Managing Chinese Threat

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 24 May 2014 16:54

China wishes Modi; Keen on boosting ties - Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu

China on Friday congratulated Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi, with Foreign Minister Wang Yi meeting Indian Ambassador Ashok Kantha here to convey the wishes of President Xi Jinping and the Chinese leadership.

Mr. Wang told Mr. Kantha that China was keen “on strengthening” ties with the new government set to take office in New Delhi.

Premier Li Keqiang is expected to speak to Mr. Modi after his swearing-in next week. The Chinese government is keen on reciprocating the fact that India was among the first countries to formally wish the new leadership under President Xi and Premier Li Keqiang when they took over in March last year.

‘New chapter’

Mr. Xi is expected to make his first visit to India as President this year, with the trip being seen by Chinese officials as laying the groundwork to craft a new chapter in ties with Mr. Modi’s government.

At Friday’s meeting, Mr. Kantha also expressed India’s “strong condemnation” of Thursday’s terror attack on Urumqi, in western Xinjiang, that left at least 31 people dead, saying India opposed “terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.”

rajrang · Post by **rajrang** » 24 May 2014 21:37

Isn't it odd that China congratulates PM Modi one week after other countries - and that too via the Indian Ambassador? Heads of other countries made personal phone calls on May 16 itself. Perhaps India or democracy or both make them insecure?

member_19686 · Post by **member_19686** » 25 May 2014 07:05

China Strategic Interest in Cambodia

Cambodia is pivotal to China’s strategies to project greater inuence in SoutheastAsia, buffer longstanding rivals, and potentially tame America’s hegemony. China’stransformation from regional backwater into inuential global actor raises concernsfor many countries. As expected, the rise of a powerful regional player makes tradi-tional hegemonic countries anxious...
.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/57682175/Chin ... n-Cambodia

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 25 May 2014 11:26

China fighters in dangerous brush with Japanese planes - AFP, ToI

Japan on Sunday accused China of "dangerous" manoeuvres above the disputed East China Sea after a Chinese fighter flew within roughly 30 metres (100 feet) of a Japanese military aircraft.

A Japanese defence ministry spokesman said that a Chinese SU-27 jet on Saturday flew close by a Japanese OP-3C surveillance plane above the waters where the countries' air defence identification zones overlap.

Another Chinese SU-27 fighter also flew close by a Japanese YS-11EB plane in the same airspace, the ministry said.

One fighter jet flew about 50 metres and the other was as close as 30 metres to the Japanese planes, according to the spokesman.

The incidents come as relations between Japan and China are strained amid a territorial dispute over Tokyo-controlled islands in the East China Sea.

"They were dangerous acts that could lead to an accident," Japanese Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera told reporters on Sunday.

"The Japanese crew reported that the fighters were flying with missiles, which raised the tension as they handled the situation.

"I consider the (Chinese fighters) acted out of rule." Tokyo protested Beijing over the incidents through diplomatic channels, he said.

The Chinese fighters did not enter the Japanese zone, according to the Asahi Shimbun daily.

The two Japanese aircraft were monitoring a joint naval drill by China and Russia in the northern East China Sea near Japanese territorial waters, Kyodo News said, citing an unnamed government source.

Samudragupta · Post by **Samudragupta** » 25 May 2014 13:59

rajrang wrote:Isn't it odd that China congratulates PM Modi one week after other countries - and that too via the Indian Ambassador? Heads of other countries made personal phone calls on May 16 itself. Perhaps India or democracy or both make them insecure?

This is how the Middle Kingdom treats the rise of people it consider as regional satraps....

Agnimitra · Post by **Agnimitra** » 25 May 2014 14:33

Samudragupta wrote:This is how the Middle Kingdom treats the rise of people it consider as regional satraps....

Is that so? Any other such examples? Hu Jintao congratulated Kim Jong Un on the day he assumed the newly created post of "First Secretary of the Worker's Party of Korea." Heck, the humourless official Chinese media even congratulated Kim when they saw a piece in The Onion calling Kim the "sexiest man alive"!

So, just curious why you say the Chinese are treating Modi as a "regional satrapy". Its true that Modi is close to China, expressed being "abhari" to them before, so there are questions about the equation. Its a rather odd way to convey congratulations, and rather late.

member_19686 · Post by **member_19686** » 26 May 2014 03:57

[youtube]g_jm39mG46M&feature=youtu.be&t=1m4s[/youtube]

Chinese Haier company hoisting the Japanese flag in Vietnam to ward off irate Vietnamese.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 26 May 2014 16:06

Abe to break out 15 'collective defence' contingencies to woo skeptical Komeito - Japan Times

As part of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s push to get Japan a greater security role overseas, the government is planning to present 15 military contingency scenarios at the ruling coalition’s ongoing talks this week, a source said.

The scenarios include one in which the Self-Defense Forces protect U.S. vessels in a military emergency when a neighboring country is preparing to launch a ballistic missile, the government source said Saturday.

Another involves the SDF protecting U.S. vessels carrying Japanese on the high seas, the source said.

The government disclosed 10 similar scenarios last week to suggest that Japan might have to break the Constitution and exercise its right to collective self-defense.

This time, the new cases will focus mostly on SDF protection of U.S. ships but drop one of the two scenarios that involved so-called gray zone incidents that stop short of full-fledged military attacks.

The government hopes the cases will help it persuade New Komeito, the junior coalition partner of Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party, to agree to reinterpreting war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution in backing Abe’s contentious security revamp.

Of the 10 cases presented last week, the government has decided to exclude a gray-zone scenario in which foreign submarines enter Japanese waters and refuse to leave despite repeated warnings, apparently out of consideration to arguments made by a skeptical New Komeito, the source said.

In informal talks with the two parties, the government decided to drop the scenario out of concern that any involvement by SDF personnel in such a case could lead to escalation of the situation, the source said.

As one of the key measures for seeking a greater security role for Japan overseas, the government aims to legalize the use of collective self-defense by reinterpreting or bypassing the war-renouncing Constitution.

A panel of security experts, handpicked by Abe, last week called for lifting the ban imposed by Article 9. Their approach to the issue appears to be based on a simple argument: that individual self-defense and collective self-defense are one and the same {The last sentence is a coup. Fantastic}.

vijaykarthik · Post by **vijaykarthik** » 27 May 2014 12:03

China at it again. Crazy idiots.

Chinese vessel rams into Vietnamese fishing boat and sinks it

A Chinese fishing vessel rammed and sank a Vietnamese fishing boat in the disputed South China Sea, Vietnamese state media reported Tuesday, in an incident likely to sharpen already dangerously high tensions between the two nations over their overlapping claims in the waters.

The reports in the Tuoi Tre newspaper and other media said the incident occurred about 18 miles (30km) from a large oil rig China deployed on 1 May in a section of the sea claimed by both countries. The move by Beijing infuriated Hanoi and set off violent anti-China protests.

China's official Xinhua news agency countered that the Vietnamese vessel capsized after "harassing and colliding" with the Chinese boat.

"Crew aboard the boat were saved after their ship jostled a fishing boat from Dongfang city in southern China's Hainan province and overturned in the waters near China's Xisha Islands," Xinhua said, citing a government source.

China's government had launched solemn representations with Vietnam over the incident, Xinhua said.

A Vietnamese coastguard officer said earlier on Tuesday that the Chinese boat had rammed and sunk the Vietnamese fishing vessel.

Vietnam sent patrol ships to confront the rig and China has deployed scores of vessels to protect it. The two sides have been involved in a tense standoff, with boats occasionally colliding.

The countries have long sparred over who owns what in the oil and gas-rich waters. Incidents between fishing crews are common.

Tuoi Tre said about 40 Chinese fishing boats surrounded a group of Vietnamese vessels on Monday afternoon. One rammed into the Vietnamese, tossing 10 fishermen into the water and sinking the boat. The fishermen were picked by the other Vietnamese boats and there were no injuries.

Since 1 May Vietnam has accused China of ramming into or firing water cannon at Vietnamese vessels trying to get close to the rig, damaging several boats and injuring fisheries surveillance officers. Vietnamese authorities have shown video footage of some of the incidents. China accuses Vietnam of doing the same.

China claims nearly all of the South China Sea as its own, bringing it into conflict with the far smaller nations of Vietnam, the Philippines and three others that have rival claims. In recent years it has been more assertive in pressing its claims in the waters and resisting attempts to negotiate.

The United States, which has launched its own military "pivot to Asia" partly in response to China's rising military might, called the deployment of the rig "provocative".

Vietnam is trying to rally regional and international support against Beijing but its options are limited because China is its largest trading partner.

Me thinks China going full swing ~~with their 9" thing~~ with their 9-dash line strategy. Such brutal arrogance. I really feel for the Japanese and they need some sensibility and the first thing to solve will indeed be Article 9. It doesn't hold water anymore considering their neighbor is hungry for stupidity, a fight and territory.

Yagnasri · Post by **Yagnasri** » 27 May 2014 12:20

China is over playing its hand now. Peaceful raise is not longer so "peaceful" for others. Others will slowly push back and Panda is not going to get a walkover irrespective what it does.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 27 May 2014 17:10

Oh, earlier there was a 'peaceful resolution' in Tibet !

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 28 May 2014 13:24

Sinking of Vietnamese ship fans China tensions - Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu

Tensions between China and Vietnam over the disputed South China Sea have heightened this week with both countries trading accusations over the sinking of a Vietnamese fishing boat near islands at the centre of a recent spat.

The Vietnamese government, which has been protesting the deployment of an oil rig by China off the contested Paracel Islands in the South China Sea, said on Tuesday 40 Chinese fishing boats had rammed the vessel, causing it to sink. The 10 fishermen on board had been saved by nearby fishing boats, the government said.

China disputed that account, with the official Xinhua news agency saying that the fishing boat had “harassed and collided” with Chinese vessels.

China has in recent days accused Vietnam of sending ships to disrupt its oil rig off the Paracel Islands, which Beijing claims. Hanoi has opposed the deployment, saying the waters were within its exclusive economic zone, around 200 nautical miles from its coastline.

On Tuesday, the Chinese operator of the oil rig, China Oilfield Services Limited (COSL), said the rig had moved to a different location as it had finished its first round of drilling. While the COSL did not say where the rig had been moved to, the announcement signalled the possibility of easing of tensions if the new location was beyond disputed waters.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 29 May 2014 00:18

Its very auspicious Mahurat to gift few Brahmos to Friend Vietnam. They can use them as they please.

anupmisra · Post by **anupmisra** » 29 May 2014 01:17

China sentences 55 people in mass Xinjiang trial - Tellibunny style.

Fifty-five people in China's north-western Xinjiang province have been found guilty of terrorism, separatism and murder

The defendants, who appeared to be from the region's Muslim Uighur community, were presented to a stadium holding about 7,000 spectators

Wow! Presented to 7000 spectators. Mass justice! What's next? Public flogging? Mao's Cultural Revolution redux.

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 29 May 2014 03:42

From WSJ
What you may have missed: Narendra Modi’s message to China
Through his diplomatic gestures and one specific ministerial appointment, Modi has sent a clear declaration of intent to Beijing

..But the smartest move that Modi has made vis-à-vis China—and which hardly anyone seems to have understood the significance of so far—is giving former army chief V.K. Singh an apparently strange combination of portfolios. Singh will be minister of state with independent charge of the north east, and also be minister of state in the external affairs ministry under Sushma Swaraj.
As China continues to refuse to recognise Arunachal Pradesh as an integral part of India, and builds military-grade highways that can rapidly move tanks and heavy artillery to India’s border, it’s absolutely the perfect stratagem to put a former army chief in charge of the region. This should give the Chinese some pause.
And his additional responsibility in the external affairs ministry is a brilliant piece of thinking. In effect, Modi has made a committed Indian soldier our man for China. The People’s Liberation Army may now think twice before sending in troops miles inside Ladakh and camp there for a week and saunter back, sneering at India’s supine indecisiveness. China’s strategy for long has been to push India and see how far we can be pushed. So far, the message that our neighbour has got is that we can be pushed very far indeed. That message gets altered dramatically now in one stroke.
This is Modi’s message to China. One, we will not be sitting around any longer watching you bead your string of pearls around India, and we will try to reclaim some of the pearls. Two, don’t expect to be getting those old jollies any more, of pushing us and strolling away, whistling merrily. Many in India may not have understood Modi’s intent, but the wise men in Beijing surely will.

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 29 May 2014 03:43

Hmmm.. PeeAref may be read in certain quarters, I guess.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 29 May 2014 17:14

From NightWatch for the night of May 28, 2014

China: Today, Chinese police sentenced 55 people for crimes that included terrorism, murder, separatism, harboring criminals, extremism and rape. The Chinese chose to make a public spectacle and example of the criminals by holding the proceedings in a stadium filled with 7,000 people in Ili Prefecture in Xinjiang.

Chinese newspapers reported that on 26 May subway authorities began enforcing passenger and luggage checks for riders at three heavily used stations in Beijing. The security checks have doubled commute times. Three Uighur terrorist attacks against train stations are responsible for the increased security and inconvenience, according to the press.

Comment: What relate the two stories, aside from their connection to Uighur terrorism, are the measures the Chinese are prepared to take to try to stop the terrorists and maintain public confidence in the government. The last time China used mass public trials was during the social upheavals in the late 1980's and the early 1990's that accompanied economic reform.

The attacks are dangerous, but even worse are the dangers of public panic and of a breakdown in public confidence in the authorities in a population the size of China's.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 29 May 2014 18:26

Chinese Premier, Li Keqiang, Calls up Modi - Ananth krishnan, The Hindu

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday afternoon had a telephonic conversation with Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, in which he described China as “a priority” in India's foreign policy and also extended an invitation to President Xi Jinping to visit India later this year.

Mr. Li is the first foreign leader to call Mr. Modi following his swearing in, Indian officials said, although leaders of SAARC countries were invited to Monday's ceremony.

During the phone call, at 1:15 pm IST on Thursday afternoon, Mr. Li congratulated Mr. Modi and “conveyed the Chinese government’s desire to establish robust partnership with the new government of India,” the Indian Embassy in Beijing said in a statement.

Mr. Modi said China “was always a priority in India’s foreign policy,” and stressed his government’s “resolve to utilise the full potential of our Strategic and Cooperative Partnership with China.”

He expressed his desire for closer economic engagement with China, and to resolve “outstanding” issues by working closely with Beijing.

Whether or not Mr. Modi's government will be able to make progress on the long running boundary dispute is one issue being followed closely in China.

Mr. Modi also extended an invitation for President Xi Jinping to visit New Delhi, which is likely to happen later this year.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 30 May 2014 07:31

Narendra Modi Charms Chinese Premier Li Keqiang with Hieun Tsang Story - Sachin Parashar, ToI

After flooring the neighbourhood by inviting Saarc leaders for his swearing-in, Prime Minister Narendra Modi enthralled Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Thursday when he referred to the memoirs of 7th century Chinese scholar Hiuen Tsang to underline the importance of ties between the two countries.

The conversation took place at the initiative of Li, who wanted to congratulate Modi. The telephone conversation was Modi's first with a foreign head of government since taking over as Prime Minister of India.

Modi told the premier that Hiuen had even visited his village Vadnagar in Gujarat, top government sources told TOI. Modi is apparently familiar with Hiuen's memoirs which he wrote after travelling all over India during his stay of close to 15 years in the country.

Largely forgotten in China, Hiuen is remembered in India for the most authoritative and captivating account of social, economic and political conditions in India in the 7th century.

Modi and Li hit it off so well that the conversation lasted for about 30 minutes.

Modi mentioned Hiuen's visit to his village to emphasize the importance he attached to ties with China. He told Li China would be a priority country for him.

Any talk about the civilizational links between the two countries is incomplete without a reference to Hiuen. By mentioning Hiuen's visit to his village, Modi has in a way made himself central to India's foreign policy imperatives on China.

The government also confirmed after the conversation that foreign minister Sushma Swaraj would meet her counterpart Wang Yi in the second week of June. Wang will come as a special envoy of President Xi Jinping who is expected to visit India later this year. Li said China wanted to have a robust relationship with India.

"Noting that China was always a priority in India's foreign policy, he (Modi) underlined his government's resolve to utilize the full potential of our strategic and cooperative Partnership with China and his keenness to work closely with the Chinese leadership to deal with any outstanding issues in our bilateral relations by proceeding from the strategic perspective of our developmental goals and long-term benefits to our peoples,'' said a press statement. Modi also welcomed greater economic engagement between the two countries.

The two leaders agreed to maintain frequent high-level exchanges and communication. Modi extended an invitation to President Xi Jinping through Premier Li to pay a visit to India later this year.

China probably poses the most serious strategic challenge to Modi in the form of its breakneck speed of growth and its rising influence in the neighbourhood but, it is believed, Modi also sees an economic opening for India in China's growth.

Li congratulated Modi on his victory in the recent general elections and conveyed the Chinese government's desire to establish a robust partnership with the new government of India for further development of relations between the two nations.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 30 May 2014 17:33

Abe to pitch for Japan as China's Counter - Japan Times

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe left Friday morning for Singapore to attend a three-day security summit for the Asia-Pacific region, where he will lay out a vision of Japan as a counterweight to the growing might of China.

Abe was planning to tell the so-called Shangri-La Dialogue {so called because it takes place in the Sahngri-La hotel on the Orchard Road in Singapore} that Japan and its partner the United States stand ready to bolster security cooperation with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

He was scheduled to deliver a keynote speech Friday night in which he would outline his vision for a Japan that can contribute more to global peace. He was also to explain why Japan is reviewing the legal constraints imposed by the pacifist Constitution amid the changing security landscape, officials said.

Before his departure, Abe said he would like to “send a message in the speech” that Japan “will never condone an attempt to change the status quo by force,” apparently referring to China’s increasing assertiveness.

He was to meet Friday with U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, while Defense Minister Onodera will hold talks with Hagel on Saturday.

The summit comes as domestic debate intensifies over whether Japan should exercise the right to collective self-defense in what would be a major departure from postwar pacifist policy.

Japan’s move to lift the ban on defending allies under armed attack has unnerved China and South Korea, which suffered from Japan’s wartime brutality. One of the tasks facing Abe is dispelling concerns that Tokyo may be reverting to militarism.

Any exchange of words between Tokyo and Beijing will also draw attention at the summit, as Chinese fighter jets recently flew unusually close to Self-Defense Forces airplanes over the East China Sea.

Japan said this week it is exploring whether it can accelerate a proposal to supply patrol boats for Vietnam, which is embroiled in a tense standoff of its own with China after Beijing moved an oil rig into disputed waters. In a similar deal, Japan agreed in December to lend ¥18.7 billion to the Philippines to purchase 10 Japanese-made boats.

The vessels are a tangible sign of Abe’s effort to deepen ties with Southeast Asia in the face of China’s expanding maritime ambitions. He was to stress Japan’s commitment to regional stability in his speech Friday night.

“China’s recent behavior has enabled Abe to push cooperation in a much more conspicuous way,” said Corey Wallace, a Japan and maritime security expert at the University of Auckland in New Zealand.

China claims nearly all of the South China Sea, bringing it into conflict with others in the region. The Philippines accused China in May of reclaiming land around a reef claimed by both countries. The feuds mirror China’s dispute in the East China Sea over the Senkaku Islands.

“What Japan is doing is being sympathetic to us, at the same time it’s also protecting its own interests, which is the Senkaku Islands,” Philippine Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin said in an interview in Manila.

The Philippines welcomes Japan’s expanded role, though the legacy of Japan’s brutal occupation of much of Asia before and during World War II make Gazmin wary of Japan going too far.

“We have to see,” he said. “We will have to follow it up so the direction would not be toward what happened before.”

Accompanying Abe, Onodera is expected to call on China in a speech Saturday to exercise restraint and ensure the rule of law.

Such a message is expected to be confirmed when Onodera and Hagel meet with their Australian counterpart, David Johnston. The defense chiefs of Japan, the United States, and South Korea will also hold talks during the gathering.{The US is making concerted efforts to get South Korea & Japan cooperate. Japan is all right but South Korea is reluctant}

On a bilateral basis, Onodera will meet with Johnston, along with the defense chiefs of Britain and Vietnam.

The summit is a forum for defense and military chiefs from the Asia-Pacific region and Europe to discuss security challenges and cooperation.

This year’s gathering comes after Chinese President Xi Jinping called earlier in the month for the creation of a new Asian security structure that includes Russia, but not the United States.

According to Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, Abe will call for “constructive discussions” to take the heat out of the rows that pit China against a number of ASEAN countries, as well as Tokyo against Beijing.

“Considering the heightening situations in the South China Sea and the East China Sea, we hope that various constructive discussions will take place toward this region’s peace and safety” at the forum, he said.

Since coming to power in late 2012, Abe has assiduously courted ASEAN, visiting all 10 member countries at least once.

He has still not been to China, nor met with Xi.

Some ASEAN members have been bolder than others in standing up to China; Vietnam and the Philippines have both proved willing to push back, despite their relative military weakness.

Others have been less keen to put their heads above the parapet for fear of angering Beijing.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 30 May 2014 17:42

New Japanese Agency to Modernize Arms Procurement

Japan plans to create an arms procurement agency to streamline Tokyo’s spending on defense-related hardware that will also promote military exports and take charge of advanced weapons research, two people with knowledge of the developing plan said.

One immediate aim of the new agency, to be set up as early as next year, would be to lower the outsized costs of buying equipment for Japan’s military at a time when Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is looking to counter China’s military buildup and bolster Japan’s claims to the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea.

“The goal is to cut costs. It (the agency) is being created to improve how we buy things,” said Akira Sato, a ruling Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker involved in formulating defense policy as the parliamentary vice defense minister.

Helping to win overseas business for defense contractors such as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the nation’s biggest, would go some way to realizing that ambition.

While arms procurement agencies exist in other nations, including South Korea and Australia, Japan’s military purchases have been less coordinated because of legal and political limits on its military rooted in Japan’s defeat in World War II.

Abe has made a priority of initiating more robust armed forces and less apologetic diplomacy after decades of restraint under the pacifist Constitution, and is calling for a review of legal limits on combat overseas.

The new proposed agency taking shape under Abe would combine currently separate procurement activities for the Maritime, Ground and Air self-defense forces, according to the people involved in the planning, who asked not to be identified.

The yet-to-be-named agency will also include oversight of the Technical Research and Development Institute, Japan’s main weapons research and development unit, with projects ranging from a homegrown stealth fighter to electronic warfare systems.

Staffed by as many as 2,000 people, the agency could tap outside advisers at Japanese corporations and foreign consultants such as Deloitte and KPMG with expertise in managing global supply chains, according to a source involved in the planning.

Abe, pressing to give the Self-Defense Forces a freer hand to come to the aid of allies in future conflicts, raised military spending by 2.6 percent over five years and invested in early-warning plans, beach assault vehicles and troop-carrying aircraft.

Because Japan’s defense contractors have been largely barred from exports and restricted to selling small lots of aircraft, tanks and other equipment to Japan’s armed forces, the costs per unit are often more than twice as much as those paid by other countries, according to industry experts in Japan.

France’s General Directorate for Disarmament, which takes the French acronym DGA and coordinates France’s role in Europe-wide arms development projects such as the Eurofighter while supporting French exports and evaluating equipment for use by the nation’s military, has been a model for the proposed Japanese agency, the sources said.

In March, Japan eased a ban on military exports that could open new markets for companies such as Mitsubishi Heavy and Kawasaki Heavy Industries.

One goal of that move, officials have said, was to bring down costs for the military by creating a larger market for key equipment. Japan’s participation in international projects so far has been limited to a handful of exceptions to export restrictions.

Among the projects the new agency will likely inherit is Japan’s participation as a supplier to Lockheed Martin Corp’s F-35 fighter jet, a nine-nation consortium, including firms in the United States, Britain, Italy, Turkey, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Norway and the Netherlands.

One goal of a new agency will be to win a bigger portion of work for Japanese firms on the project, one source said. Mitsubishi Heavy is expected to supply F-35 parts to Britain’s BAE Systems, which builds the rear fuselage of the stealth jet, sources said in January. This placed a Japanese company in an international military project for the first time.

Another major project is the joint development of an upgraded U.S. anti-ballistic missile, the SM-3 IIA, designed to destroy warheads above the Earth’s atmosphere. Japan is looking to deploy the antimissile defense against a possible strike from North Korea, officials have said.

With flight tests set to begin soon, a final decision on production could hinge on Japan’s willingness to allow sales to third countries deemed acceptable by the U.S. government, say defense industry analysts.

In the 20 years to 2012, Japan was the sixth-biggest military spender in the world, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. China, by contrast, leaped to second place from seventh after it hiked its defense spending more than five-fold

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 30 May 2014 18:42

China & Vietnam must solve maritime spat themselves: China - Straits Times

SINGAPORE - China and Vietnam have to find a way out for themselves and there is no room for the United States in their maritime spat, a senior Chinese official said.

Ms Fu Ying, chairman of the Chinese Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, made this strong statement on Friday in a debate on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue, a forum that brings together defence and security experts and officials from Asia, the United States and Australia.

Senator Ben Cardin, a member of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who was among the panelists, had said the US was concerned about any unilateral provocation by China even as he stressed that Washington does not side any country in the dispute.

“I don't think Ben can go there and solve it for us. China and Vietnam will have to find a way out,” responded Ms Fu.

Her comments came amid rising tensions between China and Vietnam over a Chinese oil rig deployed in disputed waters in the South China Sea earlier this month. It worsened this week when a Chinese ship rammed and sank a Vietnamese fishing boat that was operating within Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

“When China is confronted, China has to respond and respond effectively to protect China’s interests and also to prevent provocations from spilling over,” said Ms Fu, a former vice foreign minister. But she stressed: “But it is important to come back to dialogue and negotations.”

Mr Cardin, who was in Hanoi on Wednesday where he expressed concerns over the Sino-Vietnam tensions, said: “We don’t want to see unilateral actions taken to resolve sovereignty issues that can be resolved through internatonal norms.”

Also among the panelists were Singapore’s ambassador-at-large Tommy Koh and Mr Tarun Vijay, an MP from India’s ruling BJP.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 31 May 2014 01:18

Japan Offers Support to Nations in Disputes With China
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/31/world ... .html?_r=0

( Abe In Singapore)

TOKYO — Saying that his nation will play a larger role in regional security, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan said on Friday that his government would support Vietnam and other nations that have territorial disputes with China by providing patrol ships, training and military surveillance equipment.Mr. Abe, speaking at an international security meeting in Singapore, said he wanted Japan to shed the passiveness that has marked its diplomacy after World War II and take more responsibility for maintaining regional stability. He said Japan would cooperate with the United States and other like-minded nations like Australia and India to uphold international rule of law and freedom of navigation, and to discourage China’s increasingly assertive efforts to take control of islands and expanses of ocean that are claimed by other Asian nations, including Japan.
“Japan intends to play an even greater and more proactive role than it has until now in making peace in Asia and the world something more certain,” Mr. Abe said.
Referring to the Association for Southeast Asian Nations, he said, “Japan will offer its utmost support for efforts by Asean member countries to ensure the security of the seas and skies and rigorously maintain freedom of navigation and overflight.”

Japan has been stepping up efforts to serve as at least a partial counterbalance to China’s rising economic and military power in the region, by building new security ties with Australia and Southeast Asia and by serving as a more fully fledged ally of the United States. Japan has been moving slowly and carefully for years to set aside its postwar aversion to military power and play a larger security role in East Asia, a region still scarred by Japan’s brutal imperialism in the early 20th century.
Mr. Abe, a conservative, has sped up these efforts since he took office in December 2012 as part of his broader vision of changing Japan into a more “normal” nation that can defend itself and its allies. In his speech on Friday, he highlighted some recent changes he has made, including the recent lifting of a ban on the export of military hardware.China has recently increased its pursuit of territorial claims in nearby seas, leading to tense exchanges with neighboring countries. A map of some of the most notable disputes. “We are now able to send out Japan’s superb defense equipment,” he said, for purposes such as “rescue, transportation, vigilance, surveillance and minesweeping.” He said military equipment could be included in the aid that Japan would offer to Southeast Asian nations facing Chinese claims in the South China Sea.In particular, Mr. Abe said Japan wanted to provide patrol ships to Vietnam, which is now in a tense standoff with China over the sudden appearance of a Chinese oil drilling platform near a chain of small islands that both nations claim. He noted that Japan had already decided to provide 10 similar ships to the Philippines, which is trying to turn back Chinese efforts to control a different group of disputed islands. And Japan would help train the coast guards of Vietnam, the Philippines and other Asian nations, he said.“By doing so, the bonds between the people on the Japan side and the recipient side invariably become stronger,” Mr. Abe said.South Korea and China, which are closer geographically to Japan, have criticized Mr. Abe’s policy as an attempt to revive Japanese militarism, but his moves have met with a warmer welcome in Southeast Asia. Analysts say that for nations there, China’s increasingly aggressive territorial claims have begun to outweigh memories of Japan’s wartime aggression.

Mr. Abe has made building closer security ties in the region a pillar of his foreign policy. In his speech on Friday, he noted that he had visited 10 Southeast Asian nations last year, and that he was trying to build “a new special relationship” with Australia that includes joint military training and joint development of military equipment.

Prem · Post by **Prem** » 31 May 2014 01:21

http://www.livescience.com/45994-global ... hotos.html
Photos: US Military's Global Hawk Drones Arrive in Japan

To Keep eye on China and NOKO Nakhras.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 31 May 2014 11:21

Japan, Myanmar to boost defence ties - Japan Times

Japan’s military chief, Gen. Shigeru Iwasaki, met with Myanmar President Thein Sein on Wednesday, with Japanese diplomats saying they reaffirmed the two countries’ goals of enhancing defense cooperation and exchanges at every level.

The details of their talks in Naypyitaw, the country’s administrative capital, were not immediately available.

Iwasaki, chief of staff of the Self-Defense Forces, arrived in Naypyitaw on Monday for a four-day visit and met Tuesday with his Myanmar counterpart, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing.

In a statement, the Japanese Defense Ministry said the two generals discussed bilateral defense cooperation and agreed on “the importance of exchanges at every level between the Self-Defense Forces and Myanmar Armed Forces.”

That goal was set when Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited Myanmar in May last year, and it was reaffirmed when Thein Sein visited Japan the following December.

“The two generals shared the view that it is important to further develop relations between the two defense establishments by working on programs for defense cooperation,” the statement said.

Recent exchanges include last September’s port call at Yangon by a Maritime Self-Defense Force training squadron.

The ministry’s statement said Iwasaki and his Myanmar counterpart also exchanged views on the security situation in the Asia-Pacific region, agreeing “that solutions through dialogue are quite important for regional issues.”

They are believed to have discussed Japan’s sovereignty row with China over the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, as well as heated territorial and maritime disputes in the South China Sea, where China has been aggressively asserting its claims. Both topics were discussed between Abe and Thein Sein last December.

During the two leaders’ summit in May 2013, they said in a joint statement that they had “decided to enhance dialogue on regional issues and security in order to advance cooperation across the Asia-Pacific and the Indian Ocean.”

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 31 May 2014 11:32

US backs Abe; tells China to stop its destabilizing actions - Japan Times

SINGAPORE – The United States threw its weight on Saturday behind a push by Japan to take a more active role in regional security and bluntly warned China to halt destabilizing actions in support of territorial claims.

Using unusually strong language, U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told an Asia-Pacific security forum that the United States was committed to its geopolitical rebalance to the region and “will not look the other way when fundamental principles of the international order are being challenged.” {There had been concerns over the 'pivot' after Obama did not mention it at his West Point speech}

“In recent months, China has undertaken destabilizing, unilateral actions asserting its claims in the South China Sea,” he said in the speech to the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.

Hagel said the United States took no position on the merits of rival territorial claims in the region, but added: “We firmly oppose any nation’s use of intimidation, coercion, or the threat of force to assert these claims.”

On Friday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told the forum that Tokyo would offer its “utmost support” to Southeast Asian countries in their efforts to protect their seas and airspace, as he pitched his plan for Japan to take on a bigger international security role.

In a pointed dig at China, he said Japan would provide coast guard patrol boats to the Philippines and Vietnam, both of which have complained of Beijing’s aggression in disputed areas of the oil- and gas-rich South China Sea.

Abe also explained his controversial push to ease restrictions in Japan’s pacifist postwar Constitution that have kept its military from fighting overseas since World War II.

“Japan intends to play an even greater and more proactive role than it has until now in making peace in Asia and the world something more certain,” Abe said, referring to his “proactive pacifism” campaign.

Japan has its own territorial row with China over the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea.

China has said Abe’s government is using the islands dispute as an excuse to revive its military.

“He has made it into a bigger issue — that is, China as a country is posing a threat to Japan as a country,” Fu Ying, Beijing’s chief delegate to the forum, said on Friday. “He has made such a myth. And then with that as an excuse, (he is) trying to amend the security policy of Japan, that is what is worrying for the region and for China.”

Despite memories of Japan’s harsh wartime occupation of much of Southeast Asia, several countries in the region may view Abe’s message favorably because of China’s increasing assertiveness.

The United States, having to implement cuts to its vast military budget at a time of austerity, is keen to see allies play a greater role in security, and Hagel gave an enthusiastic U.S. endorsement to Abe’s speech.

“We … support Japan’s new effort to reorient its Collective Self Defense posture toward actively helping build a peaceful and resilient regional order,” Hagel said.

He also welcomed India’s increasingly active role in Asian institutions and growing defense capabilities. He said the United States looked forward to working with new Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and that he himself hoped to visit India later in the year.

Hagel said Asia-Pacific nations must cooperate in security in order to build a peaceful and prosperous future.

“We must continue to develop, share and maintain advanced military capabilities that can adapt to rapidly evolving challenges,” he said.

Hagel repeatedly stressed Obama’s commitment to the Asia-Pacific rebalance and said the strong U.S. military presence in the region would endure.

He said Washington would seek to uphold international rules and laws and stand up to aggression by helping to boost the security capabilities of allies and strengthening its own defense.

“To ensure that the rebalance is fully implemented, both President Obama and I remain committed to ensuring that any reductions in U.S. defense spending do not come at the expense of America’s commitments in the Asia-Pacific,” he said.

“Our friends and allies can judge us on nearly seven decades of history,” he said. “As history makes clear, America keeps its word.”

In spite of his strong criticisms of China, Hagel said the United States was increasing military-to-military engagement with Beijing to improve communication and build understanding.

“All nations of the region, including China, have a choice: to unite and recommit to a stable regional order, or, to walk away from that commitment and risk the peace and security that has benefited millions of people throughout the Asia Pacific, and billions around the world.”

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 31 May 2014 11:36

Singapore welcomes security role for Japan under US alliance - Straits Times

Singapore welcomes Japan's desire to contribute to peace and security in the region, within the framework of the US-Japan Security Alliance, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Saturday.

He made the remarks at a joint press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who is in Singapore for the annual Shangri-la Dialogue.

Mr Abe, giving the keynote speech on Friday night at the gathering for defence ministers and top military brass, had outlined his vision for a more robust Japanese role in the region's peace and security.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 31 May 2014 11:39

Vietnam mulling legal option to resolve maritime spat with China - Straits Times

SINGAPORE - Vietnam is still trying to bilaterally resolve a worsening spat with China over the positioning of an oil rig in disputed waters of the South China Sea, its defence minister has said.

But should such efforts fail, Vietnam would look for other solutions, including taking China to court, General Phung Quang Thanh told The Straits Times on the sidelines of the annual Shangri-La Dialogue.

Speaking through an interpreter, he said: "We are trying to solve the issue bilaterally with China through peaceful dialogue. But in case we cannot solve the situation by bilateral means, we have to find other solutions. However it must be a peaceful solution."

China moved an oil rig into waters disputed by Beijing and Hanoi in the South China Sea earlier this month. This sparked an acrimonious exchange of words between both countries, as well as a series of worrying skirmishes at sea.

Earlier this week, a Vietnamese fishing vessel sunk after colliding with a Chinese vessel. Both countries have blamed each other for the incident.

With no quick resolution in sight, there has been growing talk that Vietnam will take China to international court, following in the footsteps of the Philippines.

General Thanh, who is due to speak at the Shangri-La Dialogue, did not give an indication as to when Hanoi might make a final decision on whether to take legal action against Beijing.

"We are now considering the many solutions we can take," he added. "But we are considering (the legal option)."

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 01 Jun 2014 05:09

The Jiaolong, China's first manned deep-sea submersible, is a source of pride for the nation. But its mother ship has been unreliable, and Chinese officials have not offered the vessel for use in the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. (ChinaFotoPress)

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 01 Jun 2014 12:48

China wary of Japan's proactive role - Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu

Japan’s moves to take a more “proactive” security role in Asia, outlined by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s offer on Friday to supply Vietnam and the Philippines with naval patrol vessels, has brought a wary response from China, which is embroiled in maritime disputes with the three countries.

Mr. Abe, speaking at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore on Friday, a key regional security meet attended by defence ministers and military officials from the region as well as the United States, outlined a new and ambitious vision for Japan to play “an even greater and more proactive role than it has until now” in Asia.

While not directly referring to China through much of his address, the clear message from Mr. Abe was that his government was willing to play a more prominent role amid rising maritime disputes involving China and Asean countries such as Vietnam and the Philippines.

In another apparent reference to China, which is also involved in disputes with Japan over disputed East China Sea islands, Mr. Abe criticised “attempts to change the status quo through force or coercion” and said there “clearly… exist elements that spawn instability”.

His remarks drew a sharp response from Beijing on Saturday. “Listening to him, you can easily sense his nationalist ego behind the thin veil,” said People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Major General Yao Yunzhu, director of the Center on China-American Defense Relations at the Academy of Military Science, who is also attending the dialogue.

He also offered support to Vietnam, which has recently clashed with China over the sinking of one of its fishing vessels and the deployment of a Chinese oil rig in disputed waters, and the Philippines, which has also sparred with Beijing over competing claims in the South China Sea. Japan will offer the Philippines 10 patrol vessels, and will also offer vessels to Vietnam, he said. Mr. Abe specifically highlighted Japan’s close security ties with the U.S. and Australia, and also said he was eager to build both bilateral cooperation with India and closer three-way ties with India and the U.S. when he “welcomes Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Tokyo”. China’s official Xinhua news agency in a commentary on Saturday accused Mr. Abe of “trying to divide Asian countries and stoke flare-ups in the region”.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 01 Jun 2014 15:03

China slams US & Japan for provocative remarks - ToI

SINGAPORE: China denounced Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and US defence secretary Chuck Hagel on Sunday for "provocative" remarks accusing Beijing of destabilizing actions in contested Asian waters.

Lieutenant General Wang Guanzhong, deputy chief of the general staff of the People's Liberation Army, told an Asian security forum in Singapore that strong comments made by Abe and Hagel at the conference were "unacceptable".

"The Chinese delegation ... have this feeling that the speeches of Abe and Hagel are a provocative action against China," Wang, dressed in full military uniform, said in an address to the forum.

Abe had left on Saturday and Hagel departed early on Sunday before Wang spoke.

The Pentagon said Hagel and Wang held a brief meeting on Saturday in which they "exchanged views about issues important to both the US and China, as well as to the region".

About midway into his prepared speech in which he said China "will never seek hegemony and foreign expansion", Wang diverted from the script. He accused Abe and Hagel of "coordinating" with each other to attack China. "This is simply unimaginable," said Wang, the highest ranking military official in the Chinese delegation, adding that the US and Japanese speeches were "unacceptable and not in the spirit of this Shangri-La Dialogue". "The speeches made by Abe and Hagel gave me the impression that they coordinated with each other, they supported each other, they encouraged each other and they took the advantage of speaking first ... and staged provocative actions and challenges against China,"

Wang, who stressed Beijing's historic rights to the seas, said he preferred Hagel's frankness by directly naming China, compared to Abe who did not mention any country but obviously targeted Beijing. "If I am to compare the attitude of the two leaders, I would prefer the attitude of Mr Hagel. It is better to be more direct," he said. As the conference drew to a close, French defence minister Jean-Yves Le Drian joined a chorus of senior defence officials urging rival claimants to show restraint to prevent larger conflicts. Le Drian said a proposed agreement between China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on a code of conduct to handle disputes in the South China Sea was "the only way to prevent incidents in that coveted area". Singapore defence minister Ng Eng Hen urged Asian states not to "backslide into a fractious environment, riven by confrontational nationalism and lack of mutual trust". he said.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 01 Jun 2014 18:14

Hanoi due to receive Japan coast guard ships next year - Japan Times

Vietnam expects to take delivery of coast guard ships from Japan early next year, the communist country’s vice defense minister said Sunday, as Hanoi looks to boost its defenses amid a territorial row with Beijing in the South China Sea.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Friday that Tokyo would provide Southeast Asian nations its “utmost support” in their territorial disputes in the South China Sea, in a speech that received a hostile response from China.

In the area, scores of Vietnamese and Chinese ships, including coast guard vessels, have continued to square off around a Chinese oil rig in contested waters.

Tensions heightened last week when Hanoi said a Chinese boat rammed and sank a Vietnamese fishing vessel not far from the oil rig. China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported the vessel capsized after “harassing and colliding with” a Chinese fishing boat.

Vietnam Vice Defense Minister Nguyen Chi Vinh said Sunday that Japan — itself locked in a bitter territorial spat with China over the Senkaku Islands and with South Korea over two forlorn outcroppings — was helping it to train its coast guard and share information with its teams, as well as sending some of its vessels.

“The process is developing very well and we are planning to receive the ships by early next year,” Vinh said in an interview on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, Asia’s biggest security forum.

Abe had told the Diet Wednesday that Japan was unable to immediately provide decommissioned patrol ships to Vietnam as its own coast guard was being stretched by the extended surveillance activities.

Patrol ships from China and Japan have been playing cat and mouse in waters near disputed East China Sea islets, raising fears of an accidental clash between the world’s second- and third-largest economies.

Vinh said that while he welcomed the support of Japan and the United States he believed other nations could be more vocal about China’s actions in the South China Sea.

“I have the feeling that every country, whether they publicly state it or not, realizes the wrongdoing of China and does not agree with what they are doing,” he said. “I feel that other countries must raise their voices stronger, in a more public way.”

Some Southeast Asian nations such as Malaysia have remained wary of speaking out against China for fear of damaging deep-rooted economic ties.

The U.S. and China squared off at the security forum in Singapore on Saturday, with the U.S. defense secretary accusing Beijing of destabilizing the region and a top Chinese general retorting that his comments were a “threat and intimidation”.

Vinh said he met with Wang Guanzhong, deputy chief of the People’s Liberation Army, who stuck to China’s “previously stated perspective”.

“I told their deputy chief of general staff that Vietnam never wants to have tension with China,” he said.

“We do not want to fight to get a winner or loser with them, what we want is peace and territorial sovereignty and integrity.”

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 02 Jun 2014 09:06

Infrastructure sops to be India's bait for bigger slice of China's IT & Pharma - Economic Times

The same exact words have been said dozens of times before. Every time, China has promised to allow Indian companies entry into China but absolutely nothing has happened. In the meanwhile, India has loosened its strings and allowed greater access for Chinese enterprises into India with their poor quality equipment like in power stations. The present optimism will equally end in failure. The new government must do something else to improve Indian access to Chinese markets. We must link Chinese trade with us to our measurable growth in these twin areas; otherwise shut the doors to the Chinese.

India is likely to seek a bigger slice of China's information technology market and removal of trade barriers in the pharmaceuticals sector while granting a few concessions in infrastructure sectors, according to a commerce department plan being prepared ahead of the visit of Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi to help India boost bilateral ties and reduce trade deficit with its bigger neighbour.

Encouraged by China's enthusiastic response to the new government {Don't fall for it. Let us be hard-nosed}in India, the department will urge Prime Minister Narendra Modi to throw his weight behind the country's attempts to bridge trade deficit, a senior commerce department official said.

"India cannot match up to China's manufacturing, at least immediately, so we mu t leverage our strength in services to balance the deficit. We have our strengths in IT, pharma and tourism, and we must make optimum use of these," said the official, who did not wish to be identified, adding that this would be the key to building economic ties with China.

The China desk in the department is hoping to flag this for the attention of the prime minister before Wang Yi's upcoming visit on June 8. In return, China could be offered a bigger role in India's infrastructure sectors, something that India has been uncomfortable with so far, the official said.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 02 Jun 2014 16:29

Shangri-La Dialogue: Japan-US oppose China's move on territorial claims; India yet to clear its stand - Economic Times

Delhi is yet to formulate its position formally with a new government just taking charge but regional powers like Japan and the USA have been very vocal at the recent Shangri-La against China's aggressive moves and manner that seemingly have proved to be de-escalating in South China Sea disputes.

In the tense atmosphere arising from emerging security challenges, Tarun Vijay, MP and a special envoy of India's new BJP-led government at the Shangri-La Dialogue 13 at Singapore said "We want to contribute very solidly in the peace and stability process in Asia Pacific."

"In recent months, China has undertaken destabilising, unilateral actions asserting its claims in the South China Sea," he said in the speech to the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 02 Jun 2014 16:50

From NightWatch for the night of 1 June 2014

China-US: Public exchanges by senior US and Chinese leaders have increased strain in Chinese-US relations. The Asian Security Forum that was held last week in Singapore, also known as the Shangri-La Dialogue, was the center of the verbal sparring.

In Singapore, Secretary Hagel, supported by Japanese Prime Minister Abe, accused the Chinese of destabilizing Asia by taking unilateral actions to assert sovereignty in the South China Sea. (The speech covered other issues, but the South China Sea remarks set off the Chinese.)

The Japanese Prime Minister told the Forum Japan will offer its "utmost support" to Southeast Asian countries as they seek to protect their seas and airspace.

China quickly struck back. Chinese media published remarks by General Wang Guanzhong, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the People's Liberation Army, in which he criticized the American Secretary for making such remarks in public. Wang said Hagel's speech was "full of hegemony, incitement, threats and intimidation."

On Friday, Xinhua published remarks by Chinese President Xi Jinping. During a meeting in Beijing with Malaysia's prime minister, Xi said that China will not initiate aggressive action in the South China Sea, but will respond if other countries do.

Comment: Following US public accusations of Chinese computer hacking, Secretary Hagel's remarks are likely to reinforce Chinese suspicions that the US actively is attempting to contain China.

The warnings and threats will not change Chinese behavior. President's Xi's attempt at reassurance is actually a rephrasing of existing policy. It does not signify compromise or a change in Chinese activities in the South China Sea.

At this stage, China essentially has picked a quarrel with all of its maritime neighbors, but has avoided a test of military strength. Nevertheless, that is almost inevitable because China will not back down.

Despite the verbal exchanges, China's behavior suggests the leadership perceives no reason to exercise greater caution based on US behavior. On the other hand, a Japanese-led regional security cooperation arrangement would be a concern, should it emerge.

China is offering no peaceful economic arrangement that might sidestep confrontation, while allowing nations to profit from sea and seabed resources. China's blunt, pugnacious management style requires acceptance of Chinese sovereignty before other arrangements may be addressed. That is reminiscent of the style of the Chinese empire in dealing with tributary kingdoms and states.

Pratyush · Post by **Pratyush** » 03 Jun 2014 09:31

What Modi can do with China

By Nevil Maxwell

Many of those proffering ideas to India's new prime minister are suggesting he should emulate Richard Nixon who belied his reputation as a fierce anti-communist with an audacious diplomatic breakthrough to make an American peace with China. But a far more apt exemplar for Narendra Modi would be Mikhail Gorbachev, who assumed power in Moscow in circumstances, so far as Soviet relations with China were concerned, with a great deal in common with India's today.

Just as had Nehru's India previously, the USSR in the 1960s adopted an intransigent and bullying approach to China over their border disputes, brushing aside Beijing's reasonable and practical suggestion that differences be subjected to negotiation with the haughty insistence that there were no disputes, that Sino-Soviet boundaries ran exactly where Moscow said they ran.

To its unyielding refusal to negotiate, the USSR added its own variant of a "forward policy". It began to exercise armed force to drive the Chinese off the two great continental rivers, Amur and Ussuri, which together, under the 19th century Sino-Russian Treaty of Peking, comprise the boundary features in their eastern sector.

Defeat in the fierce battles fought in 1969 on the ice of Ussuri river left a bitter memory in Russia, official and popular. And Moscow followed Nehru's example again, accusing China of "unprovoked aggression" to cover up its own record of provocative bellicosity. For years Sino-Russian relations stayed frozen in hostility.

So Gorbachev inherited a deadlocked territorial quarrel which had in the recent past brought the USSR and China to the point of war, and with ideological differences to intensify the estrangement. He broke out of that stalemate with a variant of Nixon's audacity: in a much heralded 1986 speech in Vladivostok he called for friendship with China — and slipped into his text a fundamental reversal of policy, implicitly accepting the need for general negotiations over the disputed borders.

Beijing responded promptly, negotiations began, Sino-Russian enmities waned and in due course (it took over a decade) their boundaries were agreed and diplomatically settled, to the last kilometre, with many seemingly intractable contradictions being resolved in the process. The way was thus opened to entente cordiale between Moscow and Beijing which has today become arguably the most important element in world affairs.

The parallels between the position Modi inherits and those that faced Gorbachev are clear. For India today the bitter memory is of the earlier but much greater defeat in the 1962 border war. Consequently, Indian public attitude towards China simmers always just below the boil, its elite steadily fuelling it with complaints and charges about Chinese "incursions" over unmarked, intangible and disputed borderlines.

Modi enjoys many advantages, however, both personal and official. Personally, he has developed positive links with China, offering a foundation of familiarity upon which to build mutual trust. And a record of quasi-diplomatic exchanges about the border dispute has been built up over many years, with inevitable progress towards mutual understanding between the governments at the official level. Those are enough, if he has the will, to open the way for Modi to seize the great prize that has for decades been waiting for an Indian prime minister with the imagination and courage to claim it — a Sino-Indian boundary settlement.

For it has been the cruellest irony in the Sino-Indian estrangement that replaced the friendship Nehru long preached but then destroyed that their border dispute is entirely factitious and was at first eminently resolvable. Each country securely holds the territory vital to it and has no need or real desire for territory it cartographically "claims".

The dispute over the McMahon Line, for example, is essentially legalistic rather than territorial. India clings to the British-coined falsehood that this borderline derives legitimacy from the 1914 Simla Conference, making negotiation otiose; this has made it impossible for China to give expression its readiness, made clear by Zhou Enlai and cautiously maintained by Beijing's leaders since his time, to ascribe legitimacy to McMahon's alignment, the de facto border China inherited.

As for Aksai Chin, Nehru's claim to that long-held Chinese territory was always chimerical and for a new government in New Delhi to waive it in return for some Chinese territorial concessions — the essence of boundary negotiation — would be only to free the country from an albatross.

That is not to say that a Sino-Indian boundary negotiation would now be easy and straightforward, as it would have been when Zhou Enlai first called for it in the late 1950s. It would strike difficult contradictions of interest, for example Tawang, which, unlike the rest of what Beijing nowadays calls "Southern Tibet", was seized not by British imperialists but by independent India in 1951.

But there is nothing as difficult as the trickiest problems faced by the Sino-Russian negotiators, certainly nothing that could not be overcome if both sides sincerely sought agreement. Since intergovernmental exchanges over the borders have long been established, Modi would be spared even the need for a signal such as Gorbachev sent in Vladivostok.

An instruction to officials engaged to turn those into genuine boundary negotiations, following an overall understanding in principle reached with Beijing's leaders, and grandly announced, would be enough to set the two countries on the road back to friendship, a turning which might in the end have as much global significance as does Sino-Russian amity.

The writer is a journalist who covered the 1962 India-China war. He leaked the Henderson Brooks-Bhagat report earlier this year.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 03 Jun 2014 11:50

Every tom Dick and Harry has a open letter to Modi and Govt

Now this China apologist for more than 50 years is now advising India.
He has been writing the same words for 50 years. It seems that the western countries are coaching PRC to negotiate with India.

The dispute over the McMahon Line, for example, is essentially legalistic rather than territorial. India clings to the British-coined falsehood that this borderline derives legitimacy from the 1914 Simla Conference,

Not a word of PRC illegal occupation of Tibet.

It would strike difficult contradictions of interest, for example Tawang, which, unlike the rest of what Beijing nowadays calls "Southern Tibet", was seized not by British imperialists but by independent India in 1951.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 03 Jun 2014 16:13

ASEAN, the real test for Abe - Japan Times

SINGAPORE – Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has promised to forge stronger ties with Southeast Asian countries, but fulfilling that pledge will require careful political maneuvering as he seeks to end the pacifist policy that has guided Japan since the war and tries to set up a greater security role for it as China continues to assert itself.

Having made the pledge at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, the regional security forum that concluded Sunday, experts say Abe may need to strike a delicate balance to become a truly proactive contributor to peace in the Asia-Pacific region.

Stronger ties between Japan and members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations could benefit the region and position Japan to help counterbalance China, but they are unlikely to be welcomed by the Asian powerhouse, whose relations with Japan remain at their lowest point in years.

In his keynote speech at the security forum, Abe made a veiled criticism of China and argued that Asia must uphold the rule of law. He threw strong support behind Vietnam and the Philippines in their attempts to resolve their own territorial disputes in the South China Sea through peaceful means.

“Taking our alliance with the United States as the foundation and respecting our partnership with ASEAN, Japan will spare no effort to make regional stability, peace, and prosperity into something rock solid,” said Abe, who became the first Japanese prime minister to address the forum.

China immediately accused Japan and the United States of staging “provocative actions” against the country — the latest instance of the two Asian powers trading barbs on the global stage.

Despite repeated calls for dialogue, Abe has not yet held a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who proposed in May that Asia should have a new security structure that excludes the United States.

Abe’s push to remodel Japan’s security architecture, which is bound by the pacifist Constitution, has alarmed China, which suffered from Japan’s wartime brutality. Abe denies that Japan will ever go to war again, even if it decides to remove its long-standing ban on using the right to collective self-defense, but Beijing has rejected his argument.

“What is clear in Abe’s message is that Japan will help ASEAN with capacity-building so the grouping can bolster its own defenses, given that ASEAN countries could be the weak link if we are to create an Asian network to counter China,” said Narushige Michishita, professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo.

“Abe did not mention this because the issue is still controversial in Japan, but it’s becoming more obvious that one reason why Japan is trying to remove the ban on collective self-defense seems to be working more closely with ASEAN,” Michishita added.

Abe has prioritized bolstering the U.S.-Japan security alliance as the security landscape evolves due to China’s maritime forays and North Korea’s missile and nuclear development programs.

Bilateral defense cooperation guidelines that define the roles and responsibilities of the Self-Defense Forces and the U.S. military are expected to be revised by the end of the year. Tokyo and Washington hope a decision will be made by then on whether Japan should defend allies under armed attack when Japan itself is not.

U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel gave his backing during the Shangri-La Dialogue to Abe’s bid to “reorient its collective self-defense posture toward actively helping build a peaceful and resilient regional order.”

Debate has continued to revolve around whether the United States, which does not take positions on sovereignty issues, would defend the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, which are also claimed by China.

Within the ASEAN framework, Vietnam and the Philippines have faced off with China in the South China Sea, and experts warn that regional tensions could escalate further.

ASEAN is not a NATO-type military alliance, but a regional bloc whose ties are still weak. Experts say some members are much closer to Beijing than to Tokyo.

RKumar · Post by **RKumar** » 03 Jun 2014 18:34

Pratyush wrote:What Modi can do with China

By Nevil Maxwell

Many of those proffering ideas to India's new prime minister are suggesting he should emulate Richard Nixon who belied his reputation as a fierce anti-communist with an audacious diplomatic breakthrough to make an American peace with China. But a far more apt exemplar for Narendra Modi would be Mikhail Gorbachev, who assumed power in Moscow in circumstances, so far as Soviet relations with China were concerned, with a great deal in common with India's today.

Richard Nixon started US fall and Mikhail Gorbachev destroyed USSR. Should NaMo start India's decline before it develops? Conflict also provides a possibility for a country to emerge stronger than ever. Although I am not advocating it but putting the blame squarely on India is also not sensible.

I sincerly hope NaMo don't do to India what Mr. Gorbachev did to USSR. Your start is stinky, so can't stand to read rest of the article.

PS: Thanks for releasing the history of 1962

sanjaykumar · Post by **sanjaykumar** » 03 Jun 2014 19:16

Curious that Devil Maxwell indian annexation of Tawang but omits the Chinese invasion of Tibet some years later.