Top U.S. General Making Visit to China

miami herald ^

[maui_hawaii]

WASHINGTON - U.S. military ties with China have been slow to recover from the forced landing of a Navy spy plane on a Chinese island more than two years ago.

But the prospect of closer military relations as well as Washington's push to get North Korea to abandon its nuclear program are among the chief reasons for a trip to Asia by the top U.S. general.

Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, left Saturday for a tour that will take him to Japan, Mongolia, China and Australia.

Myers' predecessor, Army Gen. John Shalikashvili, visited China in May 1997. No other Joint Chiefs chairman has gone to China since the early 1980s.

China is wary of U.S. intentions in Asia and the Pacific, most notably regarding Taiwan, the island that split from the mainland after the communist revolution in October 1949.

China insists Taiwan must reunite and periodically threatens to do it by force if necessary. The United States officially holds to a one-China policy but is pledged to ensure that Taiwan can defend itself.

"Myers' trip comes at a good time in U.S.-China relations," but also at a time of substantial risk of a confrontation over Taiwan's ambitions for independence, said Ashton Carter, who was assistant secretary of defense for international security policy during the Clinton administration.

Taiwan's president, Chen Shui-bian, has declared that an immediate security threat from China exists. He has announced that the island will hold a referendum March 20 - the day Chen seeks re-election - on whether China should stop pointing hundreds of missiles at Taiwan.

Beijing believes self-ruled Taiwan is part of China and fears the Taiwan electorate might vote to reject this sacred belief and chose a permanent split.

For China, even referenda on mundane issues threaten to lead the island to an independence vote, which Beijing has threatened to stop by force. To the chagrin of conservatives in Congress, the administration has criticized the referendum plans.

Bush's Pentagon has been highly skeptical of the value of military cooperation with China.

Relations sank to new lows in April 2001, when Chinese fighter pilot Wang Wei flew his jet too close to the U.S. reconnaissance EP-3E that it had been shadowing over international waters off China's Hainan island.

The two planes collided. Wang's plunged into the South China Sea and he became a national hero. The Navy plane had to make an unauthorized emergency landing on Hainan. The Chinese military kept the 24-member crew in custody for 11 days.

At that point, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld ended military contacts with China. Relations have improved only gradually since.

Unlike his two most immediate predecessors at the Pentagon, Rumsfeld has not visited China. He did meet his counterpart, Gen. Cao Gangchuan, in Washington in October.

Before Myers, the highest-ranking U.S. military officer to visit China under Bush has been Adm. Thomas Fargo, commander of U.S. Pacific Command. In a speech at Shanghai's Fudan University in December 2002, Fargo said it was important to promote "a genuine exchange of thought" and consistency in the relationship.

The state of U.S.-China military relations has been anything but consistent in recent decades.

Ties were severed after China's army-led crackdown in 1989 on student protests at Tiananmen Square.

A 1994 visit to Beijing by then-Defense Secretary William Perry was meant to put relations back on track, but that effort was short-lived.

In 1996 China lobbed missiles near Taiwan during the island's first direct presidential election. In response, President Clinton sent two aircraft carrier groups to the vicinity of the Taiwan Strait. It was the largest U.S. naval movement in the Asia-Pacific region since the Vietnam War.

High-level Chinese military visits to Washington were canceled after that. Relations improved until satellite-guided bombs from an Air Force B-2 bomber hit the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, during the U.S. air war over Kosovo in May 1999. China broke off military contacts with the United States after that.

Carter, co-director with Perry of the Harvard-Stanford Preventive Defense Project, said in an interview Friday that most of China's leaders believe U.S.-China relations have never been better.

[.cnI redruM]

The Chinese are basically a--holes, but until N. Korea is somehow defused, we need to play nicely with them. They probably know that already. It may be their gambit to offer us a trade. They isolate N. Korea in return for which we sell out N. Korea. Hopefully, we say not only no but H--- no. However, this may be what the Chicoms shoot for.

[.cnI redruM]

>>>>>>>>They isolate N. Korea in return for which we sell out N. Korea.

That should have read "They isolate N. Korea in return for which we sell out Taiwan."

[Steel Wolf]

What for? Resolution for North Korea has to come before Taiwan. We can concievably keep Taiwan separate for decades. China does not have that option with North Korea, for a variety of reasons.

Once we get what we want, and North Korea falls, we have no reason to sell out Taiwan, despite whatever may have been implied before that. It may be a restraint on our actions now, to not support Taiwan more, but once North Korea is out of the picture, we'll have much more freedom of action in Asia.