RAND Study: War with China, Thinking Through the Unthinkable

[Builder]

http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1140.html

Research Questions:

1. What are the alternative paths that China and the United States might take before and during a war?
2. What are the effects on both countries of each path?
3. What preparations should the United States make, both to reduce the likelihood of war and, should war break out, to ensure victory while minimizing losses and costs?

[Baby Steps]

The South China Sea is a powder keg with disturbing echoes of 1914


John Hulsman (Contributor)
Dr John C Hulsman is senior columnist at City AM, a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and president of John C. Hulsman Enterprises. He can be reached for corporate speaking and private briefings at chartwellspeakers.com

With all the Brexit drama, it is easy to forget that on the other side of the world a contest for primacy is brewing that will probably do more to tell the tale of what our multipolar world evolves into than anything presently happening in Europe. If the US and China manage their emerging geostrategic rivalry in Asia, all will be broadly well. If they do not, an updated version of World War I is entirely plausible.
I pick my historical analogy advisedly because, in a number of disconcerting ways, the rivalry playing out in the South China and East China Seas resembles nothing so much as 1913 Europe, sitting precariously on the edge of a powder keg. There are almost no significant multilateral security organisations in the region to cushion normal geostrategic blows, making Asia resemble pre-World War I Europe, rather than the continent’s post-World War II vintage.
Asia today, like Europe then, is bristling with nationalistic states with armies and navies, determined to throw their weight around. In Prime Ministers Abe of Japan and Modi of India, and in Chinese President Xi Jinping, the leaders of the three major regional powers are all strong nationalists, unchallenged masters of their domestic political realms, who would be unable to easily back down if a crisis occurs.
This lack of multilateral shock absorbers is mainly down to the fact that the Japanese elites have never managed to face up to their World War II atrocities (their proclivity to pray at the Yasukuni shrine, which commemorates a number of war criminals, could be laughed off as bizarre if it didn’t terrify both the South Koreans and the Chinese; imagine how the French would feel if the Germans prayed at the Goebbels shrine). South Korea, in particular, which on geopolitical merits alone ought to be Japan’s best regional ally (both working together balancing against a resurgent China) has unnecessarily fraught relations with Tokyo, stemming from Japan’s historical amnesia.
So instead the still-dominant Americans are forced to shuttle bilaterally between their various Asian allies, scuttling about like a headless chicken trying to keep the geostrategic show on the road. For there is an utterly unresolvable strategic tension lying at the heart of the increasing controversies in the waters surrounding China: the US is the dominant power in East Asia, and China wishes to be the dominant power in East Asia. Nothing can wish this basic strategic reality away.
And the doleful 1914 analogy works at another analytical level. The US resembles 1913 Britain, still the dominant power in the world, even if it is in relative decline as others gain on it. China approximates the Kaiser’s bumptious Germany, determined to secure its place in the sun, and is the global rising power most making the rest of the world nervous. Japan is Third Republic France, in decline and painfully aware of it, even as its hated rival – for the French Germany and for the Japanese the Chinese – gains in power almost by the day. India is even an alright stand-in for Tsarist Russia, powerful, slightly geographically removed from the situation, yet capable of playing a pivotal role. The aptness of the analogy leaves little room for strategic comfort.
Like pre-1914 Wilhelmine Germany, China is on the strategic march, especially throwing its weight around the South China Sea, where more than $5 trillion in trade passes through its waters each year. Beijing ridiculously claims the lion’s share of the waterway for itself, through the use of the nine-dash line that it says validates these excessive claims. The problem is that Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Taiwan also have competing claims, and they increasingly chafe at China’s high-handed treatment there, where Beijing is constructing military bases. At last bearing it no longer, the Philippines took Beijing to the international court, with The Hague set to rule on the conflicting welter of claims in the next few days.
Almost certainly The Hague will rule in the Philippines’ favour, and equally certainly China, to the horror of its neighbours, will simply ignore the court’s decision. Then the mask will have well and truly slipped, revealing China’s naked power grab in this most dangerous region in the world.
In the wise words of my grandmother, British foreign policy-makers must learn to walk and chew gum at the same time, focusing on the terms of their divorce with Europe, even as they keep their eyes squarely on Asia, where most of the world’s growth and much of its geostrategic risk resides.

City A.M.'s opinion pages are a place for thought-provoking views and debate. These views are not necessarily shared by City A.M.


http://www.cityam.com/245098/south-c...ng-echoes-1914

¤=[Post Update]=¤

The following is very slanted towards China....

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2016.../scse-j20.html


US admiral holds “frank” talks in Beijing over South China Sea
By Peter Symonds
20 July 2016

The confrontation between the US and China in the South China Sea has intensified after last week’s ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague against Beijing’s longstanding maritime claims in the strategic waters.
Admiral John Richardson, chief of US naval operations, met with his Chinese counterpart Admiral Wu Shengli in Beijing on Monday and told the media that talks were “frank and honest.” While discussing cooperation and collaboration, he stressed that “on the other hand we didn’t dodge any of the more contentious issues regarding dispositions in the South China Sea” and the court ruling.
In comments to the Financial Times, Richardson reiterated: “We would expect that [China and the Philippines] would abide by the ruling... the ruling gives all claimants to the South China Sea disputes a lot of reasons to stop and think.”
The appearance of even-handedness and support for the rule of international law is completely at odds with US actions. The US supported and assisted the Philippines in presenting its case to the arbitration court, yet Washington has not ratified the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Since last October, US warships have deliberately intruded on three separate occasions within the 12-nautical-mile limit around Chinese islets in the South China Sea.
In the wake of the ruling in The Hague, Washington is mustering support throughout the region as it prepares to step up its military provocations in the South China Sea. Currently, US Vice President Joseph Biden is in Australiapushing for its military involvement in so-called “freedom of navigation” operations to challenge Chinese claims.
After talks with Richardson, China’s state-run Xinhua news agency reported Admiral Wu as saying: “We will never stop our construction on the Nansha [Spratly] Islands halfway. The Nansha Islands are China’s inherent territory, and our necessary construction on the islands is reasonable, justified and lawful.”
Another senior Chinese admiral, Sun Jianguo, warned against further US “freedom of navigation” operations at a separate closed-door meeting. As reported by Reuters, Sun declared that China was the biggest beneficiary of freedom of navigation. “But China consistently opposes so-called military freedom of navigation which brings with it a military threat and which challenges and disrespects the international law of the sea. This kind of military navigation... could even play out in a disastrous way.”
China’s ambassador to London, Liu Xiaoming, was scathing of the arbitration court ruling, saying: “There is a big question about US behaviour in all of this... I think the arbitration case is politically motivated. On the one hand they send their warships and airplanes to challenge China’s sovereignty and on the other they think this might be a good case ... to try to humiliate China diplomatically, to damage China’s image and also give them a legal basis with which to challenge China.”
While pointing to the cynicism and hypocrisy of US actions, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regime is playing directly into Washington’s hands by resorting to its own reckless military measures that only heighten the danger of conflict. The CCP, which represents the interests of a thin layer of super-rich oligarchs, is organically incapable of making any appeal to the working class, in China or internationally—the only social force able to halt the intensifying drive to war.
Xinhua reported that the Chinese air force has begun air patrols over the South China Sea. Air force spokesman Shen Jinke said a “combat air patrol” took place “recently” involving bombers, fighters, “scouts” and tankers, and that such operations would become “regular practice.” Pictures were released of H-6 strategic bombers flying near the disputed Scarborough Shoal.
The American and international press highlighted the air patrol, as well as a new round of Chinese naval exercises close to China’s Hainan Island, but deliberately downplayed the activities of the US military, which routinely sends warships and warplanes into sensitive areas. The aircraft carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan, along with its full strike force of cruisers and destroyers, is currently in the South China Sea. Last weekend it hosted a group of senior Cambodian officials and military officers as part of Washington’s broader campaign to strengthen military ties throughout the region.
For the past five years, the Obama administration has exploited the territorial disputes in the South China Sea to drive a wedge between China and rival claimants, particularly the Philippines and Vietnam. This confrontational tactic is part of the broader US “pivot to Asia” aimed at undermining Chinese influence and preparing for war.
Newly-installed Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has raised concerns in Washington by taking what appeared to be a more equivocal stance toward Beijing than his predecessor and offering bilateral talks over territorial disputes. Philippine foreign secretary Perfecto Yasay yesterday effectively ruled out negotiations with China, after an informal meeting with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi during last weekend’s summit of European and Asian leaders in Mongolia.
Yasay said he told Wang that China’s condition that negotiations should proceed “outside, or in disregard of” The Hague ruling was “not consistent with our constitution and our national interest.” He said the Chinese foreign minister had warned that the two countries “might be headed for a confrontation” if the Philippines insisted on discussions based on the ruling.
Over the past six months, the US has rapidly implemented its military basing agreement with the Philippines, known as the Enhanced Defence Cooperation Agreement (EDCA). The American military now has access to five “agreed locations,” including four airfields and the Philippine army’s largest training camp. Two of the air bases are directly adjacent to the South China Sea. Duterte has already declared that he will honour Philippine commitments under EDCA.
A meeting of Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) foreign ministers next week in Laos is likely to become the next diplomatic battleground in the South China Sea disputes. AFP reported last week that Laos and Cambodia, both of which are aligned with Beijing, had combined to block an ASEAN statement on the decision in The Hague.

[Fellow Aspirant]

This previously started thread is very relevant here, so I'm quoting it:

Thread title:

WW III? China Tells Citizens to Prepare for “A People’s War at Sea”

From "The Free Thought Project"

Here's an article that recently caught my attention. It's a disturbing update concerning what appear to be preparations by China to enforce - militarily if necessary, its claims to the South China Sea. These have been ongoing for some time now, but the latest moves are a response geared toward defying an international court ruling that went against China. Besides the military preparations, the government's propaganda is now aimed at its own populace, conditioning their minds for war. This could cascade into an apocalypse, a word I almost never use. We need to keep our eyes on this part of the world.

It's very well written, so I've posted the beginning verbatim. I'll provide a link, below, to the source and the rest of this very thought-provoking piece:


"In continued rejection of last month’s ruling by a Hague-based tribunal invalidating China’s territorial claims to a vast swath of the South China Sea, on Tuesday, the Chinese defense minister urged for “substantial preparation for a people’s war at sea.”

Chinese Defense Minister Chang Wanquan also warned of “offshore security threats” and the need to acknowledge the gravity of risk to China’s national security; and advised the military, police, and populace to ready for mobilization to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity, according to state news agency, Xinhua.

None of this bellicose rhetoric and escalation is occurring in a vacuum, of course, and while Americans seem content to analyze whether Donald Trump has experienced a psychological break or bemoan the fact Hillary Clinton hasn’t landed in federal custody, the United States meanwhile barrels toward war with China and its ally, Russia.

China’s assertions of provocation by the U.S. — backed by the deployment of an armada of ships to the South China Sea, as well as nuclear bombers to the Pacific — its rejection of the tribunal’s ruling, and promises to aggressively defend its interests at sea all point toward impending military conflict.

Claiming it wishes to ensure freedom of navigation in the geostrategically important region, the U.S. has conducted a number of military drills in the hotly-contested waters — but its premise of defense against Chinese aggression halfway around the world hardly masks what would be rightly called outright instigation.

“China doesn’t want wars, a war with the U.S. in particular,” the Global China Times wrote in an op-ed response to a Rand Corporation report showing China would suffer heavy losses should the two nations engage in military conflict. “The only possible scenario for a Sino-US war is that the U.S. corners China on its doorstep with unacceptable provocations and China has to fight back.”

It added darkly, “We will be very prudent about going to war, but if a war is triggered, we will have greater determination than the U.S. to fight it to the end and we can endure more losses than the U.S.”

On Tuesday, China’s top court ruled there exists a “clear legal basis for China to safeguard maritime order, marine safety and interests, and to exercise integrated management over the country’s jurisdictional seas.”

Though observers weren’t in complete agreement on precisely what the court intended by ‘jurisdictional seas,’ most felt the country is attempting to establish the basis for a ‘defensive’ military response against ‘trespassers’ in the disputed waters.

“It appears that China is establishing the legal basis to enforce violations of Chinese domestic law in the South China Sea,” Bonnie Glaser, director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, explained to Business Insider."

Read more at http://thefreethoughtproject.com/chi...6Wk1AulJkAS.99


Brian

[Atlas]

Armed Clash in the South China Sea
Contingency Planning Memorandum No. 14

Author: Bonnie S. Glaser, Senior Advisor for Asia, Center for Strategic and International Studies
Publisher: Council on Foreign Relations Press
Release Date: April 2012