Managing Chinese Threat

[svinayak]

China was unified until 1911-12. There's no '100+ year' effort here. The Qing may have been weak, but that's a testament to the fact that China does not have the political cohesion to survive as a single entity unless it has a strong center - you simply don't constitute a nation-state except by force. I think every Chinese is aware of that - despite the modern day claimed of the CPC of a united mainland, you're too chaotic to remain together unless there's a strong power in Beijing.

My Friend says that the Beijing bosses and nearby provinces enforce the order in PRC always from ancient times. Even to the far flung corners they are the ones who will go and sack the region to bring it in order to be subservient to Beijing.

[SSridhar]

Comment from NightWatch on the Chinese ADIZ over South China Sea

Comment: A careful review of Chinese statements last year about establishing these zones discloses an unambiguous intention to establish additional zones as necessary and when careful preparations are complete. China's dismissal of the Japanese reports is not a denial of intent, only of timing. It also is not an accurate statement of China's analysis of the threat from Southeast Asian air forces. It simply restates that China claims to perceive no threat at this time. In other words, the Foreign Ministry spokesman affirmed China's right to establish a zone, just not yet. It also ignores or deliberately insults the capabilities of Vietnam and other nations to provide air cover for their South China Sea claims. Effective air defense coverage of the South China Sea is a daunting technological, surveillance and military capabilities challenge for any nation. China has not declared an ADIZ over the South China Sea because it can't enforce it. It has even less capability to enforce and ADIZ there than it does over the East China Sea. Japan Air Self-Defense Forces and the South Korean air force ignore China's ADIZ at will. The East China Sea ADIZ resulted in a loss of face for China before several of the most capable air forces in the world.

[SSridhar]

Huawei Facing Probe for Hacking BSNL - ToI

Chinese telecom equipment maker Huawei allegedly hacked state-owned BSNL's network and the government is investigating the matter, Parliament was informed today.

"An incident about alleged hacking of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited network by Huawei, a Chinese telecom company, has come to notice."

"The government has constituted an interministerial team to investigate the matter," Minister of State for Communications and IT Killi Kruparani informed the Lok Sabha.

There were reports of a mobile tower being impacted a few months ago in coastal area of Andhra Pradesh that was attributed to hacking by the company's engineers.

The written reply of the minister did not share any detail of the incident.

BSNL had awarded a major part of its network expansion tender of about 10.15 million lines to another Chinese company ZTE in 2012.

Huawei was also top contender in this bid but the company declined to supply equipments at low price quoted by ZTE.

A Parliamentary committee in 2012 had recommended that the government test the telecom equipment for security, against the backdrop of Chinese companies becoming biggest suppliers of hardware and software to Indian firms.

The committee has suggested government to consider United States model of auditing telecom equipments that can have serious security implications.

In 2012, a committee of US lawmakers on intelligence warned of cyber espionage threats from telecom networks built by Chinese companies and suggested that American companies considering to do business with Huawei and ZTE should look for other vendors.

The charges were strongly denied by both the Chinese companies.

[SSridhar]

US Warns China Over Activity Near Senkakus - Japan Times

The United States has warned China to cease engaging in a rapidly increasing number of “risky” maritime activities aimed at claiming the Japan-controlled islets in the East China Sea, a senior U.S. diplomat said Wednesday.

The United States told China in recent high-level talks of its concerns over China’s behavior in various Asia-Pacific issues, including “an unprecedented spike in risky activity” near the Senkaku Islands, the diplomat said in a written testimony at a congressional panel.

Deputy U.S. Secretary of State William Burns conveyed the concerns to the Chinese side during his recent trip to Beijing, according to the testimony by Daniel Russel, assistant U.S. secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs.

The U.S. concerns also include China’s unilateral establishment of an air defense identification zone over the East China Sea, according to the testimony submitted to the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific under the House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee.

Burns’ counterparts in the meetings in Beijing included Vice President Li Yuanchao and State Councilor Yang Jiechi.

“The Senkakus are under the administration of Japan and unilateral attempts to change the status quo raise tensions and do nothing under international law to strengthen territorial claims,” Russel said in the written testimony.

Russel told a session that Burns raised the concerns in the talks with the Chinese about “a growing incremental pattern of efforts” by China to assert control over some areas in the South China Sea.

Meanwhile, Republican Rep. Matt Salmon said China’s approach seemed to be, “we’re going to see what we can get away with, and if the U.S. has the guts, the cojones, to challenge us.” Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly said from a distance it looks like China is “picking a fight with Vietnam, with the Philippines, with Japan, among others.”

Chinese maritime agencies have frequently sent ships into Japanese territorial waters near the group of uninhabited islets and have them sail close to Japan Coast Guard boats since 2012.

The U.S. government has refrained from taking sides in the sovereignty disputes but said the Senkakus are covered by the 1960 security treaty with Japan, which obliges the United States to defend Japan.

[SSridhar]

Philippine President Likens China's Rulers to Hitler - Japan Times

Philippine President Benigno Aquino has warned China’s efforts to claim disputed territories are like Nazi Germany’s before World War II, drawing a fierce Chinese response Wednesday branding him ignorant and amateurish.

In an interview with the New York Times, Aquino called for world leaders not to make the mistake of appeasing China as it seeks to cement control over contested waters and islands in the strategically vital South China Sea.

“At what point do you say: ‘Enough is enough’? Well, the world has to say it — remember that the Sudetenland was given in an attempt to appease Hitler to prevent World War II,” Aquino told the New York Times in Manila on Tuesday.

Aquino was referring to the failure by Western nations to back Czechoslovakia when Adolf Hitler-led Nazi Germany occupied western parts of the European nation in 1938 ahead of World War II.

Aquino’s comments come less than two weeks after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe raised the temperature in a parallel territorial dispute with China by appearing to compare Sino-Japanese relations with the run-up to World War I.

Japan and China are at loggerheads over the sovereignty of disputed islands in the East China Sea, raising fears about a military confrontation between Asia’s two biggest economies.

China also claims nearly all of the South China Sea, one of the world’s most important waterways, as it is home to vital shipping lanes and is believed to sit atop lucrative deposits of natural resources.

But the Philippines, as well as Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan, have overlapping claims to some of the waters, and those disputes have for decades made the South China Sea another potential trigger for military conflict.

China has been steadily increasing its military and coast guard presence in the sea in recent years to assert its claim, causing diplomatic tensions to rise and stoking concerns in the Philippines about perceived Chinese bullying.

The Philippines says Chinese vessels have since 2012 effectively occupied a rich fishing area called Scarborough Shoal, which is about 220 km off its main island but 650 km from the nearest major Chinese land mass.

The Philippines launched legal action with a United Nations tribunal last year, asking it to rule the Chinese South China Sea claim is invalid. China has refused to participate in the U.N. process.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry did not immediately react to Aquino’s comments on Nazi Germany but an angry commentary was released on the state-run Xinhua News Agency.

“Philippine President Benigno S. Aquino III, who has taken an inflammatory approach while dealing with maritime disputes with China, has never been a great candidate for a wise statesman in the region,” the commentary said.

“But his latest reported attack against China, in which he senselessly compared his northern neighbor to the Nazi Germany, exposed his true colors as an amateurish politician who was ignorant both of history and reality.”

The commentary also insisted China’s claims to the South China Sea were legitimate, and that war references by Aquino and Abe were not warranted.

“Despite lame comparisons by Philippine and Japanese leaders, the international community cannot ignore the fact that China has long chosen a path of peaceful development,” it said.

Aquino warned in the New York Times interview that China may pursue further territorial conquests if it succeeded in taking control of areas also claimed by the Philippines.

“If we say yes to something we believe is wrong now, what guarantee is there that the wrong will not be further exacerbated down the line?” he said.

Later in the interview, he said: “You may have the might, but that does not necessarily make you right.”

Aquino’s media office confirmed Wednesday the New York Times had correctly reported the president’s comments on the dispute over the South China Sea, which the Philippines calls the West Philippine Sea.

“The president’s statement affirms the country’s position on the importance of upholding the rule of law with respect to resolving territorial claims in the West Philippine Sea,” presidential spokesman Herminio Coloma said.

“It is a principled position that draws from historical lessons, including that which he cited in the interview.”

[member_19686]

Why ‘De-Taiwanize’ Taiwan?
The KMT is running an illogical campaign against Taiwanese identity.
By Lorand C. Laskai

Last week, Taiwan’s Control Yuan, an investigatory and oversight branch of government, censured government agencies for using the name “Taiwan” in official documents rather than the country’s formal title, the “Republic of China” (R.O.C.).
Lest we mistake the Control Yuan for a mere stickler for formalities, Ger Yeong-kuang, a pro-Kuomintang (KMT) member of the Control Yuan, explained the measure’s logic in frank terms: “The incorrect use of designations for our country and for mainland China not only deviates from [the government’s] policy… but also confuses the public’s perception of national identity.”
The KMT’s quibble with the use of “Taiwan,” the name by which the country is largely referred to both at home and abroad, is only the latest attempt by the party to moor the island’s burgeoning sense of independent Taiwanese identity to an ancestral Chinese one.
Recently, the Ministry of Education announced changes to high-school textbooks that emphasize Taiwan’s historical connection to the mainland.
This led one Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmaker to accuse the Ma administration with attempting to “de-Taiwanize” high school textbooks.
For his part, President Ma Ying-jeou has personally contributed to this de-Taiwanizing.
Despite campaigning on his Taiwanese heritage, Ma often refers to Taiwan as belonging to a greater ethnic Chinese nation (Zhonghua minzu).
He’s also the first leader of Taiwan since Chiang Kai-Shek to commemorate the Yellow Emperor—the mythical progenitor of the Han race—using the occasion to declaim on the Taiwanese people’s Chinese lineage.
As the pro-unification party, the KMT is bound to use its current stint in power to reinforce Taiwan’s connection to the mainland.
No matter that the narrative of “One China, two interpretations” suffers from a growing disjuncture with reality: according to the Election Study Center at National Chengchi University, over 57 percent of the public, a clear majority, identify themselves as Taiwanese today (less than ten percent identify themselves as only “Chinese”).
Eighty percent of the public view Taiwan and China as different countries.
And, given the choice without fearing retribution from the mainland, 80 percent would also choose independence.
In theory, fostering an independent national consciousness is in both the KMT and Taiwan’s interest.
With China’s rise continuing apace and the cross-strait standoff unresolved, possibly even regressing, Beijing may soon be able to issue a credible military threat against the island and impose reunification on its own terms.
One recent report by Taiwan’s defense ministry estimates that China will have the capacity to launch an effective assault on Taiwan by 2020.
Reflecting on this grim state of affairs, Richard Bush, the former chairman of the American Institute in Taiwan, worried that this unmistakable asymmetry may allow China to “intimidate Taiwan into submission” without firing a shot.
But where traditional deterrence fails, the Taiwanese leadership can fall back on alternative means of discouraging a Chinese assault.
In other words, it could guarantee a protracted and costly conflict if Chinese forces were to invade.
And maintaining a fierce sense of national solidarity in defiance of external coercion is certainly the most effective way to do that.
The potential hazards of a hostile occupation—Taiwanese protesters dying under PLA fire, freedom fighters waging guerrilla campaigns from house to house, and the international backlash that these images would set off—would very likely restrain Beijing from moving its threats beyond words.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) derided the foreign adventurism that landed the U.S. in Iraq, gleefully denoting the event as a milestone on America’s decline.
It is unlikely to risk its own quagmire, especially while development and stability at home remains fragile.
A strong Taiwanese identity thus allows the country’s leadership to call China’s bluff.
It is an electoral leaven—an insurance policy, if you will—against China’s inevitable military and economic dominance, one that will also strengthen Taiwan’s hand at the bargaining table.
Political scientist Robert Putnam famously argued states involved in international negotiations play a “two-level game,” whereby they must simultaneously negotiate with international partners and domestic constituencies.
Here democratically elected leaders have the notable advantage of being able to use domestic constraints to extract international concessions.
That is, they can creditably claim at the negotiation table that “their hands are tied”—and have poll data to back it up—helping them win concessions where they otherwise could not.
A fickle electorate, like an independent-minded Taiwanese public, thus can yield important benefits.
To be sure, a few textbook revisions and an ode to the Yellow Emperor will not reverse the Taiwanese public’s already strong sense of nationhood.
But the KMT’s effort to chip away at Taiwan’s vibrant independent identity is much like throwing away your best cards.
Of course the KMT is not acting according to strategic sensibility, rather it is acting out of political paranoia. For it rightfully fears that its ability to mobilize the electorate towards its pro-business agenda of rapprochement through economic and trade cooperation is quickly slipping away.
Indeed, President Ma Ying-jeou, whose approval rating lingers in the single-digits these day, is reeling from voter backlash over signature cross-straight engagement from his first term and stalled progress on future plans.
One recent survey indicates more than half of the public feels recent bilateral agreements with the mainland are unequally benefiting China.
The economic woes that have accumulated over the years—stagnant unemployment and rising income inequality—are surely fueling voters’ ire, but at its core is a signal distrust of relinquishing the type of agency that allows a country to determine its future.
Sixty years as an independent polity has had the predictable effect of creating an independent sense of shared destiny.
Soon nearly all of the Taiwanese public will have been born on the island, and with the exception of Taiwanese businessmen who shuttle to and fro none will share an immediate connections to the mainland. This is the natural trajectory of most overseas settler colonies—a lineage that includes the United States during the 18th century and the Latin American republics during the 19th, and of which Taiwan is merely a peculiar 21st century case.
Without reinventing itself, the KMT’s only option is to contrive and propagate to the public a renewed sense of common belonging with the mainland.
It will not likely succeed—though it may very well drone the public into submission.
Unlike previous breakaway republics, Taiwan’s former imperial homeland looms near and will powerfully shape Taiwan’s future by sheer force of its size.
How Taiwan manages relations with the mainland will be central to the island’s future.
The KMT’s strategy of priming the population for reintegration is one approach.
But if the KMT does succeed in neutralizing the island’s independent spirit, it will also surrender Taiwan’s most valuable bargaining chip.

http://chinhdangvu.blogspot.ca/2014/02/ ... um=twitter

[RoyG]

China is one of the great civilizations. Names and borders cant stop them from feeling a sense of connection to one another.

[svinayak]

China is one of the great civilizations.

This is mostly propaganda from the west mostly Unkil. HK was the biggest supporter. Geopolitical compulsion

[Prem]

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pac ... each-other

Why will Japan and China avoid conflict? They need each other.

Speaking at the recent World Economic Forum in Davos, Abe suggested that Japan’s relationship with China was in a “similar situation” to that between Britain and Germany before the outbreak of World War I in 1914. The most c[/b]ommon interpretation: that close economic ties between nations are not always enough to prevent them from going to war with each other.Japanese officials insisted that Mr. Abe’s comments, as reported by some foreign media, had been taken out of context. But his analogy raises an important question about the ongoing territorial dispute between Japan and China: whether strong bilateral trade will be enough to pull them back from the brink or, at the very least, help them weather the current diplomatic storm. The answer – at least for now – is yes, according to the consensus emerging among the myriad Japanese companies with business interests in China.
That guarded optimism contrasts with the autumn of 2012, when Japan’s decision effectively to nationalize the Senkaku islands – East China Sea territories also claimed by China, where they are known as the Diaoyu – sparked riots in several Chinese cities and forced Japanese businesses in the country to temporarily close amid calls for boycotts of Japanese products.
The broader picture tells a similar story. Exactly a year after the riots in China, sales were returning to near pre-crisis levels, with Japan’s exports to China rising more than 11 percent in September 2013 from a year earlier; Japan's imports from China, its biggest trading partner, increased by more than 30 percent over the same period.Economically, Japan and China need each other. Trade between the two countries has tripled over the past decade to more than $340 billion in 2012. China offers Japanese firms an affordable manufacturing base and a vast export market. Between 1995 and 2011, for example, shipments to China accounted for 45 percent of the overall growth in Japanese exports.
China, in turn, depends on Japanese investment and the jobs that come with it, while its own export industry would struggle without Japanese technology. About 60-70 percent of the goods China imports from Japan comprises the machinery and parts it needs to make its own products. And for every 1 percent of growth China sees in global exports, imports from Japan rise by 1.2 percent, according to 2012 calculations by the International Monetary Fund.Given that backdrop, any military confrontation in the East China Sea would have profound implications for the global economy. It could also suck in the US, which is treaty-bound to come to Japan’s aid if it is attacked.
Japanese firms can take some comfort from the absence of violent protests in China or boycotts of Japanese goods since Abe visited a controversial war shrine in Tokyo at the end of last year.
Richard Bush, director of the Center for East Asia Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution in Washington, says China has come to realize that a repeat of the officially sanctioned mass protests of 2012 would only strengthen the hand of Japanese right-wingers.
Mr. Bush suggests that the benefits China accrues from strong economic ties with Japan will trump any desire to raise the stakes over territorial and historical disputes.“But Beijing’s motivation is probably more strategic than economic,” he adds. “It doesn’t want to have the US get drawn into whatever might happen in the security realm with Japan. What I think they are doing is low-risk, and may work, whereas a more aggressive approach carries greater risks.”

Not all analysts share the view that China has responded with restraint. They point to its declaration last November of an air-defense identification zone, which requires even civilian aircraft to notify Chinese authorities of their flight paths, and frequent sightings of Chinese surveillance ships and aircraft in the disputed area.“China still rejects any peaceful means to overcome the different claims to the islands, and is sticking to coercion," says Tetsuo Kotani, a research fellow at the Japan Institute of International Affairs in Tokyo. “But China is losing the diplomatic cards with which to pressure Japan, since Prime Minister Abe has made it clear that he is determined not to compromise in the face of Chinese pressure.”Mr. Kotani is not convinced that economic considerations and fear of the terrible consequences of war will always guide Beijing’s thinking. “Economic ties are not a primary reason for avoiding war, since no one has proved that economic interdependence prevents war,” he says.Tension, not conflict, is uppermost in the minds of Japanese firms in the wake of Abe’s Yasukuni pilgrimage. The shrine honors 14 class-A war criminals among 2.5 million Japanese war dead, and is viewed by China and South Korea as a symbol of Japan’s past militarism.
While few believe that war is a realistic concern, Japanese companies appear to be making contingency plans in case the diplomatic climate deteriorates.
Their direct investments in China fell by almost 37 percent the first nine months of 2013. By contrast, Japanese direct investment in the 10 ASEAN nations rose more than 55 percent in the first half of that year from the same period in 2012 to a record high of USD10.2 billion, according to the Japan External Trade Organization.
"Politically, however, things will remain difficult. So companies in Japan are looking for "China-plus-one" strategies that connect the wider Asian market with China's strong economy, while Chinese companies are heading towards investment opportunities in Southeast Asia, too."But he adds: “While the political situation has clearly not improved, the business environment for corporations on both sides has almost normalized.”There was evidence of that as recently as November, when more than 100 executives took part in the biggest Japanese business mission to Beijing for more than a year.Their hosts, including Chinese Vice Premier Wang Yang, did not mention the Senkaku islands, while the local media reported encouraging words from China’s former ambassador to Japan, Xu Dunxin, who told the delegation: "We hope the communication between high-profile business entrepreneurs will help result in a turnaround of the strained China-Japan relationship."
A month earlier, executives from ten leading Chinese companies in Guangdong Province visited Japan in search of more investment. They met Yoshihide Suga, the chief cabinet secretary and close Abe ally."We were able to feel a positive attitude toward cooperation between Japan and China," Hiromasa Yonekura, the outgoing chairman of the Japan Business Federation, told reporters after the trip to Beijing. "I believe we have taken one step forward."

[SSridhar]

Highspeed Rail has Immense Strategic Military Value: China - The Hindu

China’s rapidly developing high-speed train network spanning the length and breadth of the giant nation could prove to be of “immense strategic military value” for the rapid movement of forces and missiles, an official media report said.

China’s high-speed rail lines are becoming a major transport force for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), allowing the rapid movement of military forces throughout the country, a recent state-run news report said.

“While bringing convenience to the lives of the masses, high-speed rail also plays a military role that is growing more prominent by the day,” the article states.

“A lightly equipped division could be moved on the Wuhan-to-Guangzhou line — about 600 miles (965 km) — in five hours, a fairly rapid mobilisation in military terms,” the China Youth Daily said outlining military benefits of the country’s six high-speed rail lines.

The report says that China’s high-speed rail network will provide “immense strategic military value”.

“And the Second Artillery (missile forces) could use the high-speed rail network to quickly deploy short-range missiles ’in a certain strategic direction’ — presumably from inland locations to coastal regions near Taiwan or Japan,” the Washington Times quoted the Daily’s report as saying.

Other key rail lines include the Xian—Baoji and Xiamen—Shenzhen connections that are part of the network that has made China a world leader in high-speed rail.

Since 2009, the PLA has reportedly been using high-speed trains to move troops in exercises. In 2011, the military conducted a rapid troop transfer on the Beijing—Shanghai line.

The PLA’s ability to move troops to the border due to a highly developed rail, road and air infrastructure, including in the rugged Tibetan region, has long raised concerns in the Indian Army prompting the Indian government to initiate its own rapid infrastructure development along the Chinese border.

The January 14 report in the Daily said China will eventually set up a high-speed network of eight lines extending in all directions.

A typical military train includes 16 high-speed rail cars that can carry 1,100 lightly armed soldiers.

“With the daily improvement in China’s high-speed rail network, transferring a 100,000-strong army might be possible within half a day in the future,” the report said, adding that the military will use high—speed rail to project “mobile combat forces in various strategic directions.”

It said, “the use of high-speed trains as mobile missile launch platforms for strategic weapons is also a good idea”.

China is reportedly planning rail-mobile Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) using a separate system that is not built for high-speed travel but for heavy transport.

“The speed with which vehicles change direction is less than in road manoeuvring and is suited to testing work during manoeuvring to reduce the time required to prepare for firing.

In addition, it is possible to manoeuvre and shift more than a thousand kilometres at once, making it easier to escape enemy tracking,” the report said. — PTI

[Suraj]

There are few things more easier to bomb than railway lines. Especially the Chinese HSR, a lot of which is built on viaducts instead of flat terrain where rails simply can be relaid.

[amit]

There are few things more easier to bomb than railway lines. Especially the Chinese HSR, a lot of which is built on viaducts instead of flat terrain where rails simply can be relaid.

+100

I posted this in the China Military Watch thread. Unfortunately it fell through the cracks. Worth a good read IMO.

Most of Chinese military is plain and simple posturing, much like how a bully growls and moves around menacingly to hide his own fear and weakness. Chinese military follows Sun Tzu like a bible. The problem is once the sh!t hits the ceiling the Art of War becomes a real messy, bloody affair.

[raj.devan]

True, but military mobilization by rail will typically occur prior to commencement of hostilities. Which means that by the time the Air Force has been authorized to launch air strikes on the Chinese rail network in TAR, there will already be substantial buildup along the border / LAC.

[chaanakya]

Yeah , but supply lines can be cut effectively reducing the combat capacity over the duration of war.

[raj.devan]

Supply lines can be cut and disrupted on both sides of the conflict as hostilities progress. If we can hit their rail network, they can also hit the few mountain roads we have leading to the border/LAC in most sectors.

But an advanced infrastructure on the Chinese side will give them the capability to mobilize faster and in larger numbers than us. And this mobilization will happen the actual outbreak of war, which means that when the fighting starts, they will have a serious advantage over our forces, unless we also have sufficient time to mobilize in required numbers.

[Aditya_V]

What about acclamitisation forr Tibet altitude of men and systems to altitude?

[SSridhar]

Make Border Areas a Bridge Says China Ahead of Boundary Talks - Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu

Looking to turn the page from last year's heightened tensions along the disputed border, China on Friday said it hoped to make border areas “a bridge and bond” with India as its top diplomat travels to New Delhi next week.

State Councillor Yang Jiechi, the Chinese Special Representative (SR) on the boundary question, will visit the Indian capital between Monday and Wednesday, officials here said. During his visit, Mr. Yang and National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon will hold the 17th round of negotiations on the long-running boundary dispute.

The boundary talks are currently in the second of a three-stage process. The current stage - seen as the most difficult - involves agreeing a framework to settle the dispute in western, middle and eastern sections of the disputed border.

The first stage involved agreeing “political parameters and guiding principles”, and was concluded in 2005, two years after the current Special Representatives mechanism was introduced.

Asked about widely-held perceptions that the slow-moving negotiations had remained deadlocked since 2005, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hong Lei said on Friday that China was of the view that both sides had “done a lot of work” towards achieving a settlement.

“Over the years, the two sides have done a lot of work to achieve settlement of the issue, in particular through the establishment of the mechanism of SRs in 2003,” he said. “There have already been 16 such meetings. At the high level we have exchanged in-depth views on the issue and positive progress has been achieved.”

He said both sides had “reiterated that the boundary question should not overshadow” overall ties.

“An early settlement serves interests of both China and India, and it is a strategic objective set by the two governments,” Mr. Hong said. “China is ready to work with the Indian government to advance the process of negotiation so as to achieve a fair, reasonable framework acceptable to both sides so as to make the border areas into a bridge and bond between the two peoples to facilitate their exchanges and communication”.

The previous round of border talks took place in June last year, only two months after Chinese troops triggered a three-week-long stand-off by pitching a tent in Depsang, in eastern Ladakh.

Addressing tensions, rather than taking forward negotiations, subsequently emerged as the focus of last year's talks, with both countries saying after the last round they had discussed “ways and means of strengthening existing mechanisms for consultation and coordination on border affairs and methodology to enhance the efficiency of communications between the two sides”.

In November, when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Beijing, both sides signed a Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) aimed at expanding on-the-ground engagement and formalising patrolling rules to prevent recurrence of stand-offs.

This year's talks take place as the new Chinese leadership attempts to recalibrate China's “neighbourhood diplomacy”, an effort reflected in renewed diplomatic outreach to a number of countries in the region.

Even as China has intensified pressure on Japan over disputed East China Sea islands and issues relating to wartime history, Beijing has recently attempted to woo its South and Southeast Asian neighbours. Tensions over the South China Sea that surfaced during the last years of the previous Hu Jintao administration have since subsided, with the President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang both visiting Southeast Asia in October and signing landmark economic deals, including an agreement for joint exploration with Vietnam.

Indian officials and analysts have also noted a particular keenness to ensure that ties with India remained stable. This has been reflected in what one Asian diplomat described as Beijing's “notable silence” as India, last month, prominently honoured Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe by hosting him as the chief guest in the Republic Day parade. In recent months, the Chinese leadership has also pushed attempts to revive a long-dormant Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM) corridor plan, with the first official-level talks held in December in southwestern China.

[raj.devan]

What about acclamitisation forr Tibet altitude of men and systems to altitude?

The PLA already has several divisions based in the hinterland of Tibet and Xinjiang, who are already used to the altitude. The Indian Army has now begun to raise more units which will similarly be based at high altitudes, and which should offer us parity with respect to units available for immediate deployment.

However infrastructure on our size of the line needs a lot of catching up. The difference can be gauged if one looks at the LAC in AP on google earth. The Tibetan side has highways and sprawling settlements, while our side has comparatively few and narrow winding roads. The advantage the PLA has in being able to maneuvre troops is immediately apparent.

This slightly old article by Major General SB Asthana in the USI journal summarizes the issue very concisely.

http://www.usiofindia.org/Article/Print ... 86&ano=856

China faces no major constraints in inducting forces required for conventional operations. It can use the three highways, railways and air transportation for moving forces up to major townships near the Indian borders. No additional acclimatisation period is required because induction of Chinese forces in TAR is spread over a long time.

[SSridhar]

India for Maintaining 'Code of Conduct' in South China Sea - Economic Times

India is looking for an amicable solution for the present situation in South China Sea, but is also for maintaining a Code of Conduct for all countries so that tensions do not escalate, a senior airforce official said today.

Addressing mediamen on the sidelines of Indian Navy's ninth biennial international naval exercise MILAN 2014, Air Marshal P K Roy said India has a three point approach towards the situation in South China Sea, where multiple countries have commercial interests.

"First, freedom of navigation in the area should be in line with international maritime guidelines. Second, we would like to have an amicable situation and are working towards it.

"The third and last is,till these solutions are arrived at, we need to make some sort of code of conduct so that the situation does not escalate anymore.That is the way we look at it," Roy,Commander--in-Chief,Andaman and Nicobar Command,said.

To a query, Roy said the situation was not just between India and China, but between a few countries and their influence in the region.

Acknowledging there are "issues" with China, he said "But we also look forward to have strategic partnership with China. We are two countries who are growing... Maybe China is growing faster... If we keep thinking that both are threat to each other, we won't grow further. We look at China as a strategic partner."

He said he is aware of increasing Chinese influence in the region."There are more ships in Indian Ocean Region because of China's needs. We are aware of it. We are also increasing our capacity."

On reports of Chinese presence in Coco Islands,where it is reportedly helping Myanmar set up an airport, he said, "We are aware of it."

What 'Code of Conduct' ? China is simply dragging its feet on this issue and is clearly not interested.

Let us recall recent history. It was in the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ meeting at Phnom Penh in early July 2012, that the ASEAN asked China to evolve a code of conduct to defuse tensions in South China Sea. An incensed China reacted by saying that the ASEAN, en bloc, cannot demand such a code as the dispute involved individual member countries of ASEAN and China and therefore should be treated bilaterally. Clearly, the intent is to 'divide and conquer' the countries of the South China Sea especially as the small countries cannot withstand the mighty Chinese. . For her part, the US Secretary of State Ms. Hillary Clinton said at Phnom Penh that the US would “look to ASEAN to make rapid progress with China toward an effective code of conduct in order to ensure that as challenges arise they are managed and resolved peacefully through a consensual process in accordance with established principles of international law”. However, for the first time in its 45-year history, ASEAN failed to issue at communique at an annual meeting of its 10 foreign ministers at Phnom Penh when host Cambodia, viewed as pro-Beijing, rejected a proposal by the Philippines and Vietnam to mention their separate territorial disputes with China in the statement.

China’s Vice President, Xi Jinping who took over from Hu Jintao as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC), assured ASEAN countries in September 2012 in a China-ASEAN business meeting that China “ will never seek hegemony nor behave in a hegemonic manner.” In the ASEAN-India Special Commemmorative Summit in New Delhi on December, 21, 2012, the Indian Prime Minister Man Mohan Singh said, “We should intensify our political and security consultations, including in regional forums such as the East Asia Summit, the ASEAN Regional Forum and the ASEAN Defence Ministers' Meeting Plus. We should work together more purposefully for the evolution of an open, balanced, inclusive and transparent regional architecture. As maritime nations, India and ASEAN nations should intensify their engagement for maritime security and safety, for freedom of navigation and for peaceful settlement of maritime disputes in accordance with international law”. He also picked up and legitimized use of the new term — Indo-Pacific — that presumes New Delhi's role and interest in the Asia-Pacific theatre.

In September 2013, the senior officials of ASEAN and China met in China and decided on the Implementation of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DoC). The DoC was a prelude to the formal Code of Conduct (CoC) and agreed to in c. 2002; but, China has shown little interest in developing this further. In the Brunei ASEAN summit meet, ASEAN resolved to intensify the discussions with China on the CoC.

[raj.devan]

The correct hypothesis here is that China is using its claims on the various islands in the SCS merely as an excuse to keep prodding its neighbours and flex its muscles. Even its recent attempt to declare an air defence zone over international waters can be interpreted as a similar attempt to provoke.

This means that even if we assume that the other countries in the SCS surrendered their respective claims on the Spratly and Paracel islands, China would probably have to start focussing on other territorial claims to keep at its strategy. In this light, it is obvious that any code of conduct is not going to be accepted by the Chinese, and does not provide a solution to the issue at hand.

On a more radical note, what might work is - if Malaysia, The Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei and Indonesia make claims to different portions of Hainan Island, and demand that China discuss this instead of Spratly and Paracel. That would treat the Chinese to a dose of their own strategy.

[Christopher Sidor]

There are few things more easier to bomb than railway lines. Especially the Chinese HSR, a lot of which is built on viaducts instead of flat terrain where rails simply can be relaid.

The problem is that in today's high tempo warfare, bombing these HSR lines after the troops and their materials have been transported is waste.

Whether these HSR lines would be able to transport heavy missiles of PRC as of today is questionable. But with time these missiles could be transported especially if they were made lighter and smaller. These are exactly the requirements of a SLBM.

[member_19686]

AMERICA HAS NO ANSWER TO CHINA’S SALAMI-SLICING
Robert Haddick
February 6, 2014 · in Analysis

John Mearsheimer recently argued that China is pursuing in Asia what the United States has in Latin America: regional hegemony. In pursuit of that goal, China keeps trying to take territory, bit by bit, in the East and South China Seas. And the United States doesn’t know what to do about it.

This practice, known as salami-slicing, involves the slow accumulation of small changes, none of which in isolation amounts to a casus belli, but which add up over time to a substantial change in the strategic picture. By using salami-slicing tactics in the East and South China Seas, China does not have to choose between trade with the rest of the world and the achievement of an expanded security perimeter in the Western Pacific at the expense of China’s neighbors. Given enough time, and continued confusion by the United States and its allies on how to respond, China is on course to eventually achieve both.

China’s salami-slicing has accelerated over the past few years. In 2012, China established “Sansha City” on Woody Island, an island in the Paracel chain that China seized by force from South Vietnam in 1974 (Vietnam refuses to recognize China’s seizure). China declared that Sansha City would be the administrative center of all of its claims in the South China Sea, including those in the Spratly Island group. Small Chinese military and paramilitary garrisons on Woody Island reinforce the image of sovereign legitimacy China is trying to establish—an image that neighbors such as Vietnam and the Philippines lack the resources to replicate. Just last month, China permanently based a 5,000-ton paramilitary patrol vessel at Woody Island.

Territorial salami-slicing against the Philippines is also proving successful. In April 2012, Chinese maritime enforcement and Philippine coast guard vessels began a protracted standoff over Scarborough Reef, located about 230 kilometers from Luzon and claimed by both countries. Lacking the material resources to maintain a continuous presence, the Filipino coast guard eventually retreated, leaving China in control of the reef. Chinese authorities subsequently roped off the reef and have prevented Filipino fishermen from returning.

With Scarborough Reef captured, the unequal contest between China and the Philippines has moved to Ayungin Island in the Spratlys, also known as Second Thomas Shoal. An October 2013 article in the New York Times Magazine described the standoff between a fleet of modern Chinese maritime enforcement vessels and a squad of Filipino marines. These eight marines live a seemingly post-apocalyptic, “Mad Max”-style existence on a rusting, collapsing World War II-era landing ship that the Philippines government deliberately beached on the island, to provide a last Filipino foothold while the Chinese encircle the island.

In a May 2013 interview on Chinese television, Major General Zhang Zhaozhong of China’s People’s Liberation Army described the “cabbage strategy” China is employing in the South China Sea. According to General Zhang, the cabbage strategy consists of surrounding a contested island with concentric layers of Chinese fishing boats, fishing administration ships, maritime enforcements ships, and warships such that “the island is thus wrapped layer by layer like a cabbage.” Of taking territory from the Philippines, General Zhang said,

We should do more such things in the future. For those small islands, only a few troopers are able to station on each of them, but there is no food or even drinking water there. If we carry out the cabbage strategy, you will not be able to send food and drinking water onto the islands. Without the supply for one or two weeks, the troopers stationed there will leave the islands on their own. Once they have left, they will never be able to come back.

In the East China Sea, friction between China and Japan over the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands has been heating up for several years. According to the Japanese Ministry of Defense, incursions by Chinese government ships in Japan’s territorial waters around the Senkakus began accelerating in late 2012 and averaged about five incursions per month during the beginning of 2013.

November 2013 brought China’s sudden declaration of an air defense identification zone (ADIZ) over much of the East China Sea, including over the Senkaku Islands. A few days later, in the South China Sea, a Chinese warship nearly collided with the guided missile cruiser USS Cowpens, a signal of displeasure that the cruiser was observing sea trials of China’s new aircraft carrier. USS Cowpens subsequently withdrew from its mission, U.S. officials apparently unwilling to risk a clash. Finally, in January 2014, a local Chinese authority on Hainan Island issued an order requiring foreign fishing vessels working in most of the South China Sea (in waters far beyond China’s currently-recognized EEZ) to first obtain fishing permits from his office.

Another example of China’s effort to establish the perception of sovereignty in the South China Sea is its attempt at economic development in the region. In June 2012, China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), a huge state-owned oil developer, invited foreign oil drillers to bid on blocks of the South China Sea that are inside Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ). In fact, Vietnam has previously put some of these blocks up for lease. Similarly, China and the Philippines have clashed over oil and natural gas drilling rights near Palawan Island.

With this series of salami-slicing measures (not an exhaustive list), China is attempting to accomplish three goals:

It is using its material advantages in civilian, paramilitary, and military vessels to create an image of dominant and sustained presence, compared to its weaker rivals such as Vietnam and the Philippines. The goal here is to create an impression of sole legitimacy and, in time, sovereignty.
China hopes to establish traditional indicators of state authority. Such indicators include constant patrolling by paramilitary enforcement and naval vessels, the establishment of government offices on places like Woody Island, the establishment of paramilitary and military bases and garrisons, the issuance of bureaucratic orders and regulations, and the establishment of operations by state-owned enterprises like CNOOC.
Events such as the establishment of the East China Sea ADIZ and the near-collision with USS Cowpens are designed to deliberately increase the risks for U.S. and allied operations in the region, with the goal of making those operations more costly and less frequent. When the frequency of U.S. and allied presence declines, China’s influence and the legitimacy of its claims will appear to increase.
America’s response: “We quite frankly welcome the growth of China as a military power”

Salami-slicing places rivals, especially conflicted rivals, in an uncomfortable position. It is the rivals of salami-slicers who are obligated to eventually draw red lines and engage in brinkmanship over actions others will view, in isolation, as trivial and far from constituting casus belli. China’s leaders are apparently counting on such hesitancy, a calculation that thus far is working out for them.

Admiral Harry Harris, the commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, made a curious remark that reveals the U.S. government’s befuddlement regarding China’s salami-slicing. When asked about China’s East China Sea ADIZ, Harris replied, “It highlights an issue that I am concerned about, and that is coercion by China in this case and other countries as well.” Which other countries are employing coercion, Harris didn’t say. Harris added, “[W]e welcome quite frankly the growth of China as a military power in the Pacific. There is nothing wrong with that.” With China’s inflation-adjusted defense budget growing at a long-term compound rate of 9.7 percent per annum (and thus doubling after inflation every 7.5 years), what Harris welcomes will certainly be fulfilled.

Harris’s comments, straining to avoid controversy with China, conform to existing U.S. government policy. Admiral Samuel Locklear, commander of U.S. Pacific Command and Harris’s immediate boss, stated in a recent speech that a goal of his command was to see China “be a net provider of security, not a net user of security.” Locklear’s statement implied an assumption that China would agree to the existing international order in East Asia, and willingly support and uphold the region’s long-standing rules governing sovereignty, the global commons, and freedom of navigation. It assumes China is a status quo state, rather than a revisionist power. China’s recent behavior, listed above, should hardly give one comfort in this regard. Rather than address this head on, however, the two admirals have instead preferred to avoid the subject, a position that matches U.S. government policy.

Indeed, there is no visible response by the U.S. government to China’s salami-slicing. U.S. officials, including Locklear and Harris, have expressed regret over China’s ADIZ declaration, and stated their intention to carry on with usual U.S. military operations inside that zone and elsewhere in the region. Yet China has suffered no penalty for its series of actions. Regarding the disputed claims in the two seas, the official policy from Washington is that China’s neighbors are on their own—the U.S. will not take sides in these territorial disputes. The United States also objects to the use of coercion in resolving the disputes. But each individual act of China’s salami-slicing is carefully calibrated to fall below a threshold most outside observers would view as overt coercion.

With no resistance to its actions, Chinese salami-slicing will certainly continue. Future Chinese slices could include:

Patrols by Chinese unmanned surveillance aircraft over the Senkakus
Landings by Chinese civilian protestors on the Senkakus
Interception and visible escort of Japanese airlines transiting the East China Sea ADIZ by Chinese fighter aircraft
The declaration of a Chinese ADIZ over some portion of the South China Sea
Boarding and seizure of Vietnamese or Filipino fishing boats for non-compliance with China’s fishing policies
Blocking the resupply or replacement of the Filipino garrison on Ayungin Island or other garrisons in the Spratlys
Additional harassment of U.S. and Japanese warships and patrol aircraft by Chinese vessels and aircraft.
With these and similar actions, Chinese leaders will hope to gradually establish “new facts on the ground” and to increase the perception of risk in the minds of U.S. and allied decision-makers, all calculated to occur without triggering a confrontation.

America’s theory of success—thus far

One would think that further Chinese salami-slicing would strain the patience of U.S. and allied policymakers. However, forbearance has been the explicit U.S. policy. Kurt Campbell, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs during the Obama administration’s first term, recently explained the theory behind the current leniency policy (at about 55 minutes into the video presentation):

I think one of the objectives here, if you look at a series of speeches that Secretary Clinton and others gave over the course of the last couple of years, it was to try to go at this idea that the United States and China were destined for conflict, and that it was almost preordained and that every time historically, from the great Thucydides, the rising powers when they face off against established powers, inevitably leads to conflict. And I believe one of the efforts underway is to learn from the lessons of history, the very difficult lessons of history, and to apply different mechanisms and different approaches for how to deal with this extraordinarily challenging hegemonic matter which is playing out right before our eyes …

The more important lesson I think that history teaches us is that rising powers, like Germany before the First World War and Germany before the Second World War, felt disrespected in global politics, felt that they were not given their due, felt like they were not given membership or a seat at the table. What I believe is very different about this particular period in global politics is that if you look at the leading countries—Japan, South Korea, the United States, and Europe—we have all insisted that China join the big table. We’ve encouraged active Chinese support in the important economic institutions, the political and strategic institutions …We want China to play a role in that and we are trying through this dialogue with China to suggest there is another way out than inevitable conflict.

What to do when assumptions go bad

The theory that Campbell presented—namely, try something different than the course that created serial disasters in the past—seems reasonable at first glance. But one should examine the assumptions implied within this hypothesis, and question whether policymakers are adequately preparing for what will happen should those assumptions fail.

Campbell assumes that by drawing China into the existing international system, a system that from outward appearances has benefited China greatly over the past three decades, China will accept that system and willingly support it (G. John Ikenberry, an international relations professor at Princeton, defended this position in an essay in Foreign Affairs, Ironically, this essay appeared in 2008, just as China’s salami-slicing began to accelerate). Alternatively, Campbell assumes that China’s leaders will come to see that the U.S. and China’s neighbors, expressed through their welcoming and forbearing behavior, don’t pose a security threat to China. And once they realize that, China’s salami-slicing will end.

Unfortunately, China’s continued salami-slicing is evidence that these assumptions are flawed. Forbearance has not ameliorated China’s security concerns, as evidenced by China’s continued rapid acquisition of access-denial military capabilities. Another explanation is that, for historical or cultural reasons, China seeks to achieve its territorial claims regardless of the level of security its leaders perceive.

U.S. officials may have another unspoken reason for their forbearance policy: what might be termed a “rope-a-dope” gambit. China’s assertions are clearly sparking a region-wide security backlash. Security cooperation is rapidly developing, from India through Southeast Asia and Australia, and up to Japan, aimed at balancing China’s military power. Non-Chinese military spending and procurement in the region is similarly expected to leap over the next five years. U.S. officials may conclude that the more such activity occurs, the lighter will be America’s security burden in the region. Under this theory, if U.S. forbearance encourages Chinese assertiveness and a regional diplomatic and military response—what some in the U.S. will see as improved “burden-sharing”—why should Washington get in the way?

But at some point, assuming Chinese salami-slicing doesn’t spontaneously cease, U.S. officials will have to abandon the forbearance experiment. With forbearance, U.S. policymakers have attempted to avoid the dreaded security dilemma, where security concerns turn two or more powers into competitors, with accelerating and wasteful arms races the result. U.S. forbearance may have been a well-intentioned effort to avoid such a fate in East Asia. But as China’s military modernization and salami-slicing advance, U.S. policymakers will have to consider the risks of continuing the forbearance experiment.

When the salami-slices sum up to a substantial security problem for Japan, India, and the ASEAN countries, someone is likely to draw a red line somewhere. The issue for U.S. officials is whether they will be the ones to do that drawing, and thus retain the initiative, or whether someone else, having lost confidence in Washington, will do it instead. When that happens, the U.S. will find itself reacting to events, rather than shaping a favorable outcome in advance.

All strategies are based on assumptions, but good strategists prepare for when their assumptions don’t pan out. The end of Chinese salami-slicing is an implied assumption in the forbearance approach. U.S. policymakers will soon face the prospect of admitting that that assumption has gone bad.

During his remarks, Campbell also said that the most important contribution the U.S. can make to Asia’s security “is to not decline.” That may have been an oblique expression of his own doubts about forbearance, or at least the need to have a strong hedge against the policy’s failure.

Admitting that China really is a revisionist power in Asia, and that forbearance has failed, will mean explicitly turning back to deterrence and trusting in the utility of U.S. and allied military power to maintain stability. U.S. officials will plead that they never abandoned deterrence as a policy—they will point to the Asia Rebalance and the pledge of stationing 60 percent of U.S. air and naval power in the region as proof. But deterrence lies in the mind of the rival. China’s leaders would not be funding exponential increases in air, naval, and missile power if they did not have a strategy they believed would work. China’s actions are evidence that its leaders believe China will achieve escalation dominance in the Western Pacific in due course. If that’s what they believe, U.S. and allied deterrence is not persuasive under current circumstances.

Restoring deterrence will require Admirals Harris and Locklear and their civilian masters to be more straightforward with their troops, their allies, and themselves over what their military forces are there for, what specific missions they need to prepare for, and what equipment and training they need to get ready for those tasks. For now, the U.S. doesn’t have an answer to China’s salami-slicing. That will have to change, one way or another.


Robert Haddick is an independent contractor at U.S. Special Operations Command. He writes here in a personal capacity. In September 2014, U.S. Naval Institute Press will publish Haddick’s book on the rise of China’s military power and U.S. strategy in East Asia.

http://warontherocks.com/2014/02/americ ... i-slicing/

[Prem]

U.S. General Tells Japan, Philippines to Cool China Rhetoric
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-0 ... lisle.html

U.S. General Tells Japan, Philippines to Cool China Rhetoric

Comments by the leaders of Japan and the Philippines drawing parallels between China’s growing assertiveness in the region and events in pre-war Europe are “not helpful,” said the commander of U.S. air forces in the Pacific.“The rise of Germany and what occurred between the U.K. in particular and Germany, and what happened in Europe, I don’t draw that comparison at all to what’s going on today” in the Asia-Pacific, General Herbert “Hawk” Carlisle, 58, said in an interview yesterday in Singapore. “Some of the things, in particular that have been done by Japan, they need to think hard about what is provocative to other nations.”Carlisle urged all countries involved in territorial disputes with China in both the East and South China Seas to try and defuse tensions. He said any move by China to extend an air-defense identification zone south, where it has disputes over oil-rich waters with the Philippines, Vietnam and Malaysia, would be “very provocative”.

The recent comments by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Philippine President Benigno Aquino -- two U.S. allies -- have escalated tensions at a time when China is pushing its territorial claims in both the East and South China Seas, and as President Xi Jinping expands the reach of his country’s navy. Both sought to cast China’s actions against the historical perspective of Germany’s ascension in the first half of the 20th century.“The de-escalation of tensions has got to be a multilateral approach and it’s not just one country that needs to de-escalate,” said General Carlisle, a former fighter squadron commander who is responsible for air force operations for more than half the globe, with oversight of 45,000 personnel. “All of them do. The risk from miscalculation is high. It’s greater than it should be.”“If you look at some of the things that have been going on in the East China Sea, both militaries have been conducting themselves very professionally,” said Carlisle. “But the potential for something, a mistake to occur or miscalculation or misunderstanding to occur, is out there. There is significantly more activity from both nations around the disputed territorial claims, and that to me is a risk.”

Any attempt by China to replicate its air zone in the South China Sea would be a “very provocative act,” said Carlisle, who has more than 3,600 flying hours in a variety of aircraft and was promoted to the rank of general in August 2012, according to his official Air Force profile.The U.S. opposes any such move and “we’ve strongly, through diplomatic channels, made that known to the PRC,” Carlisle said, referring to the People’s Republic of China.Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying today said the U.S. had first established an air defense identification zone more than 60 years ago and China was justified in doing the same in the the East China Sea.“It was the first country in the world to do so, so why can’t China do so?” Hua told reporters in Beijing. “When relevant officials make remarks they should think whether they are in any position to make irresponsible accusations against China.”

[Mahesh_R]

The Philippines launched legal action with a United Nations tribunal last year, asking it to rule the Chinese South China Sea claim is invalid. China has refused to participate in the U.N. process.

Is it so simple to refuse to participate and NO ACTION is taken ?
As I understand UN Tribunal takes cases of disputes between different countries same as
a local court in India where I can file a case on other party... and if the other party refuse to attend the court session the case will be closed in my favor ..

Can someone pls tell me what happens when one party doesn't agree to attend the UN Tribunal..
if nothing can be done then what value it holds...
every other country can try to do the same as China...

[SSridhar]

China & Taiwan Hold Historic Talks - ToI

NANJING, China: China and Taiwan on Tuesday held their first government-to-government talks since they split 65 years ago after a brutal civil war — a symbolic yet historic move between the former bitter rivals.

Taipei's Wang Yu-chi, who oversees the island's China policy, met his Beijing counterpart Zhang Zhijun in Nanjing on the first day of a four-day trip.

With sensitivities crucial, the room was neutrally decorated with no flags visible and nameplates on the table devoid of titles or affiliations.

Before leaving, Wang told reporters: "The visit does not come easy; it is the result of interactions between the two sides for many years."

Nanjing, in eastern China, was the country's capital when it was ruled by Wang's Kuomintang, or Nationalist, party in the first half of the 20th century.

When they lost China's civil war — which cost millions of lives — to Mao Zedong's Communists in 1949, two million supporters of the Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek fled to Taiwan, officially known as the Republic of China.

The island and the mainland have been governed separately ever since, both claiming to be the true government of China and only re-establishing contact in the 1990s through quasi-official organisations.

Tuesday's meeting is the fruit of years of efforts to improve relations.

But Beijing's Communist authorities still aim to reunite all of China under their rule, and view Taiwan as a rebel region awaiting reunification with the mainland — by force if necessary.

Over the decades Taipei has become increasingly isolated diplomatically, losing the Chinese seat at the UN in 1971 and seeing the number of countries recognizing it steadily whittled away. But it is supplied militarily by the United States and has enjoyed a long economic boom.

No official agenda has been released for the talks — widely seen as a symbolic, confidence-building exercise. Wang said he would not sign any agreements but added: "The main purpose of the visit is to help facilitate mutual understanding."

Taiwan is likely to focus on reaping practical outcomes from the discussions, such as securing economic benefits or security assurances, while China has one eye on long-term integration of the island, analysts say.

The political thaw comes after the two sides made cautious steps towards economic reconciliation in recent years.

As the heirs of a pan-Chinese government, Taiwan's ruling Kuomintang party accepts the "One China" principle and is opposed to seeking independence for the island.

Since it returned to power on the island in elections in 2008, President Ma Ying-jeou has overseen a marked softening in Taiwan's tone towards its giant neighbour, restoring direct flights and other measures.

In June 2010 Taiwan and China signed the landmark Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, a pact widely characterised as the boldest step yet towards reconciliation.

Yet despite the much-touted detente, Taipei and Beijing have still shunned all official contact and negotiations have been carried out through proxies.

While these bodies — the quasi-official Straits Exchange Foundation representing Taiwan and the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits for China — have achieved economic progress, they lack the power to broach deeper-held differences.

Analysts say only government-level officials can address the lingering sovereignty dispute that sees each side claiming to be the sole legitimate government of China.

Tuesday's meeting will be watched closely to see whether it can pave the way for talks between Ma and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping — although chances of that happening any time soon are slim.

"The current interaction across the Taiwan Strait is quite positive," said Jia Qingguo, a professor of international studies at Peking University.

Ties have "been developing very fast, but the potential of this relationship has not been fully tapped (by) both sides," he said.

"But people should not expect too much out of it. It will take time for the two sides to get really integrated."

Nonetheless the mood surrounding the talks soured in Taiwan after Beijing refused to issue credentials to the Taipei-based Apple Daily and the US government-funded Radio Free Asia at the weekend.

Taiwan, on Monday, said that it would raise the issue of press freedom with China during the talks.

[Prem]

China's Television War on Japan

Chinese Pakiesque Revenge on Kufr Japani

PEEJING — Iron Palm Du Dapeng’s eyes are burning with rage. The Chinese martial arts expert strikes a Japanese soldier with his fist and then, using his supernatural powers, tears the soldier in half. Blood splatters, but not a drop lands on the kung fu master.
This is one of many violent scenes in the Chinese television series “The Anti-Japanese Knight,” a recent action drama set during the Japanese invasion of China in the 1930s. Like many Chinese television dramas, the “Anti-Japanese Knight” promotes patriotism and praises the Communist Party for defeating the Japanese, while conveniently leaving out mention of the decisive role played by the Chinese Nationalists in that war. The violence and anti-Japanese tone send a clear message that killing is acceptable — as long as the targets are “Japanese devils.” I have little doubt that many Chinese people take the “Anti-Japanese Knight” and its version of history as fact, just as I used to think that China won the second Sino-Japanese War by digging tunnels in villages and planting homemade land mines, thanks to “Tunnel Warfare” and “Landmine Warfare,” two classic Chinese-made war movies from the 1960s.

Before television arrived in the countryside, film teams took projectors to villages to screen movies; they were often shown outdoors. As a child in the 1970s, I’d go to screenings as often as possible, blissfully unaware that most of what I was watching was Communist Party propaganda. I must have watched “Tunnel Warfare” and “Landmine Warfare” at least a dozen times.
When I turn on the television these days, I notice not much has changed. The second Sino-Japanese War may have ended in 1945, but the Chinese people are still haunted by it. Enemy Japanese soldiers run amok on Chinese screens. The state-approved films and TV dramas of today are more colorful and the actors are better-looking than in the films of 1960s and ’70s, but the themes remain the same.

The state prohibits content that “incites ethnic hatred,” yet according to Southern Weekly more than 70 anti-Japanese TV series were screened in China in 2012. And in March 2013 the newspaper reported that 48 anti-Japanese-themed TV series were being shot simultaneously in Hengdian World Studios, a film studio in Zhejiang Province, in eastern China. The result of this stream of rancor is just what you’d expect. A July 2013 Pew research report found that 90 percent of Chinese people have an unfavorable view of Japan. And the hatred for Japan is intensifying. Pew said that “favorability” for Japan has fallen 17 percentage points since 2006.
The anti-Japan virulence drummed up by the media is in full display online. Websites popular among young Chinese nationalists, like Tiexue (Iron Blood) and April Media, are riddled with slogans such as “Destroy Japanese dogs!” or “Annihilate the Japanese people!”
The flow of hate comes while China is building up its military, leaving its neighbors on edge. Beijing will spend $148 billion on its military this year, up from $139 billion in 2013. It launched its first aircraft carrier in 2012, and is building a fleet of submarines that it hopes will outnumber the American fleet.
A hard-line, anti-Western documentary film produced by the Chinese military called “Silent Contest,” circulated online in October 2013, revealed a troubling war-thirsty mind-set among the military. The video attempted to make the case that the United States is actively working to sabotage the Chinese government. Whoever leaked this video may not represent mainstream military thinking, but there is no doubt that pro-military voices are growing louder.Meanwhile, Beijing repeatedly criticizes Tokyo’s “militarism.” But what are China’s leaders thinking when they promote such hate of their neighbor? The world must be vigilant against “militarism” whenever it arises, but the Chinese government needs to review its own propaganda policies — and weigh the consequences of barraging citizens with such a negative view of Japan.For now, a small chain of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea is the focal point of contention between the China and Japan. In 2012, tensions over the islands triggered anti-Japanese riots in Chinese cities. Cai Yang, a 21-year-old construction worker in Xi’an, smashed the skull of Li Jianli, the owner of a Japanese car, with a bicycle lock.Mr. Cai’s mother, explaining the source of her son’s “patriotic” rage, couldn’t have been more trenchant with her question: “When we turn on the TV, most of the dramas are about anti-Japanese war. How would it be possible to not to hate Japanese?”

[SSridhar]

India-China discuss CBMs on Border Issue - Sandeep Dikshit, The Hindu

India and China held a “very constructive” two-day meeting on the border issue which discussed additional confidence building measures such as the early implementation of the Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) as well as the core issue of a framework agreement for sorting out the border issue.

Special Representatives of both countries — National Security Advisor Shiv Shankar Menon and Chinese State Councillor Yang Jiechi — also reviewed the entire gamut of bilateral relations. On the regional front, they also discussed the East Asia Summit process and touched on the situation in West Asia and the Middle East, Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin told newspersons here on Tuesday.

The BDCA was signed late last year and attempts were made to enhance coordination and iron out possibilities of misunderstanding between the armies along the disputed Line of Actual Control.

Asked why the MEA feels this round seemed to be very constructive, the spokesperson declined to elaborate on grounds that “ultimately diplomacy has to be conducted beyond public glare” because these are issues which involve a certain amount of give and take. “Nothing is agreed till everything is agreed. Please don’t gauge on a minute-by-minute basis and don’t expect us to give those sort of commentaries,” replied Mr. Akbaruddin when pressed for more details.

However, the MEA spokesperson did give a hint about the importance of the 17th Round of SR talks by pointing out that the meeting took place on the tailwind of two structured India-China bilaterals between Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh and Li Keqiang held late last year.

For the first time, this meeting was preceded by senior officials discussing operational pinpricks on the border under the aegis of the Working Mechanism for Consultations and Coordination on India-China border affairs. “There is now a symbiotic process that has been set in place whereby issues relating to border are fed into the SR process,” pointed out the MEA spokesperson.

The highlight of the two-day SR interaction was an exchange of views on what framework was acceptable for moving over to the third and final phase of settling the border question. Beginning in 2003, the SRs settled the Political Parameters and Guiding Principles two years later.

[member_19686]

An Offer They Can't Refuse
Will China win its 65-year war with Taiwan -- without firing a shot?
BY ISAAC STONE FISH

In the game of chess, there's a concept called "forced mate."
The term refers to one side maneuvering its pieces to guarantee victory in a set number of moves, regardless of what the opponent does.
On Feb. 11, representatives of the Chinese and Taiwanese government met in the mainland Chinese city of Nanjing.
Expected to produce few, if any breakthroughs, the symbolism of the event is still great: It is their first formal meeting in 65 years.
Since the Nationalists fled to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, Beijing has viewed the island as a renegade province and has made its "reunification with the motherland" a paramount objective. Tensions have occasionally flared: As recently as the 1990s, China lobbed missiles into the strait between the mainland and Taiwan, Taiwanese politicians threatened to declare independence, and the United States moved two aircraft carrier groups into the region.
Today, however, the link between mainland China and the self-governing entity of 23 million people just 110 miles off its eastern coast is warmer than it's ever been, even as Taiwan continues to insist on its rights as a self-governing body.
So if China makes the right moves, and continues to successfully and peacefully draw Taiwan into its orbit, can it create a "forced mate" situation?
Beijing has been making Taipei an offer it can't refuse: a readily accessible market of 1.3 billion people.
In arguably its greatest foreign policy success over the last decade, Beijing has been taking a patient and long-term approach toward the island, offering sweetheart economic deals and a reduction of military rhetoric (though China still maintains an estimated 1,600 missiles aimed across the strait) while isolating Taiwan internationally.
The 2008 election in Taiwan of Ma Ying-jeou, the head of the Kuomintang Party, helped: Ma's party favors closer ties with China, unlike the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which ran Taiwan for the previous eight years.
After Ma took power, Beijing visibly softened toward Taiwan, authorizing a series of economic deals that were favorable to the island, like the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), which reduced tariffs.
"We can give up our profits because Taiwanese compatriots are our brothers," said then-Premier Wen Jiabao.
In June 2008, the two sides agreed to begin direct tourist flights, and, in December of that year, they started direct shipping traffic and mail service.
Some 2.85 million Chinese nationals visited Taiwan in 2013, up 10 percent from the year before (more than double the number coming from Japan, the second-largest source of visitors).
And in 2013, bilateral trade reached $197.2 billion, up nearly 100 percent from when Ma was elected. Bloomberg, citing government statistics, reported that, today, roughly 40 percent of Taiwan's exports head to China.
Many analysts now see this as the endgame.
"Cross-strait interdependence has been an irreversible process, at least in economic, social and cultural terms," notes Titus C. Chen, an associate research fellow at the National Chengchi University in Taipei.
He adds, "The prospects of Taiwan can no longer be separated from those of China."
When asked about the chess analogy, June Teufel Dreyer, an expert on China's international relations at the University of Miami, offered a different one instead.
"There's a type of insect that a horde of ants will attack. The ants lay their eggs in the insect, and then eat it," Dreyer says.
"That's what happening with Taiwan."
While Taiwan has become closer to China, it has also grown more isolated from the rest of the world.
Only 21 nations recognize Taiwan, the largest of which is the poor African nation of Burkina Faso, which has a population of 15 million.
The Holy See recognizes Taiwan, but it's the only European state to do so. (Taiwan is not a member of the United Nations and participates in the World Health Organization as a "separate customs territory.")
Taiwan strives, and mostly fails, to attend international summits.
In September 2013, I received an e-mail from the U.S. Taiwan Economic and Cultural Representative Office, Taiwan's embassy-like presence in Washington, crowing that Taiwan "has been invited to attend the 38th session of the International Civil Aviation Organization Assembly for the first time since losing its ICAO seat in 1971."
Washington, Taiwan's most important ally, has long said it recognizes that there is only one China, and that it hopes Beijing and Taipei can peacefully resolve their differences.
"The administration is very supportive of improved cross-strait relations," says a senior U.S. defense official, who asked to speak on background.
The United States has sold tens of billions of dollars of arms to Taiwan over the last few decades, though the number has dropped recently.
"The United States makes available to Taiwan defense articles and services necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability," says Jeff Pool, a Pentagon spokesman.
U.S. policy toward Taiwan is often described as "strategic ambiguity" -- not stating if America will or will not defend Taiwan if China seizes it by force.
There is great strategic and symbolic value to the United States maintaining its alliance with Taiwan.
But the status of Taiwan matters far less to Washington, and to Americans, than it does to Beijing and the Chinese.
"There's the Inevitability Theory," says Mark Stokes, the executive director of the Project 2049 think tank, which focuses on security in Asia, and a former U.S. defense official.
"Beijing says it's inevitable [that the two sides] will fulfill reunification on China's terms, and they actually believe it. The idea is: If Taiwan is going to be eaten up by China anyway, why do we want to risk the trouble?"
Inevitable or not, Beijing still faces the challenge of convincing Taiwan that unification is beneficial -- and convincing its own people that patience continues to be the best strategy.
For the last 20 years, most Taiwanese have favored the tenuous status quo over declaring independence or reunifying with the mainland, according to data from the Election Study Center at the National Chengchi University in Taiwan.
From 2012 to 2013, the number of Taiwanese wanting to maintain the status quo but eventually move toward independence rose from 15.1 percent to 17.9 percent, while 2.1 percent wanted immediate unification.
This may be a gain for the pro-independence side, but roughly 58 percent of Taiwanese still don't want things to change.
These numbers are far less favorable to China than the most relevant comparison: Britain's return of Hong Kong to the mainland in 1997.
In February 1993, 42 percent of Hong Kongers wanted to join China, while 25 percent wanted independence, according to the Hong Kong Transition Project, a research organization.
In the weeks before the handover, as people adjusted to the new reality, those numbers changed to 53 and 17 percent, respectively.
But Beijing and London agreed to return Hong Kong in 1984; the mainland had 13 years of preparation to make it palatable.
As China and Taiwan continue to move closer together, Beijing may feel like it lacks the luxury of time it had with Hong Kong.
"The political pressures on the Chinese government when it comes to Taiwan are tremendous and growing. In the past, Chinese people knew that China was weak and could not stop the United States from selling weapons to Taiwan. Now many believe that China should no longer tolerate such insulting behavior," wrote Jia Qingguo, associate dean at the school of international studies at Peking University, in the 2014 book Debating China.
"Because national unification is an important source of political legitimacy, the [Communist Party] could face a serious domestic political crisis if it does not handle the Taiwan issue deftly."
Xi Jinping, China's most powerful and assertive leader in decades, may be keen on resolving the issue once and for all.
In October 2013, Xi said the problems caused by the cross-strait issue should not be handed on from generation to generation.
"The question is, was Xi shifting away from [his predecessor] Hu Jintao's policy of patience?" asks Alan D. Romberg, director of the East Asia program at the Stimson Center and a former State Department official.
Internationally, too, the timing is propitious.
As tensions increase between China and its neighbors over territorial disputes in the East and South China Seas, "this has diverted the attention away from Taiwan -- very few people talk about it anymore," says Stokes. (Both China and Taiwan agree that the Japanese Senkakus belong to Taiwan. The only marked difference between China's and Taiwan's claim is who owns Taiwan.)
There's increased pressure to make progress before Ma -- who will likely be succeeded by a less China-friendly politician -- leaves office in 2016.
So what will China do?
Beijing's representative at the Feb. 11 meeting, Zhang Zhijun, said both sides should have "a little more imagination" without elaborating.
The only concrete takeaway so far is that both sides have agreed to set up representative offices "as soon as possible," though it is unclear when.
One thing "imagination" probably does not mean is war: It is extremely unlikely that China will invade Taiwan in the near term.
The mountainous island would have a lot of advantages in that fight.
The Taiwanese could focus on asymmetrical capabilities, good beach defenses, and smaller units that are difficult to target.
Even if the United States decided not to intervene, a Chinese victory would not be assured.
In October 2013, Taiwan released a national defense report stating that Beijing would be able to mount a comprehensive cross-strait offensive by 2020.
If China were to succeed in a military campaign against Taiwan, it would create a tremendous amount of resentment, not only in Taiwan, but around the region -- belying Beijing's assertion that China's rise will be peaceful.
Ultimately, China will win if it can convince Taiwan to give in without a fight: through economic cooperation, technology sharing, and, if Beijing can improve its image, a chance for Taiwan to be a part of greater China. "The whole point of China's policy is to try to create an environment where people in Taiwan want to unify," said Romberg.
For Taiwan, the greatest danger is not military attack, but that Beijing "might exploit its growing power to 'intimidate Taiwan into submission' on China's terms," Richard Bush, a former head of the American Institute of Taiwan, the private corporation that manages U.S. interests on the island, said in January, according to the newspaper Taipei Times.
Chen of National Chengchi University believes "the only option -- indeed a risky one -- is to engage China, further integrate into her economic and social systems, and change her political and ideological architecture from within."
A liberalized or democratic China would treat Taiwan differently -- but drastic political change in Beijing is unlikely.
"Barring an unexpected event, the prospects for continued independence in Taiwan do not look good," Dreyer says.
As China continues to expand in influence, the world increasingly sees the Middle Kingdom, rather than the United States, as the future.
When large numbers of Taiwanese begin to do the same, that's checkmate.

http://chinhdangvu.blogspot.ca/2014/02/ ... um=twitter

[member_19686]

Filipinos back Manila's move to confront China over South China Sea
Poll shows popularity of decision to challenge China's claims in UN-backed tribunal
By Raissa Robles

A majority of Filipinos back the Philippine government's move to challenge China's territorial claims over the South China Sea before an international arbitration court, according to the results of a poll released yesterday.
The poll also showed that Filipinos did not trust China much.
Philippine pollster Social Weather Stations said 81 per cent of Filipinos it surveyed backed last January's decision to challenge Beijing's claims in the South China Sea in the UN-backed tribunal.
Philippine foreign affairs spokesman Raul Hernandez said the results proved "that taking a principled stance, one that is based on respecting the rule of law and pursuing a peaceful settlement of disputes, strongly resonates with the Filipino people".
Partly commissioned by the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs, the nationwide survey of 1,550 respondents was held from December 1 to 16.
Releasing the results, the president of the polling company, Mahar Mangahas, said the survey showed a high awareness level of the South China Sea dispute.
Some 73 per cent of respondents said they were aware of the dispute and 61 per cent said they knew the Philippines had filed a case before the UN tribunal.
Mangahas said respondents had given China a net trust rating of minus 17 per cent, the lowest rating among six nations with whom the Philippines has important dealings.
He said previous surveys had shown that China's trust rating had fallen into negative territory in 2012.
In the latest survey, the US topped the "most trustworthy" list with 82 per cent of respondents choosing the country.
Australia was next, chosen by 53 per cent of those surveyed. Japan was chosen by 47 per cent of respondents, Taiwan by 11 per cent and Malaysia by 8 per cent.
The survey was held after the US had responded in a big way following Typhoon Haiyan.
The country sent aircraft, ships and troops to help out with rescue work.
Mangahas said the trust survey was part of the pollster's regular survey and had not been commissioned by the Philippine government.
The survey results came as China condemned US Pacific Air Force commander Herbert Carlisle for his "irresponsible remarks" over a possible declaration by Beijing of an air defence zone over the South China Sea.
Beijing set up an air defence identification zone in the East China Sea in November.
Amid concern Beijing might do the same to assert territorial claims in the South China Sea, Carlisle said on Sunday that such a step would be "very provocative".

http://chinhdangvu.blogspot.ca/2014/02/ ... um=twitter

[SSridhar]

Sri Lanka to Sign Landmark Trade Pact with China - Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu

China has said it will take forward plans to boost maritime connectivity with Sri Lanka, where it is already building a major port project, with both countries this week also agreeing to deepen economic links and sign a landmark Free Trade Agreement (FTA) before the end of the year.

A push for closer economic ties was emphasised during this week’s four-day visit by Sri Lankan Foreign Minister G.L. Peiris to Beijing.

Mr. Peiris said on Thursday a feasibility study for the FTA was “on the verge of completion.”

“It will be a landmark, historic achievement since the Rubber-Rice Pact in 1952,” he told the state-run Xinhua news agency.

The Sri Lankan Foreign Minister hailed China’s support, particularly following the end of the civil war in 2009, saying it was “among the nations contributing most to Sri Lanka’s economy” in terms of development assistance.

China is now the biggest provider of loans to Sri Lanka, overtaking countries such as India and Japan that had earlier been the largest source of financing for infrastructure projects.

Today Beijing is involved in projects ranging from roads and railways to the massive port project in Hambantota, with investments amounting to $4 billion according to state media reports.

Both sides also discussed building a “21st century maritime silk road,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying told reporters. This would involve boosting “maritime interconnectivity,” besides working together on disaster prevention and expanding people-to-people exchanges.The visit of Mr. Peiris this week had been somewhat overshadowed by next month’s United Nations Human Rights Council meeting, where the United States is expected to put forward a resolution criticising the country’s post-war right record.

The main objective of his trip to China was seen by many analysts here as aimed at reinforcing Chinese support to Sri Lanka ahead of the UNHRC meet.

China, which was among 14 countries elected to serve on the 47-member UNHRC in November for a three-year term, has been among the most vocal backers of the Sri Lankan government amid increasing international criticism of the post-war reconciliation process and the human rights situation.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi this week underlined that support, telling Mr. Peiris that China opposed “some countries’ interference,” without directly naming the U.S., “in the internal affairs of Sri Lanka under the pretext of human rights issues.”

[raj.devan]

A hard-line, anti-Western documentary film produced by the Chinese military called “Silent Contest,” circulated online in October 2013, revealed a troubling war-thirsty mind-set among the military

Does anyone have a link to this video, preferably one with subtitles? It would give an insight into the PLA's sentiments and intentions.

[member_19686]

Propaganda Documentary Silent Contest Deleted

The online release of the purported documentary film
"Silent Contest", produced by the Chinese military,
has been the cause of much controversy.

However, a few days after its release, the film has been
blocked by Chinese mainstream media for unclear reasons,
leading many speculate about the cause...

The movie used extremely pointed rhetoric
reminiscent of Mao's Cultural Revolution.
It says that China is being completely infiltrated and
subverted by the US.
The film also classified China's complicated social conflicts,
the CCP officials' corruption, human rights protests,
the spread of Christianity, and people's urging for the launch
of a constitutional government, as a U.S. infiltration conspiracy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5HaFeEgj00

Here is the doc, no subtitles:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_8lSjcoSW8

[Rony]

Feb 13 is considered by occupied tibetans as their lost independence day

[raj.devan]

Propaganda Documentary Silent Contest Deleted

The online release of the purported documentary film
"Silent Contest", produced by the Chinese military,
has been the cause of much controversy.

However, a few days after its release, the film has been
blocked by Chinese mainstream media for unclear reasons,
leading many speculate about the cause...

The movie used extremely pointed rhetoric
reminiscent of Mao's Cultural Revolution.
It says that China is being completely infiltrated and
subverted by the US.
The film also classified China's complicated social conflicts,
the CCP officials' corruption, human rights protests,
the spread of Christianity, and people's urging for the launch
of a constitutional government, as a U.S. infiltration conspiracy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5HaFeEgj00

Here is the doc, no subtitles:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_8lSjcoSW8

Couldn't figure out much without the subtitles, although the lifted soundtrack from 'Game of Thrones' gave an ominous backdrop.

One the topic of Chinese local language media propaganda directed against India, the following slightly old video is interesting. Again, there are no subtitles, but the visuals are enough. 0:00 to 2:35 shows a Chinese unit undergoing what looks like Hell's Week training. But 2:35 onwards it shows a joint training exercise between Indian and PLA troops. While it tries to disguises itself as a straight forward report about the joint exercise, the manner in which the visuals have been edited makes it clear that the intent is to put the Indians vaguely in bad light.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yWtXquUK_Q

[rajrang]

The US India relationship appears to be going back to the pre President Bush Jr. era of benign neglect.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 533211.cms

If India does not want to be on the strategic side of the US (especially in its affairs with China), then the US does not regard India as a friend. Maybe a lukewarm, unreliable friend who is always calculating a cost benefit analysis for every move. (In contrast India did not make such calculations in its relations with the former USSR.) A combination of an inability (unwillingness?) of the US to understand Indian mindset (which maximizes avoidance of conflict at all costs) and Indian strategic timidity.

India may still be able to import arms from the US because it helps the US economy, does not threaten the US/West and potentially gives India some spine to at least partially stand up to China.

Even the Japan-India-US trilateral is still alive because Japan wants it, because of their problems with China, not because India wants it. Japan is hoping a stronger India will be better able to stand up to China. The US also shares this view, that is why US allows exports of advanced technology arms to India but stops short of engaging India uselessly in various forums. After all India may attend these forums and then go and tell China what the US is thinking! After all India wants to be everybody's friend (even if they kick sand in your eyes).

India may have a long three year wait for the next US President to try to improve relations. However, as an outside chance, with a new Indian PM, hopefully with an understanding of geopolitics and a strong decisive Indian Government, things may change.

[member_19686]

Vietnamese People Remember 35th Anniversary Of Chinese Invasion
Posted on February 16, 2014 by eyedrd


How China is perceived by Vietnamese

http://eyedrd.org/2014/02/vietnamese-pe ... um=twitter

[SSridhar]

Jane Goodall Lashes Out at China - AFP, The Hindu

China is exploiting Africa's resources just like European colonisers did, with disastrous effects for the environment, acclaimed primatologist Jane Goodall said.

On the eve of her 80th birthday, the fiery British wildlife crusader is whizzing across the world giving a series of lectures on the threats to our planet.

And the rising world power's involvement on the continent especially raises alarms when it comes to her beloved chimpanzees and wildlife habitats.

During the last decade China has been investing heavily in African natural resources, developing mines, and oil wells.

Activists accuse Chinese firms of paying little attention to the environmental impact of their race for resources

“In Africa, China is merely doing what the colonialist did. They want raw materials for their economic growth, just as the colonialists were going into Africa and taking the natural resources, leaving people poorer,” she said.

The stakes for the environment may even be larger this time round, she warns.

“China is bigger, and the technology has improved... It is a disaster.”

Other than massive investment in Africa's mines, China is also a big market for elephant tusks and rhino horn, which has driven poaching of these animals to alarming heights.

Remains optimistic

But Goodall, who rose to fame through her ground-breaking research on chimpanzees in Tanzania, is optimistic. “I do believe China is changing,” she said, citing as one example Beijing's recent destruction of illegal ivory stockpiles.

“I think 10 years ago, even with international pressure, we would never have had an ivory crush. But they have,” she added. “I think 10 years ago the government would never have banned shark fin soup on official occasions. But they have.”

Her organisation Roots and Shoots, founded over two decades ago to instil conservation values in children, has also become involved in China. “We work with hundreds of Chinese children, and they are not different from children we work with here. They all love nature, they love animals, they want to help, there's no difference because they're Chinese,” she said.

[SSridhar]

Japan & ASEAN Reach Disaster, Terror Deal - Japan Times

The meeting was held in Okinawa for the first time — a location seen as strategically important, given China’s increasingly assertive sea and airspace activities.

Ryota Takeda, parliamentary vice minister of defense, told the gathering that there have been “unilateral attempts to change the status quo by force,” a reference to China.

Japan and ASEAN covered various topics ranging from post-disaster technical support in infrastructure-building to the introduction of Japanese defense equipment such as infrared radars and unmanned robots to clear explosives.

“We hope to deepen and enhance cooperation, as ASEAN countries are Japan’s partners that share basic values and strategic interests,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said in a message delivered to the meeting in Ginowan.

As part of Abe’s planned reworking of defense policy to bolster the capabilities of the Self-Defense Forces and increase its presence abroad, the government is expected to set new rules on arms exports that will ease restrictions on transferring defense equipment to other countries.

The ministry official said Japan had explained its ongoing review of the restrictive policy on arms exports, and gained support.

The Defense Ministry plans to showcase defense equipment at an Air Self-Defense Force base in Naha on Wednesday to explain how Japan conducts surveillance and warning activities in the East China Sea.

China appears to be at the forefront of Abe’s defense vision, bolstering the case for Japan to strengthen ties with ASEAN. Tokyo and Beijing remain staunchly at odds over the sovereignty of the Japanese-administered Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, known as Diaoyu in Chinese, with patrol ships and airplanes shadowing each other.

Other ASEAN member states, notably Vietnam and the Philippines, are tackling similar maritime challenges because they too have been embroiled in territorial disputes with Beijing in the South China Sea.

[SSridhar]

Vietnam Deploys Dancers to Thwart anti-China Protests - Japan Times

Anti-China protesters hoping to lay wreaths at a famous statue in the Vietnamese capital on Sunday were obstructed by an unusual sight of ballroom dancers and an energetic aerobics class held to a thumping sound system.

The demonstrators suspect the government deployed the dancers as a way to stop them from getting close to the statue and make their speeches inaudible. The few who tried to get close to the statue of Ly Thai To, the founder of Hanoi and a nationalist icon, were shooed away.

The protesters were marking the 35th anniversary of a bloody border war between China and Vietnam, where anger over Beijing’s increasingly assertive territorial claims on islands in the South China Sea — islands that Hanoi insists belong to it — is already running high.

Relations with China, Vietnam’s ideological ally and major trading partner, are a highly sensitive domestic political issue for Hanoi’s rulers. They don’t want anger on the street against China to spread to other areas of its repressive rule.

Nguyen Quang A, a well-known dissident, and others attending the rally in Hanoi on Sunday said the government deployed the dancers at the statue of Ly Thai To, and at another statue nearby, to prevent them gathering there. The tactic appeared to be part of a low-key approach to policing the event to avoid confrontation. There were scores of plainclothes security officers at the rally, but very few wearing uniform.

Quang said he asked the dancers to stop for a few minutes, but that they refused.

Last year the government organized old women to hold a street protest to prevent a visiting U.S. government official from reaching a dissident’s house, where he was due to talk to him about Hanoi’s human rights record.

Around 70 people took part in Sunday’s rally close to Hoan Kiem Lake in downtown Hanoi.

They shouted anti-China slogans, and took video and photos of each other to be posted on dissident blogs and Facebook pages. After around 90 minutes, they managed to lay their wreaths commemorating the Vietnamese dead in the war at a pagoda before dispersing.

Earlier anti-China protests in the capital have resulted in demonstrators being dragged into buses or scuffles. The government is keen to avoid such images spreading on social media because they make it seem it is defending China against nationalist anger, which is widespread among many Vietnamese.

[SSridhar]

China for Border Code of Conduct, India Mum - Indrani Bagchi, ToI

China has suggested drawing up a code of conduct with India on the disputed border. This is expected to govern the behaviour of troops and personnel of both countries on the border. The proposal was made during the recent special representatives talks between Shivshankar Menon and Yang Jiechi.

While the Indian side is "studying" it, nobody is clear whether its actually necessary or why a new code is needed less than a year after both sides signed a border defence cooperation agreement (BDCA).

Late in 2012, the Chinese proposed a border defence pact with India which would supplant the previous pacts signed since 1993. India was initially reluctant, but after the Depsang incident in April 2013, it decided to go ahead with the agreement with China, which was finally inked when PM Manmohan Singh visited Beijing in October.

The proposed code of conduct is expected to cover operating procedures for both sides on the disputed border, including the use of offensive equipment and sophisticated surveillance systems. India is more receptive to the agreement this time around, indicating that China's initiatives on the border, while sometimes aggressive, are also less threatening.

For its part, India wants to ensure that any agreement on behaviour should ensure that there is no flare-up on the border. Patrolling by both sides has become more aggressive in recent years. Although China has had a head start, India has been playing catch-up on border infrastructure, including raising an entire strike corps.

The defence establishments of China and India will be meeting on February 24 for the next round of defence talks in New Delhi. This will dovetail into the strategic and economic dialogue in early March. Later this year, India is expecting a visit by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang to keep up the momentum of high level engagement. A maritime dialogue has also been proposed.

At a time when India is building its infrastructure and forming MSC etc., it should not tie itself into unnecessary knots through innocuous sounding agreements.