Not the old sort of calculus is that. And I'm talking about Taiwan and of
course, the tension surrounding the island.
The old calculus is that when the price of a war becomes far less than the price
of peace. Wars do occur.
And with decoupling that price of war is actually going down and down because
Beijing community has less to lose, if you will.
Well, I would nationalize the regional security market quite in that way.
I don't think that the People's Republic of China wants to shortly to invade
Taiwan. They've said often that they want a
peaceful reunification. There is a risk that if their blockade
of Taiwan become ever more aggressive, that a military accident could occur.
And equally, the United States is being clear.
President Bryden has been clear that the one China policy is one to which the US
still holds. Now, in the political and economic and
technological domain, there is a risk of decoupling.
There is a risk of conflict there. And the big question for those who are
interested in the political economy of the region is where did whisking sit on
the spectrum? We know that business is normal on one
side is not going to be possible. We know on the other side that full
decoupling will be a disaster is risking really in the middle or will do risking
move towards cleaving to decoupling. I think that will still be the new
economic focus on the region. There is concern about an accident at
sea or in the air to which the United States has regularly pointed.
And that is why direct conversation between the United States and China is
too important in the military domain. And John, I guess for China's ISE,
depressing and decoupling are basically the same thing.
I have to wonder that the new defense chief, Li Xiang Fu, is in Singapore.
It's his first meeting, really meeting since he took the post.
What message do you think he's going to bring, especially after rejecting that
meeting with Lloyd Austin? Well, generally, as attending his first
double a double last Shangri-La dialogue, the Chinese are here knowing
that they need to engage with a variety of different defense ministers, both
from the region and outside the region. It is certain that General Lee will be
restating the known Chinese position on what its core interests are in the
region. He will assert that China's intentions
in the area are entirely peaceful. He might refer to the Global Security
Initiative that his President D has mentioned in the past, and he will say,
as General Wei Fung, her his predecessor did last year, that China wants a
peaceful reunification with Taiwan. But if there is any declaration of
independence or possibly a decision by Taiwan to acquire nuclear weapons, then
China will not hesitate to defend that core of its core interests.
To that will be expected. It will be delivered.
It will be interesting to see what questions come from the floor, not
principally from Americans or Europeans, but from Southeast Asians, who are also
concerned about the fact that China and the United States are not having
regularly face to face military and defense dialogues.
John, what would it take to actually ratchet these tensions down and get a
working relationship, a proper working relationship there between Washington
and Beijing? What it would take to restore proper
relations between Washington and Beijing in the military sphere is a variety of
conversations at different levels. A couple of years ago, I think by one
calculus there was perhaps 250 different conversations between the US military
and China. Now it's down to something like seven or
eight. It's not just important that the two
defense ministers speak to each other, but also that the head of the China
Southern Theater Command will speak to Admiral John Aquilina, the Indo-Pacific
commander, and at other levels further down that there's a constant
information exchange and reassurances, given that movements in the region have
no aggressive intent. And unfortunately, the Chinese point of
view is that if you create these guardrails, it might make the United
States too confident about the stability of the area, and that at a time when
there are not good relations between the two countries, it is better not to talk.
And therefore they are chalk and cheese apart in terms of the importance of
dialogue as military confidence building measure.