PRC Scholar Explains Logic Behind China's Development of Anti-Missile Technology

PRC Scholar Explains Logic Behind China's Development of Anti-Missile Technology
CPP20100119038003 Shanghai Dongfang Zaobao Online in Chinese 15 Jan 10

[Article by Shen Dingli, executive deputy dean of the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University: "Understanding the Logic of China's Anti-Missile Test"]

In the field of national security, China has been consistent in its adherence to a realistic path: When the country faces a security threat with regard to weapons technology, we will first call on the international community to ban such weapons technology, otherwise China has no choice but to keep up with it. This is how it is with regard to nuclear weapons, and it is also this way with regard to missile defense technology.

On the 11th, the Chinese government announced that on that day China had successfully conducted a test of ground-based, midcourse missile intercept technology. Over a decade ago, we vigorously opposed the development by the United States of theater missile defense (TMD) and national missile defense (NMD) technology, but we were not successful. Accordingly, we have also developed our own missile defense technology. In a certain sense, at that time we had no need to oppose it, because after all this was defensive technology. If the United States faces a missile threat, naturally it would want to develop missile-defense technology. The threat that the United States perceives might include China's missile offensive/counterattack capabilities. China has no intention of posing an active threat to the United States, and our development of limited offensive missile capabilities is entirely for self-defense. However, China's limited self-defense capabilities may still be perceived by the United States as posing a threat to its restraint of China.

Naturally, this view of security on the part of the United States will necessarily be seen by China as a threat, and furthermore China believes that it has the right to not be threatened. Therefore, when the United States came to possess nuclear weapons and, in the 1950s, used them to threaten China, China was then forced to develop its own nuclear weapons (this is also the logic behind North Korea's development of nuclear weapons). And when the United States continues to possess nuclear weapons and, at present, continues to threaten China (including the mainland and Taiwan) by selling weapons to Taiwan, China's central government has also decided to continue to possess nuclear weapons (and this is also the reason why North Korea is unwilling to give up its nuclear programs).

Whether or not the United States possesses nuclear weapons is still its sovereign right. However, if the United States actively interferes abroad, it will harm the sovereignty of other countries, and at such times the missile defense capabilities of the United States will help the United States in daring to interfere while not being too worried about being subject to retaliation. When missile defense which originally seemed reasonable is integrated with an aggressive foreign strategy, people's understanding of the complexity of missile defense will deepen -- missile defense can not only increase the chances of countries which possess it to resist missile invasions and improve national security, it can also be integrated with an offensive foreign strategy and prompt those who have missile defense systems to dare to take risks and adopt foreign policies that are highly aggressive.

Accordingly, opposing missile defense will not be successful. Missile defense certainly may enhance the ability of countries which possess such technology to resist aggression, but this need is shared by mankind and every country. Opposing it is not as good as constructing it oneself, and this is because those who oppose it are themselves facing missile threats, and although one can, through cooperative security or collective security, mold a more secure international environment, it is actually difficult to ensure that an invader will never appear in the international system in the future, and one cannot ensure that a missile threat directed at one's own side will never appear. Furthermore, faced with a threat, a sovereign state must have sufficiently credible deterrence capabilities to thwart aggression, and also immediately adopt advanced missile defense technology to disrupt a missile invasion after it is launched.

China is fully aware that it has no way to keep other countries from developing advanced missile defense systems, and therefore it has decided to develop its own ground-based, midcourse missile intercept technology, and it is only for that reason that we have the current successful anti-missile test by China. Obviously, China has achieved a small measure of success in developing anti-missile [technology], but still, faced with the United States, which possesses marked offensive and defensive missile superiority, it is hard to say we are secure. However, in the field of national security, China has been consistent in its adherence to a realistic path: When the country faces a security threat with regard to weapons technology, we will first call on the international community to ban such weapons technology, otherwise China has no choice but to keep up with it. This is how it is with regard to nuclear weapons, and it is also this way with regard to missile defense technology.

Even with regard to the problem of anti-satellite [technology], it is still this principle that we have adhered to. The United States was the first country to carry out an anti-satellite warfare test, and the debris in space produced by the test has directly jeopardized the security of the orbiting space vehicles of other countries, and the anti-satellite capabilities thus acquired by the United States have posed a serious threat to the communications, sensing, and command security of other countries, and were bound to encounter intense opposition from China and Russia. However, out of its absolute-security considerations, the United States has no scruples over this, and this then forces China to conduct a Chinese version of the anti-satellite capabilities project, and through a security balance in space among the related countries, ensure that there is an effective balance of nuclear deterrence on the ground among various countries.

Three years ago, it was also on 11 January when China first successfully conducted a "satellite experiment." However, China really did not want to announce that "experiment," but confirmed it because of the international public opinion environment. Three years later China has conducted an anti-missile test, which it actually reported ahead of other countries, so the increased military transparency is self-evident. Over these three years, there has been a marked change in China's attitude toward publicizing major national defense construction achievements, which is gratifying and auspicious.

Whether or not this announcement was related to the arms sales to Taiwan by the United States, every citizen will acknowledge that China must establish a military system with full offensive and defensive capabilities. So long as we face security threats, we will need to establish our own national defense, including missile defense that undergoes gradual improvement. Where socialist China differs from other countries is only in that we will exercise restraint in the development of offensive capabilities, and furthermore will not be the first to resort to force, but we should not just criticize the development of defense by other countries while not developing such ourselves.

[Description of Source: Shanghai Dongfang Zaobao (Oriental Morning Post) Online in Chinese Website of daily newspaper established by the party-connected Wenhui-Xinmin United Press Group in 2003; URL: http://www.dfdaily.com]