Clinton’s Dangerous China Policy Is Bad for U.S. Trade and Security Interests
(Washington, D.C.): This weekend,
President Clinton is headed to Manila to
participate in the Asia Pacific Economic
Cooperation (APEC) Summit. High on his
agenda will be a meeting on Sunday with
the totalitarian communist ruler of
China, Jiang Xemin. Such a meeting would
be the perfect opportunity for
Mr. Clinton to take the Chinese leader to
task for his country’s continuing,
dangerous proliferation activities.
Unfortunately, if the Administration’s
past track record — including Secretary
of State Warren Christopher’s just
completed trip to Beijing — is any
indication, Mr. Clinton will continue
to ignore Chinese behavior that is
extremely inimical to American security
interests in the Pacific rim, South
Asia and the Middle East. To add insult
to injury, the President may try
to mislead the American people into
believing that such behavior, notably
China’s proliferation of weapons of mass
destruction and their delivery systems,
has actually been terminated, thanks to
his Administration’s diplomatic efforts.
Like Lucy and the Football
Such a deceptive picture was painted
most recently by Secretary Christopher
after his meetings with Chinese Foreign
Minister Qian Qichen, Prime Minister Li
Peng (the man widely credited with
ordering the Tiananmen Square massacre)
and President Jiang. Mr. Christopher
claimed that the two nations had achieved
“specific understandings” on
efforts to halt the spread of weapons of
mass destruction and the means to deliver
them. Mr. Christopher also noted that
Beijing had “reaffirmed its
commitment” to abide by the Missile
Technology Control Regime (MCTR) and
agreed “to formulate and adopt
comprehensive nationwide regulations on
nuclear export control.” He even
went so far as to declare that “our
discussion generally on nonproliferation
has advanced our cooperation in this area
of vital interest.”
These assurances are but the latest in
a series of such remarks by U.S.
policy-makers concerning Chinese
non-proliferation policy. They
ring absurdly hollow, however, in light
of the fact that Beijing continues to
sell weapons of mass destruction and
their delivery systems to rogue nations
around the world.
In fact, the assurances offered by
Secretary Christopher and other Clinton
Administration officials are reminiscent
of nothing so much as the running gag in
the cartoon strip Peanuts, in
which Lucy induces the hapless Charlie
Brown to place-kick a football again and
again — despite the fact that she always
pulls the football away and he always
winds up prostrate and mortified.
A case in point, ironically, occurred
on the very day that Secretary
Christopher indulged in his latest bout
of boosterism concerning Chinese
non-proliferation policy. On 21 November
1996, the Washington Times
published a leaked CIA report disclosing
that: “China recently sold Iran
advanced missile technology and
components for an advanced radar
system….Beijing also shipped nearly 400
metric tons of chemicals used in
producing nerve agents and riot-control
agents to an Iranian chemical
center.”
Regrettably, this disclosure had no
more sobering effect on the Clinton
Administration than Charlie Brown’s
unhappy experiences have had on him. As
Mr. Christopher’s press spokesman, Glyn
Davies, put it in response: “We
believe at this stage that, in fact, the
Chinese are operating within the
assurances that they have given
us…We’ve not seen any reason to
question their behavior.”
Compounding the Damage
The Clinton Administration willingness
to persist in “improving
relations” with China even though
Beijing has repeatedly violated its past
promises concerning non-proliferation
issues is no laughing matter — except,
perhaps for the contemptuous Chinese. In
particular, since this sort of foppish
kow-towing reflects poorly not only on
Messrs. Clinton and Christopher but on
the power and prestige of the United
States, China’s contempt can produce
extremely serious strategic
repercussions.
Worse yet is the fact the Clinton
Administration has decided not only to
excuse Chinese malevolence but to reward
it. During his meetings this week, Mr.
Christopher pledged to allow American
firms to sell limited amounts of
nuclear technology to China for
“peaceful purposes.”
Once again, the Administration
appears to be placing the opportunity to
enrich a few American companies anxious
to sell China advanced nuclear reactors
ahead of the national interest
in restricting the flow of technology
that may, in the hands of the Chinese and
their friends, prove relevant to
dangerous weapons programs. What
is more, it is far from clear, given
China’s burgeoning exports to the United
States, whether even the sale of
expensive U.S. nuclear technology to
Beijing will make a significant dent in
the worsening U.S.-Chinese balance of
trade.
Floyd Spence Steps Into the
Breach
Importantly, Rep. Floyd Spence
(R-SC), the Chairman of the House
National Security Committee, yesterday
released four studies that suggest that this
dubious initiative is hardly an isolated
event. And these studies provide
a sense of the impact of this larger
pattern arising from the Clinton
Administration’s relaxation (or effective
evisceration) of export controls on
sensitive, dual-use technologies. They
note that China has demonstrated an
enormous appetite for such technologies,
both to enhance its own military strength
and to profit by passing them along to
rogue nations like Iran and Syria.
Chairman Spence summarized the studies
by the General Accounting Office and the
Congressional Research Service with the
following, chilling comments:
“When you add it all
up, it is clear that China’s military
is exploiting the existing
international technology transfer
rules — even breaking specific
agreements and U.S. laws — to
modernize as fast as it can.
Given China’s increasingly aggressive
posture, I am very concerned that we’re
selling our edge in military
technology to a nation that may well
be our adversary someday.”“China already has the
largest military in the world, and
now has embarked on a sustained and
ambitious modernization
effort….Furthermore, the Chinese
have a dismal track record in
discouraging proliferation, including
nuclear weapons technology and cruise
and ballistic missiles. Past history
indicates that Chinese weaponry will
find its way to Iran and other
unstable regimes around the
world.”
The Bottom Line
Apologists for the Clinton
Administration’s policy of largely
ignoring Chinese proliferation activities
while vigorously encouraging dual-use and
other exports to China argue that
American access to the vast Chinese
market is more important getting hung up
over Chinese proliferation activities.
What cannot be ignored, however, is that if
the Clinton Administration continues both
to ignore Chinese proliferation and to
encourage dual-use exports to China —
technologies that will undoubtedly end up
in the hands of Iran, Syria or North
Korea — the Clinton Administration risks
not only effectively legitimating but
facilitating Beijing’s indiscriminate
proliferation activities.
The Center for Security Policy
commends Chairman Spence and his
colleagues on the National Security
Committee (notably, Republican
Representatives Tillie Fowler of
Florida and Curt Weldon
of Pennsylvania) for their action thus
far in illuminating the serious problems
with the Clinton Administration’s China
policy.(2)
In light of the strategic implications of
that flawed policy, the steps taken to
date must be regarded as just a
beginning.
The new Clinton Cabinet — as well as
the Congress that will consider its
nominees and oversee their actions in
office — must give urgent attention to
the first Clinton Administration’s
actions with respect to China, and set in
train corrective actions required by both
national security and American
trade interests.
– 30 –
1. For more on
China’s track record on proliferation and
the Clinton Administration’s wholly
inadequate responses to such activity,
see the Center’s past Decision
Briefs entitled Clinton’s
Flim-Flam on Chinese Proliferation: Even
the Washington Post Can’t Conceal Its
Contempt (
May 1996), ‘There You Go
Again’: More Chinese Proliferation, More
Clinton Politicization of Intelligence
(No. 96-D 56,
12 June 1996), and The Shape
of Terror to Come (
July 1996).
2. Not least of
these are indications of self-dealing —
or at least serious conflicts of interest
— some senior Clinton Administration
officials appear to have with respect to
the export of militarily relevant
technology to China. See the Center’s
paper entitled An Alternative
To Clinton’s Failed China Policy:
‘Strategic Containment and Tactical Trade
Ambiguity’ (
March 1996).
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