Topic “China”
Ordnance Survey: More Slippery Metrics
As Adam recently reminded us to beware bad quantitative measures, it’s important to remember that bad qualitative ones are similarly subversive. To stay on the subject of Sino-American rivalry, note David Axe’s post comparing the J-20’s progress to American frustration with its 5th generation fighter programs. While the reader’s first temptation is to fear for American superiority because China appears to be developing new aircraft faster than America, jet-for-jet comparisons and procurement process envy only tell part of the story. Even when Axe notes that China’s stealth programs have their own problems, I think comparing weapons systems that China isn’t likely to field equivalents to in large numbers leads debate down the wrong track.
States with the best hardware or most technically-impressive defense establishments don’t automatically win. Niall Ferguson, in his Pity of War, pointed out that the Central Powers were more fiscally efficient in inflicting casualties. In World War II, the Allied powers were often technically inferior side. Certainly the German R&D programs had some notable advantages over U.S. equivalents in some fields. The Germans led the way in sophisticated tanks, aircraft, small arms, and rocket and jet technology. But ultimately, logistical and geographic advantages bought the Allied coalitions time that initially technically or tactically superior foes could ill afford to waste.
Similarly, while China’s development of 5th generation fighter technology is certainly concerning, it’s not the prime concern in theater. The more concerning issue is that China might be able to muster a large number of platforms and personnel that are good enough to deny a more limited number of qualitatively superior American and allied equivalents. John Stillion and Scott Perdue made this point, most explicitly on a tactical scale, in “Air Combat Past, Present and Future,” noting sortie generation – with scant mention of J-20s, and even with soft-balled estimates of Chinese A2/AD measures against American local infrastructure – could deliver devastating results as American airmen struggled to overcome distance and inferior numbers.
If America suffers a disappointing result in a conventional war in the near future, it will likely not be because the victor fielded, pound-for-pound, better equipment. It would more likely be that the enemy is able to “get there first and with the most,” and maintain that longer than the U.S. is politically willing to muster additional resources from either geographic redistribution or internal economic extraction. None of this to say that technological superiority or fast R&D don’t necessarily matter, but only to note they only matter to the extent they can leverage advantages or mitigate disadvantages in the broader geographical and logistical framework that allows the arms to be brought to bear.
Measuring Military Power: You're Doing It Wrong
True net assessment is a lost art these days, at least in popular military budget discussions. Let's take this Bloomberg piece, for example. First, the headline: "Obama's 'Paper Tiger' Pentagon Budget Spends Five Times China." I understand and respect that the piece is mostly about rebutting an election year claim that reductions of the defense budget will make the US militarily weak. I have no desire to wade into those muddy waters since they have been well-covered by others. But, as the article title implies, the piece supposedly rebuts the claim by looking at the data:
U.S. spending accounted for 41 percent of global military expenditures in 2011, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. China accounted for 8.2 percent and Russia 4.1 percent, the Stockholm-based policy group said in an April report.
And this is where the problem begins. It means nothing to state that the US outspends China by five times because flat aggregate comparisons of defense spending tells us little about operational and strategic outcomes. Let's start with the strictly material: The US is a global power with global responsibilities. China, on the other hand, regionally concentrates its forces. The US is operating at the periphery whereas China, an power rooted in the hard crust of the Asian landmass, has no such logistical problems. Such a figure also tells us nothing about the correlation of forces in the theater in question, or whether each power has managed to translate spending into usable military resources. Given that there have been a lot of news stories about whether or not the US has been getting value out of its latest aerial platforms and problems associated with aging Cold War-era systems as well as the way that personnel and per-unit major platform costs may be causing a "defense death spiral," such an omission has analytical consequences.
Doctrine and force employment matter too. During the late 70s, Phillip Karber ran a simulation of May 1940 for an overly quantitative theater balance methodology called WEI-WUV and found that it didn't account for French and British defeat. The Allies may have enjoyed quantitative and qualitative platform advantages but did not master the "modern system" of military operations that had evolved out of World War I. The Germans, on the other hand, were farther along in the path towards combined arms mobile warfare even if they had some serious material and doctrinal flaws of their own. Andrew Marshall also reminds us that the socio-bureaucratic set of relationships within a military hierarchy also have an impact on effectiveness.
Finally, let's go to the most important factor: the human. WJ Rue at Gunpowder and Lead explains:
Let’s assume that the U.S. and Russia spend the same amount of money on their respective militaries. Let’s further assume that the U.S. allocates a sizeable portion of its resources to training – we’ll say the average fighter pilot gets roughly 150 hours per year in the cockpit. Russia, meanwhile, elects to spend its resources on slightly more capable jets, but its pilots only get 20 hours per year flight time, and they ran out of money before they could build a simulator. If we assume that similar circumstances exist throughout the Russian armed forces, who has the more capable military? The well-trained one or the one with the expensive equipment that the troops don’t know how to use effectively?
Is it too much to expect this in a short piece ostensibly about US budget debates and election politics? Probably. But defense budget debates are also never served well by using total military spending as a good metric of comparison of military power. As Rue argues, military power has aspects that are easy to quantify and other facets that are difficult to express on a balance sheet. Hence, the utility of net assessment.
The US-Pak gap
"I'm curious, though, to hear from my Islamabad-based blogging partner how he would square the circle facing U.S. policy-makers."
Right, well... hmm... I feel slightly fraudulent even assuming I can answer this question when the issue of Pakistan is befuddling lorry loads of eminent people even as I type.
Much is said about Pakistan, but I'm constantly saddened that so many innocent pixels are lost without good cause. Americans talk about what their country's policy should be towards Pakistan with almost as much vigour as Pakistanis when they talk about what their government should do about America. But none of the indignant laments get us any further to finding a way forward.
US commentators seem to see Pakistan through a very narrow time line that stretches as far back as 9/11 and as far forward as the end of the US involvement in Afghanistan. In turn, Pakistanis see their problem with extremism as starting with 9/11 and ending with the pullout of the last US soldiers from Kabul. Both views are as flawed as they are intertwined. Extremism has deep roots in Pakistan that were fed mainly by opportunistic politicians and army men while Pakistan's international friends looked away or actually helped. It's the results of that extremism that now draw the US to Afghanistan and what will continue to trouble it even when the last soldiers leave.
If no one objects, I'll take the medium to long term view of US policy towards Pakistan because the short term is dominated by Afghanistan and the tone will be set by American efforts to talk to elements of the Taliban and withdrawing in the next year or two. If the US wants to talk to the Taliban and relies on Pakistani help to do so, some might well see that as a victory of sorts for the Pakistani military's decision not to go hard after the Afghan Taliban. However, it would have come at a massive cost in terms of the violence and instability spreading now throughout Pakistan. However, even if the gamble is seen to have paid off and Pakistan gets to act as mediator and ends up with a fairly friendly regime residing in Kabul, that will not be the end of it, for Pakistan or the United States.
At the risk of sounding reductive, I would summarise the present situation thus: Pakistan, and much of the Muslim world, are largely rural landscapes with a fast-spreading media industry. In the various bits of travelling I've done in Pakistan, Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East, I've found that most people in rural areas have heard little of the outside world. In most cases 9/11 means little and America, the UK, France and Germany are an incoherent jumble of places ruled by a king who lives in a palace called London. Abu Muqawama is the resident expert on COIN, insurgency and guerrilla war, but whenever I hear of a new attack planned by militants on civilians in the States or Europe, I can't help but thinking that it sounds like the kind of action insurgents have under taken since the dawn of warfare: attack a larger power in the name of honour/justice etc and provoke a disproportionate backlash that rallies the undecided masses around your cause.
i still marvel in horror at the ability of extremists against all conventional logic (Western assets, Muslim views) to make their narrative of events sound the more plausible to the increasing number of people becoming integrated into the global media and political landscape. This is more to do with the failure of Muslim leadership and the misdirection of Western efforts than the actual truth or abilities of the extremists.
Keeping that in mind; probably the most talked about issue when it comes to Pakistan is "the nukes. Conventional wisdom says; Pakistan deserves attention because of its nuclear status.
"It's all about the nukes."
Now, actually, that statement would probably be agreed on by your typical informed Pakistani and American, but from two totally different positions. Many commentators over in Washington, London, Brussels etc regularly paint a doomsday scenario that involves wild-eyed bearded men grabbing nukes and running off into the mountains. Whereas in Pakistan, the newspaper reading public is convinced the US is constantly planning to send black-clad Blackwater special forces to grab Pakistan's Islamic bomb and fly off in helicopters in the direction of Israel or India.
In truth, the problem crystallising in Pakistan is more about gradual state breakdown, ungoverned spaces, increased regional instability, internal chaos and the spiralling of events in such a fashion that the extremist fairytale starts resembling a plausible reality. It's depressingly more likely that someone like Faisal Shehzad succeeds in taking advantage of the increasing writ of militant groups to attack and kill people in America, India or elsewhere with regular arms and not nuclear weapons. In this scenario we could expect some sort of action on Pakistani soil and/or more Quran burning etc in the US and Europe, which would then play into the "War on Islam" talk.
Basically, nuclear weapons need not fit into a nightmare scenario facing Pakistan. Yes, it's worth worrying about, but it's not the start an end of the threat the situation in Pakistan poses to the region and the wider world.
Extremism: The well-repeated view in Pakistan on violence and extremism within the country is that it started with the US war in Afghanistan and will end with it. The corresponding misunderstanding in the West is that Pakistan's secret cabal of generals are al Qaeda's ideological comrades and the population is genetically prone to extremism.
Pakistan's problems with extremism will not end with the US-led involvement in Afghanistan because the problem did not start with 9/11. The Pakistani establishment has been rather cynically manipulating religious sentiment even before they had a state to rule. The concept of Pakistan was based on the idea that the Muslims of the subcontinent (the former rulers) would lose their identity and any political influence in Hindu-majority India. The issue there was self determination - a burning concern for minorities through the ages. The point here is not to argue whether the sentiment was justified, or whether a separate state was the appropriate answer (these are issues that South Asia specialists devote libraries of books to) but to make the point that Pakistan was built on the fear of a diverse set of Muslim societies who were told that being Muslim meant being Pakistani and that survival was built on being the "purest" Muslims they could be. In a feat of myopia challenged only by US-led lack of planning in post-invasion Iraq and Afghanistan that vague but over-exploited sentiment was never allowed to mature through the natural engagement of the public. Once the establishment of the state was achieved, the religious rhetoric was left aside in favour of more secular-leaning public pronouncements.
But it was too late by then. Too many promises had been made and politicians and generals were finding it too tempting to resist playing on religious sentiment for short term gains. Every Pakistani leader has done this at one time or another. In 1965, the largely non-religious military ruler Ayub Khan found himself running against Fatima Jinnah, the sister of Pakistan's founder. Shamelessly, Ayub Khan leaned on pronouncements by religious leaders that a woman can't be head of a Muslim country. Pakistan's military (led in those days by many a Sandhurst-trained whisky lover) used Jihad as a rallying cry in 1948. From their point of view, it was a cheap and effective way of raising manpower; a point of view that has not changed much. At the same time, the various decisions made in India and Pakistan coupled with the ideological underpinnings of their separation, ensured that hostility would endure and that in Pakistan, it would take on a religious dimension.
China vs US: Pakistan's leadership decided pretty early on that it would need big power patronage to challenge India. After the waning of British military influence around the globe, the US became the best bet and the arrangement served both partners. Now, it's common to hear Pakistanis talking about China being a better friend to Pakistan. The idea is based on the Pakistani perception that the country has been a steady Western ally for decades, but with little reward. The country (not the leadership) has paid dearly for the Afghan war and Iranian-Western hostility has soured relations between Iran and Pakistan, where economic logic would suggest Pakistan invest in cordial relations. The US-Pakistani relationship is a long one, and unfortunately, from the Pakistani point of view the US has used Pakistan like hired muscle in a turf war, and when the battle was won turned its back on the battered and jobless roughneck.
However, in seeking to play the enforcer role, Pakistan has neglected its long term interests. The Pakistani establishment whether political, bureaucratic or military - and this is my own opinion - seems to have become wedded to the idea that to survive against India it must enter into a Yakuza-style relationship as the kobun to a big power's oyabun. Be it Britain, the United States or China, Pakistan feels that if it swears loyalty it should be taken care of. When Pakistan feels betrayed, it goes rogue. And as Pakistan has realised more than once that the United States' interest waxes and wanes it turns to another cheap short-term solution, Jihadi militias, secret nuclear programmes and proliferation.
China's relatively good standing in Pakistan is based on the perception that China is a loyal ally - an image that China has worked to establish across the region. But again, this is a short-term solution that might seem to work for now but probably wont in the future as interests and priorities shift. The cracks are already present. As I recently heard from a former Pakistani official, the much vaunted free trade agreement is far much more in China's favour than Pakistan's. A few well-connected Pakistani businessmen-politicians will do well from the deal, but in essence it allows Chinese goods to destroy Pakistan's fragile industrial base.
Pakistan is not alone in seeking to sell its geography or assets to a larger power in the hope of survival and largess. Arab Western allies countries have done something similar for decades. In each case, the desirability of the vassal-like alliance is down to the difficulty of enacting an alternative; the development of a strong economy built on a stable political structure. If Pakistan was able to encourage economic activity beyond the narrow class of well-connected elites, and raise income tax to cover its expenditures it would have less need to seek fickle patrons. But building a political-social consensus has eluded Pakistan as it has other states in the region.
At the same time, Western powers have been unabashed at utilising Pakistan's failings for their own short-term goals. Yes, the USSR was humiliated, but look where we are now. 9/11 left Pakistan knowing it HAD to side with the United States. But the idea that reliance on Jihadi militias was a necessity ran deep through the state. Musharraf carried out a couple of purges of ISI. But as time went on, the state came to the conclusion that the US would ultimately withdraw from Afghanistan and leave Islamabad and Kabul to fend for themselves. In that scenario, Pakistan would be left having amputated its own arm with a backyard that was increasingly becoming the playground of its archenemy.
Having said all this, the basis for a stronger relationship between the US and Pakistan is there. Relations were good in the past (for example, see here). And they should be in the future. A Pakistan that becomes the Kobun of China is not in Pakistani or US interests. In my view a number of things need to happen that are beyond the experience of traditional state-to-state relations. Firstly, the US could well benefit from developing a relationship with Pakistani civil society with a view to strengthen the country (not necessarily the elites). This means youth groups that agitate against corruption, educational and health charities that foster greater social cohesion by bringing together Pakistanis from the various ethnic and sectarian backgrounds. At the same time, improving the economy should not just be focused on making the rich richer (as is usually the case with free trade agreements) but empowering regular Pakistanis to set up small to medium size business and make them grow and export. Pakistan's bureaucracy needs help to transform itself to an asset for governance, not a hindrance. These are not things that necessarily require lots of money, but they need thought and clever application. Of course, these are things that Pakistan's rulers should have done themselves. But right now that point has become academic.
In short, the challenge for US diplomacy is to help Pakistan normalise and stabilise. To do so will require subtlety, sensitivity as well as toughness. The key here is not money, but intelligently applied effort. In the past US political efforts had a specific goal (for example, fighting Communisim) and Washington needed specific things done which necessitated a relationship with the actors that could make them happen. This meant the US developed a relationship with the military and sometimes dealt with politicians. US policy in the future, if it is to be successful, needs to engage with the public. A good starting point to achieve this is to understand why the relationship went sour, and I think this is something US diplomats working in Pakistan understand. The challenge is to convert that quickly developing understanding into positive action.
At the moment, US public diplomacy in Pakistan is patchy. But to be fair, the task is immense. There are constant stories published in the media that paint any contractor, even one providing translation or financial services, as members of Blackwater hit teams. Security considerations make it difficult for diplomats to go out and about and make friends. Also, the infamous Pakistani bureaucracy makes getting visas for staff and getting staff out to visit outlaying areas a complicated process. But sometimes, too often, mistakes are made that just need not happen. I once saw a testy verbal altercation between US embassy people and staff at a well-watched Pakistani channel. The diplomats were bringing a senior US official to appear on a popular show but turned up late. The channel's staffers expressed their frustration and the diplomats did likewise. In the end, the official did not appear on the show.
The atmosphere of animosity makes bad situations worse and needs to be resolved (or at the least overcome) if the US is to deal with specific issues. And they don't come more specific than India. The key to a more stable Pakistan is a normalised relationship with its neighbour. A couple of Pakistani governments have tried to negotiate with India over Kashmir in the past but as opportunities have been missed and the decades roll on, the task becomes harder. Moves towards a resolution will unsettle vested interests and differences of opinion will inevitably be played out in the public domain. But this is where political capital with ordinary Pakistanis will be best used in the long term.
Afghanistan and/vs. China
This may surprise some of you, but within the walls of 1301 Pennsylvania Ave., there is a pretty lively debate among the scholars and staff who work here about whether or not we should continue a counterinsurgency campaign in Afghanistan when we might instead be focusing on preserving our energies for rising powers. Obviously enough, those of us who work on Afghanistan and counterinsurgency feel one way (more or less), while those who work on China and the rest of Asia feel another way (again, more or less -- it's not a black-and-white disagreement). Bob Kaplan, in today's New York Times op-ed on Afghanistan and China, articulates a lot of the debates that take place around the water cooler here at CNAS:
In nuts-and-bolts terms, if we stay in Afghanistan and eventually succeed, other countries will benefit more than we will. China, India and Russia are all Asian powers, geographically proximate to Afghanistan and better able, therefore, to garner practical advantages from any stability our armed forces would make possible.
Everyone keeps saying that America is not an empire, but our military finds itself in the sort of situation that was mighty familiar to empires like that of ancient Rome and 19th-century Britain: struggling in a far-off corner of the world to exact revenge, to put down the fires of rebellion, and to restore civilized order. Meanwhile, other rising and resurgent powers wait patiently in the wings, free-riding on the public good we offer. This is exactly how an empire declines, by allowing others to take advantage of its own exertions.
Of course, one could make an excellent case that an ignominious withdrawal from Afghanistan is precisely what would lead to our decline, by demoralizing our military, signaling to our friends worldwide that we cannot be counted on and demonstrating that our enemies have greater resolve than we do. That is why we have no choice in Afghanistan but to add troops and continue to fight.
But as much as we hone our counterinsurgency skills and develop assets for the “long war,” history would suggest that over time we can more easily preserve our standing in the world by using naval and air power from a distance when intervening abroad. Afghanistan should be the very last place where we are a land-based meddler, caught up in internal Islamic conflict, helping the strategic ambitions of the Chinese and others.
Catching up...
...with some weekend reading:
--The Marines try to do some counterinsurgency in Helmand, but still without any help from Afghan forces. I'm increasingly pessimistic about Afghanistan, and the inability of the ANA to rally (despite previous assertions that they're supposed to be fairly competent) is a big reason why. The situation reminds of a comment made by an officer I interviewed about Iraq in early 2007: "How do you convince someone to fight for their country?" In that light, it's somewhat troubling that the U.S. focus is on expanding the Afghan forces when we can't seem to get many of the existing ones into the fight. Or do the Afghans have a different strategy than the Americans do?
--Robert McNamara passed away this week, and Bradley Graham, author of this hefty tome, wonders whether we'll see a mea culpa from Rumsfeld on Iraq in same way McNamara admitted his failings in the Vietnam War. There's certainly no indication that Rumsfeld is pondering what happened in Iraq; it's hard to see him becoming a tragic, McNamara-like figure haunted by his past decisions. But I agree with Graham's punchline: "More important than hearing Rumsfeld say he's sorry for what he did may be getting a frank explanation of why he did it."
--Is this China's chief counterinsurgent?
What's going on in Xinjiang?
This story was the top above-the-fold headline in today's Washington Post, but I still feel like the goings-on in western China are not being given much attention (especially in comparison with the utterly ridiculous Michael Jackson boondoggle happening now in Los Angeles). I read a couple of interesting articles and analyses in the Asia Times, but please sound off with better sources. Is this a big deal, or just another brief spark of unrest the Chinese government will sweep away?
If anyone was looking for a definition of "unconventional warfare"...
Maritime experts were given a rare glimpse of the underlying capabilities of the Chinese navy on Sunday, when crewmen involved in a stand-off with a US surveillance ship in the South China Sea revealed the fleet's previously hidden firepower.
The exposure came as the American vessel USNS Impeccable was attempting to defend itself against what the Pentagon claimed was co-ordinated harassment and aggression from five Chinese ships. Being unarmed, the Impeccable turned its fire water hoses against two of the Chinese vessels that had come within 50 feet in a threatening posture.
Then, the Pentagon records in the admirably restrained language of international diplomacy, "the Chinese crew members disrobed to their underwear and continued closing to within 25 feet."
In the annals of great naval battles, the contretemps may not rank alongside Trafalgar or Jutland. But it must be a contender for this year's award for naked aggression.
The Chinese Foreign ministry has remained silent on the incident, which in the circumstances is probably sensible.
Olympic Hurdles
--Niccolo Machiavelli
China is the land of the peasant revolt, numerous small scale insurgencies spread over the land of a billion people, dealt with by compulsion and compromise and done relatively efficiently for state of its size.
A half century ago, Tibetans revolted against Communist Chinese rule. The revolt was crushed, and the Dalai Lama found himself opening the wisdom eye to Hollywood stars from exile in India and lecture halls around the world.
The Chinese have made major efforts to Sinify Tibet since its conquest, encouraging a settlement policy in these occupied territories that makes Israel's efforts in the West Bank and Gaza, well, look tame.
Tibetan revolutionaries are now seeking to make one last stand in the weeks leading up to the 103rd Olympiad, which Beijing hopes will mark its emergence as a world power. The leaders behind the movement are Tibetan monks, reflecting a seeming resurgence of Buddhist assertiveness after Buddhist-monk-led protests in Myanmar.
(All that needs to happen next is monk self-immolations in the streets, and this will look much like the 1960s with burning Buddhists in Asia and books on counterinsurgency.)
Tenzin Gyatso, the Dalai Lama, is now 73 years old. Last year he received the Congressional Gold Medal--he is also a recipient of honorary Canadian citizenship and the Nobel Peace Prize (Kip thought these were the same thing). There are few moments left for the Dalai Lama to convert external moral support into actual political and resource support. The Dalai Lama has limited the demands of the movement over the years, willing to accept simply his return to Tibet and the protection of Tibetan culture, Buddhism, and autonomy while acknowledging Chinese sovereignty over the country.
With the Olympics putting China center stage, the Dalai Lama and his Tibetan supporters seek to keep the pot stirred just enough to embarrass China, to have people threaten or introduce significant possibilities of boycotts of the Olympics, and to make the possibility of acquiescence to Tibetan demands more palatable to the Chinese government. It is a very wise use of intensive media coverage of China with the upcoming Olympics.
Widespread protests have erupted through much of the Chinese province of Tibet and areas that were once part of Tibet but are now subsumed into other Chinese provinces. The Chinese government has responded by a major military crackdown and by trying to entirely cut off the province from Western media. Chinese media has highlighted violent aspects of the protests in order to garner more support within China for a crackdown on Tibetan demonstrators. Tenzin Gyatso has now called for an international investigation of "cultural genocide" in Tibet.
The troops and the monks are now in the streets. We will have to see how strong the desire for liberty is in the hearts of the average Tibetan. I give them pretty good chances of making an ongoing impact if they can keep the pressure up through the Olympics rather than pull the Burma fizzle.
Update: Charlie, here. See also, "The Restless Children of the Dalai Lama," for a discussion of inter-generational differences amongst Tibetan exiles. What role might these Tibetan Tigers have played in the current uprising?
Update II: What's next, free love?
Tibetan exiles here said they had also received news of at least two Buddhist monks who set themselves on fire as an act of protest; that claim could not be independently confirmed.
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