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China Gaining in Military Might
The Chinese Foreign Ministry reacted angrily yesterday to a report published by the U.S. Defense Department on the growing military power of China. Beijing's harsh reaction is in part due to the obstacle the report presents to China's renewal of relations with NATO and its efforts to end a European weapons embargo against it. China also suspects that the report will be used as justification for the placement of an antiballistic system along its eastern shore, including in Taiwan. Beijing sees Moscow as a natural ally in its efforts to counteract the United States.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Jiang Yu said that "The U.S. Defense Department's report exaggerates China's military expenditures out of ulterior motives and continues to disseminate the China threat' theory.” That 50-page document was presented by Pentagon chief Robert Gates on Friday. It is the seventh annual report prepared by the U.S. Defense Department. It criticizes China mainly for the growth of defense spending there. A 17.8-percent increase in military spending was approved this year in China and Beijing is officially spending $46 billion on it army this year. The real sum of expenditures on the army may by two or three times greater than the official budget.
Last year's report emphasized Chinese imports of Russian weapons. This year, new developments in the Chinese military-industrial complex are mentioned. China tested an anti-satellite missile in January and has developed mobile nuclear missiles and a new class of Jin submarine with nuclear missiles that are capable of threatening targets in the U.S.
The timing of the report is particularly bad for China since it and NATO renewed a dialog last week, for the first time since 1999, when the Chinese embassy in Belgrade was bombed. NATO took the initiative in restoring those relations, and its offer was quickly accepted. China acknowledges that relations with NATO are a necessary step in overcoming a European embargo on arms sales to the country imposed after the events on Tiananmen Square in 1989. Russia has sold China mainly weapons based on Soviet models, and not the most modern technology. Therefore, removal of the European embargo is a primary goal for China.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of May 29, 2007
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