have failed to deliver yet again.
the ‘requests’ to the US for increased military co-operation and exchanges are a thinly veiled attempt at open espionage: i.e., let us into your control and command centres during exercises so we can learn as much as possible about how to counter your tactics.
making China play its part in world peace keeping missions such as in the Congo, in Sudan, and in the Middle East and Afghanistan would help the world community much more than shelling out direct intel. on US capabilities and operational procedures. China has the world’s largest military (numerically), and they claim to be a responsible major power: they should therefore step up to the plate and put their military into the firing line of the world’s trouble spots, not hide behind their inscrutable bamboo wall and develop in secret by leeching other military’s secrets (like buying a hulked Russian aircraft carrier for scrap, but then refitting it and reverse engineering it into their own carrier).
So you don’t know China actively particpates and has been contributing to UN peacekeeping forces…since 1990!
Well I guess you learn something new every day.
[quote] China actively participated in the UN peacekeeping operations, says a white paper on the country’s national defense in 2008 issued here Tuesday.
“The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has sent 11,063 military personnel times to participate in 18 UN peacekeeping operations since 1990,” says the paper issued by the Information Office of the State Council. news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009- … 689163.htm
[quote]China is now the 13th-largest contributor of U.N. peacekeepers, providing 1,648 troops, police and military observers to 10 nations, mostly in African countries, including Congo, Liberia and southern Sudan. But its activities reach well beyond Africa. washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co … 01007.html
China also recently sent a frigate to play Pirates of Somalia.
I don’t trust them further than I could throw a tank from the 13th army… but my favorite strategist regularly argues for a different approach (albeit one that sees Taiwan going the way of Hong Kong).
