U.S. and Chinese Militaries Find Reason to Start Talking Again
Pentagon, Beijing revive communication as disputes over Taiwan, South China Sea raise risk of conflict
By Brian Spegele and Chun Han Wong Sept. 12, 2024 https://www.wsj.com/world/china/u-s-and-chinese-militaries-find-reason-to-start-talking-again-affbb690
BEIJING—The U.S. and Chinese militaries are taking tentative steps to re-engage diplomatically after a two-year freeze in relations, seeking to dial back the risk of confrontation while tensions simmer over Beijing’s activities in the South China Sea and its support of Russia.
Jump-starting talks between military leaders has been a priority of the Biden administration, but one that has previously faced stiff resistance in Beijing.
In the past few weeks, U.S. officials have netted long-sought meetings with senior Chinese military officials including Gen. Wu Yanan, whose command includes operations in the South China Sea. Wu is also expected to participate in a military conference in Hawaii this month, a senior U.S. defense official said Thursday.
The Pentagon, meanwhile, has dispatched Michael Chase, deputy assistant secretary of defense for China, Taiwan and Mongolia, to attend the Xiangshan Forum, an international security conference in Beijing that began Thursday. The conference offers a rare venue in which senior defense officials from China, the U.S., Russia and other powers convene as they push competing visions of global security.
“The bottom line is that we’re going to keep open lines of communication because that’s important for preventing competition from veering into conflict,” the U.S. defense official said. China’s Defense Ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Military ties between the U.S. and China froze after a visit to Taiwan by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) in August 2022 led Beijing to cut off several communication channels with the U.S. A summit between President Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in California in November opened the door for the revival of working-level ties.
While the White House has presented recent meetings themselves as progress in stabilizing ties, inside the talks officials have dug in their heels and publicly shown no signs of backing down on issues each view as core security concerns, according to official readouts.
When Gen. Zhang Youxia, a vice chairman of the Communist Party’s Central Military Commission, which commands the Chinese armed forces, met with U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan last month, he accused the U.S. of “military collusion” with Taiwan and demanded that the U.S. stop selling weapons to the island.
Sullivan, meanwhile, told Zhang that the U.S. would persist with American military operations in the South China Sea despite China’s objections. The U.S. has also sought to reinforce security ties with allies, including a move announced in July, to set up a new military command in Japan to better coordinate operations.
Before the Biden-Xi summit last year, Beijing had rebuffed American efforts at engagement by taking the stance that it didn’t believe in communications between the countries’ militaries just for the sake of it.
China has tended to postpone or cancel exchanges as a diplomatic signaling mechanism, the U.S. defense official said. “They’re not doing that right now, but it’s certainly always possible that they would do that again in the future,” the official said.
Chinese officials have described Taiwan as the most sensitive issue in U.S.-China relations. Beijing views the island democracy as part of its territory and hasn’t ruled out using its military to take control of it.
Washington is obligated under U.S. law to provide Taiwan the means to defend itself, though the U.S. has traditionally maintained what officials describe as “strategic ambiguity” on whether it would intervene if Beijing attacks the island.
In the South China Sea, the face-off between China and U.S. ally the Philippines has emerged as the most immediate flashpoint. The U.S. has pledged to defend its ally if the territorial disputes ever escalate into armed confrontation. The risk of conflict has been growing in recent months as Chinese and Philippine vessels faced off in the vicinity of two disputed shoals, including clashes that erupted as Beijing tried to stop Manila from resupplying a remote outpost that hosts a small detachment of marines.
Given what Washington views as growing assertiveness by Beijing, the head of the U.S. military’s Indo-Pacific Command said last month that the U.S. would be open to considering escorting Philippine vessels in the South China Sea.
For Beijing, improving communication with the Pentagon means one less thing to worry about when faced with challenges such as tepid economic growth at home and mounting trade pressures from abroad, said Dylan Loh, an assistant professor at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University who studies China’s foreign policy.
“Resuming military-to-military ties is a low-hanging fruit that does not cost China much, bearing in mind that the absence of such dialogue was actually an aberration not the norm,” Loh said.
At the same time, “Beijing sees the risks in not having channels of communication at the military-to-military level,” such as misunderstandings over each other’s intentions in moments of confrontation or crisis, he said.
Chase is the most senior U.S. official since 2019 to attend the Xiangshan Forum after it was suspended for several years during the Covid-19 pandemic. A lower-level U.S. delegation participated last year, when Beijing restarted the event.
Countries with friendlier ties to China typically send higher-ranking officials to the forum, such as their defense ministers. A Russian deputy defense minister is leading Moscow’s delegation, according to a list of attendees reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. Ukraine is represented by its defense attaché in Beijing.
Western defense chiefs have preferred to attend another security conference, in Singapore, the Shangri-La Dialogue. At this year’s event, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met with Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun and reaffirmed plans to reopen direct lines of communication between their militaries.
As Russia’s war in Ukraine grinds on, U.S. officials object to China’s support for Moscow’s military industry. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said this week that China is providing components to help build Russian weapons in exchange for submarine technology.
Shortly before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Moscow and Beijing declared a “no limits” partnership in a pact aimed at the U.S.
The U.S. defense official on Thursday described the partnership as a major challenge, but said Washington had also observed growing signs of competition between the countries, for example as they jockey for influence over North Korea.
“There do also seem to be some limits to that partnership,” the official said.
Write to Brian Spegele at Brian.Spegele@wsj.com and Chun Han Wong at chunhan.wong@wsj.com