China Boosts Spending on Military by 12.6%

In a move likely to spur further concern in foreign capitals, China announced Friday that its military budget would grow 12.6% this year, the latest in a string of double-digit increases.

The $29.9-billion budget does not include the cost of new weapons purchases, research or other big-ticket items for China’s secretive military, and many analysts believe the actual figure is significantly higher. Some say $60 billion to $80 billion is more realistic. That would make China the world’s second-biggest military spender, behind only the U.S. at $420.7 billion.

Although China still has far to go to modernize an army traditionally built around “the sons of farmers and workers,” the announcement to the annual National People’s Congress, which opened today, could push its neighbors to seek closer ties to Washington. And it could further strain transatlantic ties as Europe mulls lifting a ban on weapons sales imposed after the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown.

President Bush raised the issue during the NATO summit in Brussels last month.

“There is deep concern in our country that the transfer of weapons would be a transfer of technology to China, which would change the balance of relations between China and Taiwan,” Bush said.

Although China has offered little information on how the money would be spent, analysts say the figure shows that China continues to spend aggressively on its military in line with its growing wealth and influence.

But it also seeks to avoid alarming its neighbors by keeping the growth rate in line with past years. China has increased its military budget more than 10% in each of the last 15 years, except in 2002, when the increase was 9.8%. Much of the budget goes for salaries, housing and related costs for the 2.3 million-strong People’s Liberation Army.

“The official budget is not a charade, it’s just incomplete,” said Robert Karniol, Asia Pacific editor for Jane’s Defense Weekly, a military publication.

China denies that it wants to threaten its neighbors or the global security system and insists that it is only trying to prevent Taiwan from declaring independence. Premier Wen Jiabao said in his annual policy address to the congress today that a controversial anti-secession law was intended to spur peaceful reunification, not conflict.

Taiwan separated from the mainland politically in 1949, but Beijing views the island as part of its territory and has vowed to use force, if necessary, to prevent formal separation.

China is worried about a joint statement issued by Tokyo and Washington late last month listing concern over Taiwan as a “common strategic objective” and is closely watching a proposed $15-billion sale of U.S. weapons to Taiwan.

“China is only increasing its military strength because of Taiwan,” said Yan Xuetong, a foreign policy expert at Qinghua University in Beijing. “We need to do more to convince people that we’re sharpening our teeth, but that the teeth won’t bite you.”

Those teeth are often well hidden. The Chinese military is one of the most secretive organizations in a secretive state. The People’s Liberation Army has an unlisted number and no website. Taking pictures near a military base can result in years in jail.

Outsiders got the last real peek at Chinese hardware during a 1999 parade that featured cruise missiles and the intercontinental Dong-Feng 31 ballistic missile, which is capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to Alaska.

Still, analysts say, China’s obsession with military secrecy probably has at least as much to do with what the country does not have as what it does.

“If you’re strong, you don’t need to hide,” said Jing-dong Yuan, research director at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. “But when you’re weak, you don’t want to show all your cards.”

In an era when advanced communications, changing threats and new technology are redefining warfare, China’s military is slow, bulky, largely landlocked and low-tech.

China’s weak military-industrial complex is an Achilles heel. Because China’s economy is built around light industry rather than innovation, it can’t produce a lot of its own hardware.

“This has consistently been their weak point,” Yuan added.

China is starting to make progress in a limited number of areas, including the creation of a home-grown airborne warning and control system using domestically produced radar mounted on a Russian-made aircraft. Washington blocked a planned purchase of a similar system from Israel several years ago.

Ni Lexiong, a military expert at the East China University of Science and Technology in Shanghai, said China also had made progress in the last six years on missile deployment, satellites and submarines.

But huge gaps in its capabilities remain, and the U.S. and European weapons bans leave China with few procurement options. Europe is expected to lift its ban this year, but most European states are party to other nonproliferation treaties that would probably block any rapid transfer of technology, analysts predict.

As a result, China is forced to buy most of its weapons from Russia. But Russia, a traditional rival, tends to limit sales to off-the-shelf technology that isn’t always what China needs.

Beijing is also aware that if it modernizes too aggressively, it could push its neighbors closer to the United States.

“Chinese diplomats have made various efforts to persuade Southeast Asian nations and other states that China is a ‘friendly elephant,’ ” said June Teufel Dreyer, a professor at the University of Miami and a member of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. “For many countries in Asia, however, the increased spending is very worrisome indeed.”

Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian on Friday denounced China’s military build-up.

“The international community must not overlook China’s military expansion just because countries can gain economic benefits from the immense Chinese market,” Chen said. Taiwan announced this week that Beijing had more than 700 missiles aimed in its direction.

U.S. officials also have expressed concern about the buildup.

“Beijing’s military modernization and military build-up could tilt the balance of power in the Taiwan Strait,” CIA Director Porter J. Goss said at a Senate hearing last month. “Improved Chinese capabilities threaten U.S. forces in the region.”

Goss said U.S. officials were particularly concerned about an increase in ballistic missile forces and several new Chinese submarines.

U.S. officials believe that by 2015, China will increase the number of warheads capable of reaching the United States “several-fold,” Navy Vice Adm. Lowell E. Jacoby, director of the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency, said at the same hearing. The Chinese also are developing missiles that U.S. officials worry could be used to preclude outside intervention during any crisis over Taiwan, Jacoby said.

Beyond weapons systems, China struggles with organizational problems. Chinese planners echo Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in calling for a leaner, faster military built around advanced technology. Jacoby said the Chinese were studying the U.S. experience in Afghanistan and Iraq to guide their own modernization efforts.

But modern military theory places a premium on the ability to mix air, ground and sea forces and on making many decisions on the battlefield itself. The massive Chinese army is difficult to break into component parts, analysts say. Furthermore, China’s centralized political system is not organized to allow significant authority at low levels.

As a new generation of leaders takes power, including Premier Wen and President Hu Jintao, who did not serve in the military, a greater separation is gradually developing between military leaders and politicians.

However, the top brass still wields enormous clout. Hu is expected to become chairman of the government’s military commission during the 10-day congress.

Analysts say China is still many years away from attaining the ability to invade Taiwan, a status it would like to develop in part to ensure that its threats are taken seriously.

“As long as you don’t try to stop the rightful unification of Taiwan and China, you have nothing to worry about,” said Ni, the military expert from Shanghai.

“We don’t want to be a global hegemon. It’s very tiring.”