Pentagon: China's secrecy poses problem
WASHINGTON (AP) - March 3, 2008 The report, the latest in a series of annual assessments of
China's military power, highlights developments in China's
commercial space program and asserts that some can be of military
use. And it says Chinese leaders have been silent on the question
of a military motivation for their space programs.
The Chinese military, known as the People's Liberation Army, is
acquiring technologies to improve China's ability to operate in
space and is "developing the ability to attack an adversary's
space assets," the report said.
"PLA writings emphasize the necessity of `destroying, damaging,
and interfering with the enemy's reconnaissance/observation and
communications satellites,' suggesting that such systems, as well
as navigation and early warning satellites, could be among initial
targets of attack to `blind and deafen the enemy," the report
said.
The Bush administration was highly critical of China's shootdown
in January 2007 of one of its weather satellites, asserting that
the orbiting debris created by the attack poses a danger to other
assets in space.
Last month, when the Pentagon shot down a dead U.S. spy
satellite, China expressed concern, although U.S. officials said
the shootdown did not mean the United States had dropped its
objections to possessing a permanent anti-satellite capability.
More broadly, the Pentagon report asserted that Beijing's
reluctance to share details about its military buildup poses a risk
to stability in Asia.
The report said the international community has limited
knowledge of the motivations, decision-making and capabilities of
China's military modernization. This includes a lack of clarity
about China's defense spending, which Washington contends China
understates by the equivalent of tens of billions of dollars.
"The lack of transparency in China's military and security
affairs poses risks to stability by increasing the potential for
misunderstanding and miscalculation," the report said. "This
situation will naturally and understandably lead to hedging against
the unknown."
The military buildup in China has increased in recent years, the
Pentagon said.
"China's expanding and improving military capabilities are
changing East Asian military balances; improvements in China's
strategic capabilities have implications beyond the Asia-Pacific
region," the report said.
The main short-term focus of China's military buildup is the
Taiwan Strait, the report said.
As of November 2007, the Chinese military had deployed between
990 and 1,070 short-range ballistic missiles to garrisons opposite
Taiwan, according to the Pentagon's latest estimate. That compares
with 900 such missiles reported in last year's Pentagon report.
Every spring, the Pentagon is required by Congress to provide a
comprehensive assessment of China's security and military strategy,
an analysis of developments in its military doctrine and
capabilities, and an update on the security situation in the Taiwan
Strait.
The reports have largely mirrored a consensus Bush
administration view that China is rapidly modernizing its military,
underreporting the extent of its defense investment and remaining
deliberately oblique about its long-term intentions.
A prominent theme recently has been an assertion that the
People's Liberation Army is transforming from an army designed for
protracted wars of attrition on its territory to one capable of
fighting short-duration, high-intensity conflicts against high-tech
adversaries.
U.S.-China military relations have been strained in recent years
over numerous issues, not limited to American concerns about the
scope of Beijing's military buildup. But there also have been some
positive moves, including a pair of agreements signed last week in
Shanghai - one on installing a telephone hotline between the
Chinese Ministry of Defense and the U.S. Defense Department, and
the other on research in Chinese military archives related to U.S.
MIAs from the Korean War.
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EDs: The entire report can be viewed at:
http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/pdfs/China-Military-Report-08.pdf
