How bad is that? Not as bad as it may seem on paper. David Shambaugh, a China expert at the University of London, wrote recently that “there is more hype than reality in assessments of Chinese military modernization.” The PLA is dangerous because it has nuclear weapons and because the generals seem to have slipped the bonds of civilian control. But China’s armed forces still are not capable of invading Taiwan, and they are making little progress–none at all, some experts think–in closing a huge technology gap that keeps them backward. “They’re getting better, no doubt about it,” says a Pentagon analyst. “But they’ve got a long way to go.”
China has plenty of troops for an invasion of Taiwan, but getting them there is beyond its means. “It’s a task in some ways greater than our D-Day invasion,” Defense Secretary William Perry said two weeks ago. With China’s armada sailing on sea routes as long as 200 miles–observed by satellites all the way–there would be no surprise. In the first phase of an assault, the Chinese would have to put ashore at least three reinforced divisions of troops– perhaps 60,000 men. Not even the U.S. Marines have that capability these days. And even if Beijing were willing to throw wave after wave of troops into a meat grinder on the beaches of Taiwan, no amount of manpower would make up for a lack of air and naval superiority.
Beijing is trying to change that. Two years ago Deng Xiaoping reportedly promised the PLA that its budget would have a double-digit annual growth rate for the rest of the 1990s. But China’s defense budget is still no more than $36 billion a year, according to Western estimates–more than $15 billion less than Japan’s. Inflation has eaten up a large portion of the increases. And although the PLA owns or manages more than 20,000 commercial enterprises, most Western experts think the profits are being plowed into new businesses, not into the military. As a result, the transformation of the PLA into a high-tech force is going very slowly, hampered by the vast size of what has to be transformed. The antiquated air force is a threat to no one, and although the navy is slowly adding a deepwater capability to its coastal-defense role, it’s still no match for the U.S. Seventh Fleet. “China’s military is 20 to 30 years behind the U.S.,” says Bates Gill, an American expert on Chinese military acquisition. “There’s no sign that they are making the leapfrogs or the breakthroughs in their own military R&D that would enable them to catch up.”
The struggle over the succession to Deng may give the generals their best chance to catch up. Like Germany before World War I and Japan before World War II, China today is an undemocratic country dominated by its military leaders and other hard-line nationalists. The top military power brokers include two veterans of the Long March, Gen. Zhang Zhen, 81, and Adm. Liu Huaqing, 79, who wants Beijing to establish its control over the South China Sea, with its mineral and marine resources. Business and corruption both flourish in the military, turning some commanders into new-model warlords. Commercial branches of the PLA’s General Staff and its General Logistics Department are so far-flung and profitable that they function as “small kingdoms,” says China analyst K. P. Ng of Hong Kong Chinese University. The Communist Party and the government’s civilian leaders have little control over the military. President Jiang Zemin, who tried to extend an olive branch to Taiwan last year, has had to adopt a harder line.
Short of invading, the generals could cause all sorts of trouble for Taiwan. They could harass its shipping or even impose a loose blockade. They could lob medium-range M-9 and M-11 missiles at Taiwanese military bases or cities. They could even try to capture inshore Taiwanese islands, such as Quemoy or Matsu. But each option would carry a steep price. Any naval action might lead to a fight with the Seventh Fleet. Missile attacks would look like simple terrorism, alienating most of the world. And a Pentagon official observes that “taking Quemoy to intimidate Taiwan would be like trying to cow the United States by invading the Virgin Islands. You’d make everyone mad at you for no conceivable gain.”
China’s recent military exercises have already stiffened opposition to Beijing. Last week the Clinton administration agreed to sell Taiwan Stinger antiaircraft missiles and advanced targeting and navigation systems for the 150 F-16 jet fighters previously sold to the island (with deliveries of the planes beginning next year). The sale was relatively modest; the Taiwanese were not allowed to buy other items on their shopping list, including U.S. submarines, which they had requested in order to offset Russia’s recent sale of four attack subs to China. But the upgraded F-16s could be a stabilizing factor in the region, giving the Taiwanese a new capability for air-to-ground strikes at Chinese targets, including attacking warships and missile bases.
Arming Taiwan is one thing; fighting for it is another. The United States has always been deliberately ambiguous about where the tripwire lies–in part because even Washington can’t tell in advance what it would take to make Americans go to war for Taiwan. At a seminar in Beijing last summer, a Chinese military analyst wondered out loud whether Washington would protect Taiwan under any circumstances. “They said, “You guys don’t have the political will these days’,” recalls one participant, the Pentagon’s top China watcher. “The United States would have to intervene to defend Taiwan,” this analyst told his Chinese counterparts. “You should understand, the issue in the final analysis has nothing to do with Taiwan. The issue is U.S. credibility around the world.” American officials say that if other Asian nations ever get the idea that the United States will not defend Taiwan, the result could be an all-out arms race in the region, with Japan and South Korea quickly going nuclear. Only by steadfastly walking a beat in the Western Pacific can the regional policeman hope to keep the peace.
