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February 22, 2009
U.S. and China Resume Military Dialogue
By Richard HalloranHONG KONG-The commander of US forces in Asia, Admiral Timothy Keating, speaking on this doorstep to China, said this week he had reason to believe that Beijing was ready to revive discussions of military exchanges with the United States.
Pressed by news correspondents gathered at the American consulate to explain why he thought so, Keating was reluctant to provide details but noted "we are not living in a void." He said there had been "indirect but unmistakable forms of communication" through third parties, including visitors to his headquarters in Hawaii, that the Chinese were open to negotiation.
Backed symbolically by the 97,000 ton US aircraft carrier John Stennis anchored for a port visit in Hong Kong's harbor, Keating also met informally with senior officers of China's People's Liberation Army in garrison here. Hong Kong, after a century of British colonial rule, was turned over to China in 1997 and became nominally an autonomous region within the People's Republic of China.
Further, the admiral disclosed that an initiative was underway to forge an agreement intended to prevent hostile incidents between the US and PRC warships at sea. The US and the Soviet Union had an agreement during the Cold War that each navy would not train its guns on the other's warships or to fly fighters over each other's ships. Keating said the new effort was in its earliest stages.
Sino-US military exchanges, which had been expanding in fits and starts for more than a decade, were abruptly broken off by the Chinese in October after the US announced that it would sell $6.5 billion worth of arms to Taiwan, the self-governing island over which Beijing claims sovereignty. The US is obliged, under the Taiwan Relations Act, to provide Taiwan with weapons to defend itself.
The impasse appeared to have been broken when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said on the eve of her current trip to Japan, Indonesia, South Korea, and China that the US and China "will resume mid-level military-to-military discussions later this month." She was scheduled to be in Beijing today.
Clinton's disclosure caused mild surprise in the Pentagon and at the Pacific Command in Hawaii where defense officials wondered why such an announcement had not come from Secretary of Defense Robert Gates or from Admiral Keating, who is responsible for military exchanges with the Chinese. One official shrugged it off as a "rookie mistake" from an administration still getting its feet on the ground.
In any event, the admiral argued vigorously for a resumption of military dialogue with China, asserting that it would be "very much in our mutual benefit" and would lessen the chances of a confrontation degenerating into a crisis or even into armed conflict.
Keating, on a journey through Thailand, Hong Kong, Japan, and South Korea, recalled that a Chinese officer had once suggested that the US and China divide the Pacific Ocean, with China responsible for keeping the peace west of Hawaii while the US was confined to the waters east of Hawaii. "I said," Keating reported, "no thanks."
Instead, the admiral asserted, the US and China "should work more together." He noted that three Chinese warships had been patrolling in the Gulf of Aden against pirates who preyed in Chinese merchant vessels. He said Chinese ship captains often communicated with the commander of a US naval task force in that region.
On the other hand, Keating said, the US and China had a "hot line" for communication and he had used it when the US was delivering relief supplies to China after a devastating earthquake. But, he said, "I don't have a phone number yet" so that he could call a Chinese officer directly.
Responding to fresh reports that China sought to build four aircraft carriers, two with conventional power and two with nuclear power, over the next quarter century, Keating was skeptical. "It's not as easy as it looks," said the naval aviator with 5000 hours of flight time and 1200 landings aboard aircraft carriers. "Operating an aircraft carrier is a very demanding discipline."
"It will take them a long time," he contended, "and it will be harder than they think."
