The Chinese Long-Game – USA Gov Policy

No government poses more of a challenge to the international order–America, especially–than China. Yet coverage of the world’s most populous, and threatening, nation is largely inadequate in the major media. To address that, the New York Analysis of Policy and Government will feature vital articles each Friday on China. They are written by Daria Novak, who had significant experience as a member of the U.S. State Department during some of the most critical periods in that country’s recent history.

China is a land filled with contradictory signals that continue to befuddle American foreign policymakers. In recent decades Washington has courted Beijing as if it is a friend and, at the same time, feared it as a strategic foe. Once a great dynastic power able to conquer immense swaths of Asian territory, by the early 20^th century China was a weak and divided country unable grow enough grain to feed its own population. Mao and the leaders that followed him after 1948 promised to return China to its rightful place at the center of the world.

Over the last few decades the nation-state has grown stronger, bolder, and made enormous strides toward becoming a regional hegemon in East Asia. It can challenge the US Navy on the high seas. This is the China the United States faces today. The broader strategic military question facing Washington is “What are China’s leaders willing to do to turn it into reality and when?”

Less than 40 years ago three out of four Chinese missiles failed to reach their target and half of the PLAAF (People’s Liberation Army Air Force) planes were grounded due to a lack of spare parts or trained pilots. That same September China’s military General Staff Department (GSD) held a month-long meeting to develop a strategy to counter a Soviet attack. Moscow, at that time, was the untrusted one.

Only twenty years ago American intelligence discovered Xianyou, a Chinese short-range missile base 220 miles off the Taiwan coast. It allowed Beijing to target all of the island’s major military installations and also held tunnels large enough to store the missiles and a brigade-size force with over a dozen truck launchers and 97 CSS-7 mobile missiles.

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By November 2007 China already had deployed between 990 and 1,070 of the CSS-6 and CSS-7 short-range ballistic missiles near Taiwan, according to the US Department of Defense. And for the first time, last April, the Defense Department’s Report to Congress on China’s military power included a section on China’s Arctic policy, with information about Beijing’s overall presence in the region, its new double-hulled ice breakers, and its possible deployment of nuclear submarines to the area.

Only two weeks ago, in its 39^th space launch of the year, China put its Long March 5 heavy lift rocket carrying a “new era of communications equipment” into space. BeiDou, the country’s satellite navigation system, has now surpassed the number of GPS satellites in space. It may also contain elements of an offensive, space-based weapons system.

China has invested billions in modernizing its military and has come a long way in a short time. It may only need another 10-15 years to surpass the overall military strength of the United States, according to some intelligence analysts in Washington. Does China’s military buildup and use of advanced technology mean it will use it more often to project power? Some in the US intelligence community say we already are seeing those results in the expansion of China’s reach from the South China Sea to the Arctic Circle some 900 miles distant from its shores. Beijing even created a new name for its northern policy — The Polar Silk Route and a new ID for China – as a “Near Arctic” nation. Washington has ignored China’s reach for too long. Beijing’s policymakers continue working toward the complete strategic transformation of its military from a large standing army to one based on advanced information technologies and integrated joint operations. China is playing the long game to win. No other option is a possibility for the communist leadership.

Illustration: Chin’a Great Seal (China Official Site)

Quick Analysis

Ukraine’s Frozen Conflict

As we approach winter in the northern hemisphere, the war in Ukraine is beginning to resemble a “frozen conflict” from many perspectives. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the media he hopes the war will end faster once President-elect Trump takes over in January. Opinions in Moscow, however, differ from that of the Ukrainian leader. Russian President Vladimir Putin argues that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) needs to exclude Ukraine from joining in “exchange” for peace. If it does not, he says, then no end to the war is in sight. So far there is no Christmas solution. Several NATO countries, according to Vladimir Socor of the Jamestown Foundation, are tentatively considering “coalitions-of-the-willing” to provide security for Ukraine outside of the formal NATO framework. There is, however, no collective mechanism today under which such an arrangement is viable. According to the NATO Charter, while Ukraine is a NATO partner country, it may not join as a full member since it has not fulfilled the requirements for membership. That has not stopped NATO and allies from continuing “to provide Ukraine with unprecedented levels of support, helping to uphold its fundamental right to self-defence,” according to the organization. Socor says that keeping Ukraine out of NATO will not advance peace with Russia. Waiting for a peace settlement, he suggests, would only serve to encourage Moscow to continue the war indefinitely. Although the Biden Administration officially withdrew its support for Ukrainian membership in 2021, NATO maintains an “open door” policy toward membership-seeking countries. The current White House position led the way for European states to oppose Ukraine’s membership saying that a decision should be delayed until “conditions are met.” Biden pushed for changing “open door” to a “bridge” metaphor. It is not intended as an across-the-board NATO policy and has been implemented in the past on a case-by-case basis, says Socor. “The alliance’s open-door policy was not fully insulated from Russia’s non-statutory blocking power, and NATO-aspirant countries’ path toward membership was not always irreversible.” Russia has successfully blocked states like Georgia from joining, first in 2008 and again after the war in Ukraine began in 2014. Russia recognizes the value add of Ukraine to NATO is enormous and that Kyiv has a better case than some other nations. Putin’s invasion was, in part, intended to foreclose that option. By 2021, Moscow was pushing hard to maximize its war objectives, which included further annexations of Ukrainian territory. A main goal for Putin was, and is, to ensure there is no Ukraine left to join NATO. As President-elect Trump prepares to assume office in January, he is faced with the historical challenges presented by the war. Post-conflict security guarantees were the center of several proposals made during the 2023 military stalemate. The incoming Trump Administration has yet to outline how it intends to handle the Russia-Ukraine war. Analysts in Washington believe that the new Administration will expect its European allies to guarantee the majority of Ukraine’s security needs. As we approach 2025, several European nations have acknowledged that they do not view Ukraine as eligible for NATO membership as it would draw the organization into the middle of the conflict. Others want to wait until the war is over or pending a “peace” settlement before considering Ukrainian membership. Socor reports that some “influential voices” are suggesting that “Kyiv should join NATO after “freezing” the war along a stable armistice line, de facto accepting Ukraine’s partition, with NATO security guarantees applying de jure to the government-controlled territory only.” This would mean starting accession talks soon with the actual talks to commence only after a ceasefire is in place. Trump arrives in Washington at a time when Putin’s hybrid strategies of war in Ukraine have eviscerated commonly-held differences between war and peace. “Absent a political consensus in NATO over Ukrainian membership, certain European allies, including France’s President Emmanuel Macron, are holding informal consultations about post-conflict security guarantees to Kyiv by NATO members outside of NATO’s framework,” according to the Jamestown Foundation. The Biden Administration downplayed the discussions on possible forms of military assistance and defense industry cooperation by sending only an Assistant Secretary of State. For a European peace to hold the Trump Administration would need to formally extend the United States’ nuclear deterrence to Ukraine. Options under discussion in Europe include a “coalition of the resolute” to deploy forces to Ukraine as part of a possible armistice package, deterring further Russian attacks, says Secor. European officials are also debating, without any agreement, whether its military forces could perform non-combat logistical roles to free Ukrainian forces to fight. None of the possible courses of action has moved forward as all eyes are waiting on the incoming Trump Administration for clues about its intended level of support for a NATO framework and other non-NATO proposals. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.