China's Military Faces the Future (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: China's Military Faces the Future Richard Desjardins (bio) James R. Lilley and David Shambaugh , editors. China's Military Faces the Future. Washington, D.C.: AEI; New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1999. xi, 356 pp. Hardcover $74.95, ISBN 0-7656-0505-8. Paperback $29.95, ISBN 0-7656-0506-6. China as an emerging power has been the object of much concern in the United States in recent years. This is particularly visible on Capitol Hill where members of Congress have been investigating various allegations of Chinese espionage at U.S. nuclear facilities and involvement in the political process itself through secret donations.1 The climax to this hysteria came with the arrest of a Taiwanese American, Wen Ho Lee, who worked as a nuclear scientist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, on charges of illegally downloading secret nuclear information onto a personal computer. Whether any of these allegations can be substantiated will probably never be known. The so-called damaging conclusions of the Cox Report on alleged Chinese espionage at nuclear facilities have been challenged by a number of China and scientific experts.2 [End Page 170] These developments suggest that much remains to be done to raise the level of public debate in the United States on China in general and on the state of its military in particular. The book under review here should help to clarify some of the issues and provide a sounder basis for assessing the capabilities of the Chinese military in the near future. It is doubtful, however, that the efforts of the contributors to this book will put an end to the ongoing debate. The evidence they present will certainly be used by both sides to prop up their respective positions. The book contains eleven chapters dealing with such issues as the Chinese high command, doctrine and strategy, types of weapons, defense spending, logistics, science and technology, and China's present security environment. Most of the contributions are self-contained and thorough in the presentation of their respective topics. Both Lilley and Shambaugh have been longtime observers of the Chinese leadership and military. The same can be said for most of the contributors within their respective areas of expertise. For the purpose of this review, I will focus on four topics: military leadership, doctrine and strategy, logistics, and science and technology. Military Leadership From David Shambaugh we learn that the top ranks of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) have been entirely renewed in the period since 1995. As a result, the new officers generally lack experience in dealing with major foreign crises; while they did gain some experience fighting border conflicts (i.e., border skirmishes with the Soviet Union in 1969 and with Vietnam in 1979), these are not recent events and were largely regional. Furthermore, the new officers have had little contact with the foreign community, and this likely has given them an insular view of the world. However, they tend to be more professionally trained. Shambaugh notes that the top military leaders have few if any political credentials and that conversely the political leaders have no military background. This may have important ramifications for Army-Party relations in the future. From the standpoint of the political system, this trend could contribute to a liberalization of politics in China and a tendency to seek political solutions to political problems.3 One important question that remains unanswered is how the members of this new military elite will interact with one another and with the foreign powers. By providing individual profiles of the top military leaders, Shambaugh opens a window on these men (there are no women), who will likely advise the political leadership in any confrontation with the United States. These profiles will also assist in further investigations into the implications that any new developments will have on the strength and intentions of the Chinese military. Doctrine and Strategy The Gulf War of 1991 is regularly referred to by Western commentators as a wake-up call to the Chinese military on the deficiencies of China's armed forces. The [End Page 171] essays in this book are no exception, but they tend to go further and elaborate on...