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President George W. Bush is scheduled to travel to China next month to meet with Chinese leaders. An advance team is going to Beijing next weekend to prepare for the summit. Chinese leaders did a little preparation of their own this weekend, turning up the heat on the United States in two ways.
First, Beijing released information that more than 20 sophisticated listening devices had been discovered on an aircraft fitted in the United States for President Jiang Zemin’s personal use. China made it clear that Jiang was furious over the bugs, with the implication that the Central Intelligence Agency was behind the plot.
Interestingly, Jiang’s rage was sufficiently manageable that China did not make an issue of the bugs until this weekend, despite reports that the devices were discovered during a September test flight. Even more interesting, Beijing confined its outrage to foreign media outlets. Thus far, there appear to have been no reports of the incident in China’s media, suggesting that China is not attempting to sink the summit.
Second, China released a report claiming that Osama bin Laden has supported Muslim separatists in the province of Xinjiang. By doing so, Beijing was engaging Washington on a fundamental issue of U.S. foreign policy. The United States has argued that all nations should join against the common threat posed by al-Qaida. Thus, Washington has tempered its criticism of Russian operations in Chechnya, given the presence of al-Qaida operatives there. But it has not identified the Xinjiang separatists as terrorists.
China is pointing out that Washington cannot have a selective anti-terrorism program. It has put the United States in a position to demonstrate either that al-Qaida is not involved in Xinjiang or argue that China is an exception to the rule. If Washington says there is no evidence of al-Qaida involvement, it opens the door for other nations to challenge U.S. claims about other countries. If the United States accepts the claim, it faces the dilemma of how to handle China on human rights issues, many of which concern the country’s Muslims. In fact, Beijing sees the United States as having encouraged separatists in Xinjiang and Tibet, as well as democratic activists and the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement.
Prior to Sept. 11, China was central to a U.S. foreign policy focused on economics and Asian security. While it remained an attractive target for U.S. investment and pursued membership in the World Trade Organization, China also captivated U.S. strategic attention with the EP-3 crisis, allegations of Chinese espionage in the United States and Beijing’s strategic partnership with Moscow.
Since Sept. 11, Beijing has found itself peripheral to the new U.S. focus on combating radical Islamic militants. China has lost strategic leverage as Russia has allied itself with the United States. Washington’s relations with India have warmed dramatically, while China’s lone ally in South Asia, Pakistan, seems somewhere between subservience to the United States and chaos. And the global economic downturn has rendered once common ground a potential source of tension with Washington. Worst of all, Beijing’s reversal of fortunes has occurred as it prepares for a leadership transition.
The summit is the first opportunity since Sept. 11 to resume active engagement with the United States. Given the current geopolitical situation, the last thing China wants is to intensify its isolation by confronting the United States. At the same time, Beijing understands that the way to get U.S. attention is to create an atmosphere of tension that needs soothing.
In placing the bugged aircraft and alleged links between Xinjiang separatists and al-Qaida on the summit agenda, Beijing is arguing that Washington must address China’s territorial concerns as well as the issue of U.S. interference in Chinese affairs. Beijing is signaling that if the United States ignores these interests, it will not honor the U.S. war on al-Qaida. Thus, China has positioned itself to extract maximum advantage from the meetings.
