News

Call for better China-US military ties

By Ma Liyao and Zhong Nan (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-05-26 07:27

BEIJING - A Chinese rear admiral said the commander of the United States forces in the Pacific was "making a show" when he said that his country's military ties with China were lagging behind the other bilateral dealings in maturity and sophistication.

Admiral Robert Willard had earlier told People's Liberation Army (PLA) deputy chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Ma Xiaotian, that it was regretful that military ties were so far behind the "other very mature engagements that occur between our two countries", as AP reported.

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Willard made the comment during the first of high-level military talks between the two sides since Beijing suspended military exchanges earlier this year over US arms sales to Taiwan.

But Rear Admiral Yang Yi, former head of strategic studies at the PLA's National Defense University, said Willard was just "making a show".

Yang asked the US to stop intervening in China's core interest, including those involving Taiwan, to improve military ties.

The latest suspension was the sixth involving Sino-US military exchanges and the second time it was carried out in response to US arms sales to Taiwan, closely following the one in October 2008.

Lt. Gen. Ma voiced his own frustration at the issue, saying that Chinese plans for military exchanges with the US this year had been "seriously disrupted" by the Obama administration's announcement in January.

Washington said on Jan 30 that it would go ahead with a $6.4-billion military hardware sale to Taiwan that included helicopters, missiles and other weapons.

Willard was in Beijing as part of a second round of the Strategic and Economic Dialogue. The gathering brings together dozens of Cabinet officials from both sides, the chiefs of both central banks and military officers.

"I've been struck by the maturity and sophistication in the level of exchange between the US in China in a wide variety of areas," Willard told Ma.

"Regretfully, the military-to-military relationship, we think, lags far behind these other very mature engagements that occur between our two countries."

Major General Peng Guangqian, a Beijing-based strategist, also said it is "very unlikely to expect any substantial improvement in Sino-US military ties" unless Washington respects China's core interest.

"The US is to take full responsibility on the lack of obvious improvement in Sino-US military ties," Peng said, adding that China is showing huge sincerity to enhance military cooperation with the US.

"The Taiwan Relations Act and the 2000 National Defense Authorization Act are clear interferences with China's domestic affairs," Peng said, asking Washington to "abandon its outdated Cold War mentality".

The US Congress passed the Taiwan Relations Act in 1979, providing for Taiwan to be treated under US laws in the same way as "foreign countries, nations, states, governments, or similar entities".

In 1999, it passed the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000, asking the defense department to report on China's present and future military strategy.

"The key reason why China and the US have not established a close military collaborative relationship is because of the lack of strategic and political trust based on their political divergence," said Senior Colonel Zhao Xiaozhuo, a researcher under China's Academy of Military Science.