Part 2 of my obsessive compulsory coverage of Robert D. Kaplan’s trip to Tokyo.

Yours truly with Robert Kaplan, Tokyo, 12 March 2010

After Robert D. Kaplan spoke at the Sasakawa Peace Foundation, I approached him and he graciously invited me to attend the exclusive reception. His assistant whispered the location and time, and I went outside for a breather and to send off this misspelled missive (soon followed by this amelioration).

The reception started at 8PM, at a nearby Italian restaurant. I had to catch a bullet train back to Nagoya that night, so I could only spare an hour. Many of the invitees were already standing around inside the restaurant, drinking wine and talking with one another. I waited outside for Kaplan and his assistant who came a little late. Read the rest of this entry »

What follows is a description of my experience, in fanboyish detail, of Robert Kaplan’s speech at the Sasakawa Peace Foundation on March 12, 2010. I was lucky enough to sit and chat with Mr Kaplan for more than a half hour after the event, at an exclusive reception. I will describe that in my next post. Today I would like to fill you in on the speech itself, and provide you with my notes which I think will give you insight into his new book Monsoon, due later this year. Also, Kaplan will be publishing an article about Chinese geography in the next issue of Foreign Affairs, a topic he broached a bit in the speech.

Read the rest of this entry »

On the summit of Jebel Hafeet, on the border of the UAE and Oman, I found this graffiti—the characters for “China” spray painted on the rock.

I saw similar graffiti in a natural valley in Sapa, Vietnam, back in 2005. As China grows richer, and its citizens find more opportunities for overseas tourism, I guess we should expect more of this kind of vulgar graffiti to pop up in the natural tourist sites of the world.

I’m happy that China’s economic development has created an upwardly mobile middle class that has the opportunity to travel overseas. I just wish they wouldn’t take out their lack-of-modern-empire-penis-envy frustrations on the natural environment of the world.

(It could be worse—at least the Chinese government doesn’t have management over tourist sites outside China, which would be a real disaster for human civilization).

China’s decade long surge into becoming an economic power house and global heavy hitter has given rise to a myriad of theories and assertions regarding the role of Asia in this century. It has been widely touted that the 21st century will be “Asia’s Century” as the US fades from virtual hegemony and hyperpower and joins its European cousins in the ranks of imperial has beens. That the on going economic crisis embattling what I’ll term the “Old Order of Global Primacy” has left China’s 10% annual economic growth unscathed seems to be validating those theories and assertions.

Map via Wellesly College Chinese Politics

Chirol was highly critical of the US and international response in providing aid for the Haiti earthquake victims, which set off a comment thread with overwhelming criticism of Chirol’s premise that realistically, Haiti has always always been a disaster and we should not commit resources into black hole because of media and popular excitement. Although I didn’t comment, I basically agreed with most readers who spoke out that Chirol’s stated position was isolationist, especially considering that the country was so close and the problems so manageable with basics not available in Haiti. (Other criticisms—that he was being cruel or callous—didn’t really register with me because appearing cruel is part of the very nature of stone cold realism.) But there are careful realist calculations behind the motives of the three most active participants in Haiti—the US, China and Taiwan.

As it happens, today the Japanese Mainichi Shinbun has an article (Japanese only, sorry) with this title: “Haiti Earthquake: Aid to Victims Displays ‘Diplomatic War’; US, China, Others” summarizes the key player’s (realist) goals. Taking that article and some other articles, the interests of the major countries providing aid are:

• The US, by dispatching one nuclear aircraft carrier and two former presidents, has created the most obvious presence in Haiti and is looking to flex its muscle in the region and show off its power, yet in a peaceful way that is aimed at bettering relations with Central and South American countries. The primary diplomatic targets are Cuba and Venezuela, who could easily win friends and show off their influence if they were seen as being active in the region. I think this also gets to the Monroe Doctrine, where the US long held, from the turn of the 19th century until the end of the Cold War, that no other power could interfere in the Western Hemisphere. That policy was basically abandoned under Bill Clinton during the first Haiti intervention, but I believe it should be vigorously maintained to make sure that all foreign policy fronts are

• China has been ramping up its activity in Central and South America and has tried to become an alternative to US-sourced credit and business, and in cutting off Taiwan from its global friends in the region. China has long been active in Haiti and had 148 peacekeepers in Haiti, of whom 8 were killed in the earthquake—read one of the very first ever ComingAnarchy posts on that topic here. It has dispatched an additional 50 aid workers and donated about a million dollars in aid.

• Taiwan initially offered $500,000 in aid, but when China announced that it would double that, it quickly announced it would provide $5 million in aid, most likely to preserve and protect its status as the legitimate Chinese government as recognized by the Haiti government. Of the 23 countries that have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan, 12 are in Central and South America. This is despite the fact that, under the current Taiwanese government, Beijing and Taipei have called a “ceasefire” in their war for recognition, but the events in Haiti show that this war is still being waged, albeit more quietly.

Even with that, the position of Australia on the list of countries providing aid surprised me—but keep in mind this list incorporates donations by regional governments, but not those by individuals and NGOs.

• US: $100 million (disaster teams, aircraft carrier, hospital ships, soldiers)
• Australia: $9 million (including donations by regional governments)
• China: $5.4 million (including aid workers)
• Taiwan: $5 million
• Japan: $5.3 million
• Norway: $5 million
• England: $1.4 million
• World Bank: $1 million

A new approach to China

1/12/2010 03:00:00 PM
Like many other well-known organizations, we face cyber attacks of varying degrees on a regular basis. In mid-December, we detected a highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China that resulted in the theft of intellectual property from Google. However, it soon became clear that what at first appeared to be solely a security incident—albeit a significant one—was something quite different… we have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists. Based on our investigation to date we believe their attack did not achieve that objective. Only two Gmail accounts appear to have been accessed, and that activity was limited to account information (such as the date the account was created) and subject line, rather than the content of emails themselves…

We have discovered that the accounts of dozens of U.S.-, China- and Europe-based Gmail users who are advocates of human rights in China appear to have been routinely accessed by third parties. These accounts have not been accessed through any security breach at Google, but most likely via phishing scams or malware placed on the users’ computers.

We have taken the unusual step of sharing information about these attacks with a broad audience not just because of the security and human rights implications of what we have unearthed, but also because this information goes to the heart of a much bigger global debate about freedom of speech. In the last two decades, China’s economic reform programs and its citizens’ entrepreneurial flair have lifted hundreds of millions of Chinese people out of poverty. Indeed, this great nation is at the heart of much economic progress and development in the world today.

We launched Google.cn in January 2006 in the belief that the benefits of increased access to information for people in China and a more open Internet outweighed our discomfort in agreeing to censor some results. At the time we made clear that “we will carefully monitor conditions in China, including new laws and other restrictions on our services. If we determine that we are unable to achieve the objectives outlined we will not hesitate to reconsider our approach to China.”

These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered—combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web—have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.

The decision to review our business operations in China has been incredibly hard, and we know that it will have potentially far-reaching consequences. We want to make clear that this move was driven by our executives in the United States, without the knowledge or involvement of our employees in China who have worked incredibly hard to make Google.cn the success it is today. We are committed to working responsibly to resolve the very difficult issues raised.

Old Town sprawls behind People’s Square in Central Kashgar. The Han crowd in.

China Digital times features a photo essay of The Demolition of Old Kashgar from the French paper Le Monde. The old brick houses and streets have been declared vulnerable to earthquakes. The English translation of the accompanying article argues that the complete levelling of the town, rather than the clean up and protection of heritage buildings, shows that this is just another campaign in the war of cultural dominance between the Han and the Uighur. Human Rights Watch researcher Nicholas Becquelin sums it up: “… it is much easier to control the population in a modern city.” The NYT covered this last May as well.

During my trip to Chinese Turkestan in 2004 I visited Kashgar’s Old Town and took some (rather unworthy) photos myself. Check out the gallery to see some photos of:

• Streets of Old Town
• People’s Square and downtown
• Yusup Has Hajip’s tomb
• Sunday Market
• Animal Market

Don’t forget to click on the IMAGE INFO in the bottom left corner of each pic for an explanation.

Robert D. Kaplan supplies a chapter on Chinese naval strategy to a Center for a New American Security report entitled China’s Arrival: A Strategic Framework for a Global Relationship. Much of the chapter is based on his previous work in Foreign Affairs and The Atlantic with a healthy dose of James Holmes and Toshi Yoshihara, two academics many will be familiar with. Kaplan’s primary contention is that in the long-term, China is pursuing a two-ocean strategy for its navy:

… the Chinese Navy would prefer to be not a one-ocean, but a two-ocean power, with multiple access routes between the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific to ease its dependence on the Strait of Malacca. (pp. 53-54)

Unfortunately much of the analysis is based on the Mahanian concept of physical protection of the sea lanes. This type of thinking has been criticized by naval thinkers in the West, but is considered the norm in Chinese strategic circles (see Mao Zedong, Meet Alfred Thayer Mahan: Strategic Theory and Chinese Sea Power (PDF) by Holmes and Yoshihara). Much of China’s resources pass through the Malacca Strait from the Indian Ocean. It is to this end that China has set up its string of pearls strategy (one being Gwadar Port), contemplating a Kra Canal as well as beefing up its naval power projection capabilities into the Indian Ocean. Thus, quoting Chinese naval analyst Zhang Ming, “India is perhaps China’s most realistic strategic adversary.” Kaplan points out that 90 percent of Chinese arms sales are to Indian Ocean littoral countries, virtually surrounding India on three sides.

This all sounds very ominous but before you begin accusing Kaplan of being a war-monger realize that much of this article is about justifying China’s expansion. Kaplan stresses that “there is nothing illegitimate about the rise of the Chinese military.” and “… it is too facile to suggest that China is acquiring naval power as a means to the end of regional or perhaps global hegemony.”(pp. 46) Chinese expansion is a function of expanding trade, giving rise to economic and strategist interests overseas. Furthermore, Chinese naval expansion, argues Kaplan, is “an indication that its land borders are for the first time in ages not under threat.” (pp. 48)

Kaplan once again makes the comparison of China’s rise to that of America’s rise in the 19th century. He even makes a reference to the Indian Wars and the Wounded Knee Massacre of 1890. Reader beware, one must tread carefully when using historical metaphors and analogues. There is learning from history, and there is being blinded by history. A good book to read on this subject is Neustadt and May’s excellent Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision-Makers. That said, I think Kaplan is doing something more subtle here. Rather than making an argument about the progress of a rising power, he is offering a moral argument to counter anti-Chinese sentiment in the US. Basically he is saying: hey, we went the same route and the world didn’t turn out so bad did it? For some that may seem a very egocentric argument, but remember that the entire report is directed at the American and Chinese decision makers and is titled: A Strategic Framework for a Global Relationship. Kaplan argues that China’s naval rise can present the US with opportunities for engagement (eg. the Chinese dispatch to the Gulf of Aden as an example), and we know from his previous work that Kaplan supports the military as the harbingers of diplomacy. Furthermore, Kaplan advises that rather than leveraging allies like Japan and India to isolate China, the US should leverage these relationships to bind China in an Asia-centric alliance system. A moment of institutional liberalism from the self-proclaimed pessimistic realist Kaplan?

The rest of the report is written by name-brand academics such as John Ikenberry, Michael Green and Richard Weitz. Often Kaplan is criticized for writing in academic settings. The situation is no different here as he makes a number of claims without sufficient evidence. At least this time he uses endnotes (a whole 16 of them!). Since this is really a think piece, an exploration of a potential naval strategy from a decidedly American point of view, it might not require such adherence to the rigour of the academy. Unless you are a professional academic working on SLOC issues or are familiar with Holmes and Yoshihara’s work, this article is probably worth the read.

h/t to Lex who passed this on oh so long ago!

Hat Tip to Chief Wiggum for bringing our attention to a new Kaplan article in the NYT.

Beijing’s Afghan Gamble
By ROBERT D. KAPLAN
IN Afghanistan’s Logar Province, just south of Kabul, the geopolitical future of Asia is becoming apparent: American troops are providing security for a Chinese state-owned company to exploit the Aynak copper reserves, which are worth tens of billions of dollars. While some of America’s NATO allies want to do as little as possible in the effort to stabilize Afghanistan, China has its eyes on some of world’s last untapped deposits of copper, iron, gold, uranium and precious gems, and is willing to take big risks in one of the most violent countries to secure them.

In Afghanistan, American and Chinese interests converge. By exploiting Afghanistan’s metal and mineral reserves, China can provide thousands of Afghans with jobs, thus generating tax revenues to help stabilize a tottering Kabul government. Just as America has a vision of a modestly stable Afghanistan that will no longer be a haven for extremists, China has a vision of Afghanistan as a secure conduit for roads and energy pipelines that will bring natural resources from the Indian Ocean and elsewhere. So if America defeats Al Qaeda and the irreconcilable elements of the Taliban, China’s geopolitical position will be enhanced.

This is not a paradox, since China need not be our future adversary. Indeed, combining forces with China in Afghanistan might even improve the relationship between Washington and Beijing. The problem is that while America is sacrificing its blood and treasure, the Chinese will reap the benefits. The whole direction of America’s military and diplomatic effort is toward an exit strategy, whereas the Chinese hope to stay and profit.

But what if America decides to leave, or to drastically reduce its footprint to a counterterrorism strategy focused mainly on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border? Then another scenario might play out. Kandahar and other areas will most likely fall to the Taliban, creating a truly lawless realm that wrecks China’s plans for an energy and commodities passageway through South Asia. It would also, of course, be a momentous moral victory achieved by radical Muslims who, having first defeated the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, will then have triumphed over another superpower.

Read the rest.

From June 26-30, Turkish President Abdullah Gul visited China, visiting the capital of Beijing, the cultural city of Xi’an, and the heart of Turkic China, Urumqi. His visit brough the signing of major bilateral business cooperation pacts worth more than a billion US dollars, involving infrastructure, power, mining, agricultural, and trade. And in Urumqi, Gul told press he was deeply impressed by the development of the region and the large-scale construction. Gul also said, “Uyghurs act like a bridge of friendship between Turkey and China. Such role will contribute to the further improvement of our relations.”

What Gul did not know at the time was that ethnic riots had broken out in southern China between Turkic Uyghur migrant workers and Han locals which would spark ethnic riots on the streets of Urumqi just days later, resulting in the death of at least 180 people.

Left: Gul in Urumqi. Right: Victims of the riot.

Those riots resulted in an immediate about-face stance from Turkey with regard to China relations. The political leaders have since called for discussing the Xinjiang riots in the UN Security Council. Prime Minister Erdogan also said that Turkey would grant a visa to Rebiya Kadeer, the Uighur political activist who China blames for the unrest, were she to travel to Turkey. (The day before she said that her visa to visit Turkey in 2006 and 2007 had been denied.) And Turkey then went on to call China’s acts in Xinjiang “genocide.” (On an interesting sidenote to this, you can read this article on China’s longstanding sympathy for the Kurds here, which may partially explain why Turkey’s leaders are taking the opportunity to stick it to Beijing.)

The only other fierce call was from Al Qaeda in Algeria, an independent branch that remains probably the most active cell of the network, has issued threats at Chinese interests. (While that might not sound like a big deal coming from a provincial terrorist organization, consider that there are 50,000 Chinese working in construction and energy projects in Algeria, and hundreds of thousands more across the Middle East and North Africa.)

However, the response from political leaders and media outlets in the Middle East was muted. Arab newspapers made gestures of sympathy in news reports, but none called for condemnations of China from their governments. There were no loud calls for boycotts. And the issue has since fallen off the pages of the newspapers as the event is quietly forgotten. No one in the Arab Middle East appears to want to make China out to be the new Israel.

So why is Turkey so excited? Turkey has long occupied both a cultural and geographic pivot, positioned between three key areas—Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia. 21st century geopolitical thinkers such as Zbigniew Brzezinski and Samuel Huntington have written of Turkey’s unique position and how Ankara has the most choices of any other state in its weight class as it moves into the future. Does it look west and try to become part of Europe? Does it look south and try to lead and ally with other Sunni Muslim states? Or does it look east towards its Turkic breathren, recently freed from Russian imperial power?

Through the 1990s, it looked as if Turkey wanted to join with Europe and become a member state of the EU. The Middle East was an afterthought—Turkey has acted as a slight counterweight to Saudi Arabia, financing more moderate Turkish Cultural Centers in various parts of the globe. And in Central Asia, Turkey has financed the construction of mosques in the wake of the Soviet collapse, but otherwise has not been proactively involved in the culture or politics of the Turkic states to the east. Does Turkey’s position in Ankara signal a change? It will be interesting to see if this is just a temporary barrier to good relations, or a sign of things to come.