Current Sino‑U.S. Relations in Strategic Perspective

Abstract

After 1995-96 Taiwan Strait crisis pushed Sino-U.S. relations to their lowest point since Chinese Government's crackdown on demonstrators in and around Tiananmen square in 1989, U.S. President Bill Clinton's visit to in June 1998 carried unusually high hopes and expectations for an improvement in this key bilateral relationship. Many observers therefore exaggerated accomplishments of Clinton's trip, saying that it heralded a major positive geopolitical change. A deeper, longer-term analysis of relationship, however, yields conclusion that while Clinton visit produced more than typical summit meeting, U.S.-China relations have undergone no major shift, and fundamental political and strategic contradictions persist. First, we should establish some interpretive parameters: what constitutes a major change in a bilateral relationship? Simply put, such a relationship may fall into one of three categories: adversarial (the dominant consideration in relationship is possibility of military conflict), neutral (few diplomatic interactions, or a rough balance between co-operative and discordant interactions), or friendly (frequent and mainly co-operative interactions). In this writer's view, a shift in nature of a bilateral relationship from one of these categories to another qualifies as a major change. For example, change in America's relationship with Japan and (West) Germany from World War II to post-World War II (adversarial to friendly) was fundamental. Less profound, but still momentous, was shift in U.S.-Soviet/Russian relations from Cold War to post-Cold War (adversarial to neutral), although dust has not yet completely settled. The ASEAN-era relationship between Indonesia and Malaysia represents a fundamental shift from Konfrontasi period, and relationship of original ASEAN states with Vietnam has similarly undergone a major transformation. By this standard, relationship between and United States has undergone no major change. In terms set out above, relationship is probably best characterized as neutral, both before and after Clinton's visit to China.(1) Perhaps a good analogue is slight improvement in U.S.-Soviet relations (manifested in signing of Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1963) that followed 1962 Cuban missile crisis, although both level of tension and stakes involved then were higher than in case of current U.S.-China relations. Background of Summit The break-up of Soviet Union left United States as China's most worrisome potential adversary and, in Foreign Minister Qian Qichen's words, the major obstacle to our foreign relations(2) for short-term and perhaps medium-term (many Chinese strategists believe Japan will eventually succeed U.S. in this role). From PRC's (People's Republic of China's) point of view, not only does Washington remain committed to its goals of weakening, dividing and Westernizing China, but end of Cold War has left America sole superpower, enjoying even greater political freedom of manoeuvre without balancing and restraining effect of Soviet influence. The Chinese therefore perceive that United States has become pushier and more arrogant this decade, as illustrated by a host of unpleasant interactions, including U.S. State Department's annual condemnation of Chinese Government's human rights record, public opposition by U.S. Congress to Beijing's bid to host 2000 Olympic Games, U.S. Navy's fruitless search for chemical weapons precursors on Iran-bound Chinese ship Yinhe, tough conditions put forth by American negotiators for Chinese entry into World Trade Organization, and Chinese complaints that American scholars and journalists have attempted to drive a wedge between Beijing and its neighbours by emphasizing a China threat to Asian security. These developments have contributed to tension between two schools of thought among Chinese elites. …