CHINA: ROGUE ELEPHANT ON WEAPONS PROLIFERATION (Senate - April 17, 1991) Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I rise today to address a topic that I think is as important to future United States and world security interests as any that I have spoken to. But we seemed not to want to speak to it very much recently.
Mr. President, I rise today to address the topic of Chinese weapons proliferation, a subject that, I am sorry to say, we may be returning to again and again in the days and weeks ahead.
If true, recent press reports of Chinese involvement in the proliferation of medium-range ballistic missiles to Syria and Pakistan and nuclear weapons technology to Algeria, open a very new chapter in Chinese flouting of international norms of behavior, in my opinion.
It appears that China is becoming a rogue elephant among the community of nations. Last year when the Bush administration was defending its policy granting China most-favored-nation trade status, so-called MFN, we heard a great deal from the President and administration spokespersons about the positive effect of maintaining our relationship with the present Chinese leadership. This, as the Presiding Officer knows as well or better than anyone, relates to the events in Tiananmen Square and what our response should and should not be.
For example, we were told by Assistant Secretary of State Solomon that maintaining ties with Beijing enables us to raise our concerns about Chinese proliferation of ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction. We were specifically told that.
This was cited as one of the benefits of high-level dialog and why we should not engage in serious activity designed to demonstrate our condemnation of their actions in Tiananmen Square.
We were told: Look, one of the things you are going to have to pay for if you withdraw MFN is that we are going to lose our ties with Beijing and the people in Beijing, and one of the reasons we have to keep those ties, keep the access, is because we, the administration, are concerned about the proliferation of ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction.
Let me give some other examples of what the administration told the Foreign Relations Committee--on
which the Presiding Officer sits--last year, about Chinese proliferation. We were told at the time, `The Chinese are on record * * * as saying they would not sell a particular class of intermediate range missiles, the M-9, to Syria.'
We are also told, `We have no indications that the Chinese have ever delivered intermediate range missiles beyond those previously sold to Saudi Arabia or the M-9 to anyone.'
Finally, Assistant Secretary of State Solomon told me, `The Chinese went on record saying that they would be prudent, they would not be exporting these kinds of weapons to unstable areas in the Middle East and we will hold them to that public pledge.'
Mr. President, if reports that have been published now in the Washington Times and Time magazine are correct, these Chinese pledges appear to have been worthless. But I fear that this administration may be less than steadfast in holding the Chinese to their pledges if, in fact, as reported, they have been breached by the Chinese. If the Chinese have broken their pledge, my concern now is whether the administration will attempt to hold them to the pledge that they made.
I cannot help but sense that the administration has developed a `China syndrome,' marked by a refusal to acknowledge or accept that Chinese diplomats are perfectly willing to tell us one thing while Chinese arms merchants go ahead and do another. One day we are told that the Chinese are prepared to live by `international guidelines' prohibiting the export of medium-range missiles. The next day, we read in the press that the Chinese are selling medium-range missiles to Syria and to Pakistan. I would not suggest that these two regions are stable areas of the world at the moment.
One day we are told that the Chinese will be prudent and responsible in exporting nuclear weapons technology and that such exports will be subject to international inspections. The next day we read in the press that the Chinese are assisting Algeria--that is right, Algeria, that stable nation of Algeria--in producing nuclear weapons technology.
This is not to say that the Bush administration has failed to communicate our concerns to the Chinese. But on Assistant Secretary Solomon's last trip to China, we saw the Bush administration's China syndrome more clearly than ever.
After his meeting with the Chinese leadership, Mr.
Solomon said, `The Chinese have indicated that they will honor the parameters' of the missile technology control regime. The very same day, China's foreign Minister said, `Those countries that did not attend the MTCR'--that is the Missile Technology Control Regime--`that did not attend the MTCR meeting should not be called upon to assume corresponding obligations to an agreement reached among some other countries.' An apparently contradictory statement on the same day.
In other words, while Mr. Solomon might wish it to be otherwise, apparently the Chinese do not feel bound to live by or live up to this international regime. While in Beijing, Mr. Solomon also said that there was no evidence that the Chinese had completed any new missile deals. A few days later, we read in the press about Chinese plans to sell medium-range missiles to Pakistan and to Syria.
Mr. President, after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, we heard speech after speech on this floor about how other nations had helped Saddam Hussein build his deadly arsenal, and how we must make sure that this terrible tragedy is not repeated.
Mr. President, press reports now tell us that what is happening is the Chinese are selling medium-range missiles to Syria. I realize that we have a new-found relationship with Mr. Assad, but let me go on record again and again and again. I see little or no distinction between Mr. Assad and Saddam Hussein, and I caution those who think that Saddam has seen the second coming to look at whether or not Mr. Assad is likely to see the second coming.
I would respectfully suggest, Mr. President, as far as I am concerned, Syria's dictator, Mr. Assad, is little better than Saddam Hussein, and yet according to the press, the Chinese are proceeding to help another Mideast dictator build another deadly arsenal.
That is why I am working with my colleagues on the Foreign Relations Committee, Mr. President, Democrats, and Republicans, to craft legislation to create an arms supplier cartel. If the key nations are willing to participate, and that
is a very big if I might add, Mr. President, but several have already indicated their willingness to do so, such a cartel can be effective in controlling the spread of these dangerous weapons.
I might also note parenthetically that no matter what the legislation that I am able to craft, if I am able to craft it, Mr. President, it is going to depend upon a sense of urgency on the part of the President to see to it that such a cartel comes into being.
In this regard, I find myself in total agreement with Assistant Secretary Solomon. On that same trip to China, he said that if we want to try to limit proliferation of deadly weapons to the Middle East `China is going to have to be a player.' Skeptics say the Chinese have made a firm decision to sell their missiles and their conventional weapons because they need hard currency that such sales provide. They say that China will never be a member in good standing of an arms supplier cartel, and that may be; that may be how it will turn out.
But China receives a lot more hard currency from trade with the United States than it does from arms sales to the Third World. Last year, the Chinese had a trade surplus with the United States of more than $10 billion, and it is climbing, Mr. President.
So I submit to my colleagues that we do have, in fact, the leverage we need to ensure at least the ear of, if not the active participation and good faith of, the Chinese in terms of their participation in any arms supplier cartel, and it is called MFN. If China continues to behave as a rogue elephant on weapons proliferation, we should be prepared to retaliate with a clear and unequivocal message that they will understand; that is, denying China most-favored-nation status.
We had a similar debate several years ago about dealing with Saddam Hussein, whether we should deny him the economic benefits of Commerce, the United States and other civilized nations. We were told, no, we can work this out. I have seen nothing to indicate the likelihood of the Chinese changing their attitude, short of some reason to change their attitude supplied by us and other Western countries.
Mr. President, we are planning to hold closed hearings with the administration and representatives of the intelligence community in the very near future to get to the bottom of this question to find out whether or not the press reports are accurate.
We will find out what the Chinese are doing and what, if anything, the administration is doing to stop whatever it is the Chinese are doing. I hope we have learned a lesson from the Persian Gulf. I know I have learned some lessons. I voted against an early use of force against Iraq.
I hope others will admit that maybe they should learn some lessons as well, Mr. President. I hope that we will be able to understand that folks like Assad do not change overnight, and patterns of misbehavior in the international community like the Chinese have been engaged in are not going to change absent some significant protests and significant actions by the United States and other Western nations.
I am hopeful about the peace process that Secretary Baker is pursuing between Israel and its neighbors. But I must confess I am not optimistic that we can cure the Bush administration of its China syndrome.' Nonetheless, we must try, Mr. President. The way to start is by confronting the Chinese about their arms sales policy. We must stop this rogue elephant in its tracks, and we must prevent the arming of another Mideast dictator.
I ask unanimous consent that the press articles to which I have referred to printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the articles were ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:
From the Washington Post, Apr. 11, 1991
[FROM THE WASHINGTON POST, APR. 11, 1991] China Helps Algeria Develop Nuclear Weapons
(BY BILL GERTZ) Algeria is developing a nuclear weapons program with the help of the Chinese government, according to U.S. officials.
Details about the nuclear program were disclosed recently in a secret CIA briefing to members of Congress. The disclosure is based on intelligence reports that a nuclear reactor is being built at a site along Algeria's Mediterranean coast.
The CIA also disclosed that despite U.S. diplomatic efforts, the Chinese continue selling ballistic missiles to Third World countries, supplying advanced arms to Pakistan, Iran, Syria and Libya.
According to the CIA, the Chinese have made or plan deliveries of M-9 and M-11 intermediate-range ballistic missiles and Silkworm anti-ship misisles to Iran, Syria and Pakistan in the next several months.
China was the first nation ever to export intermediate-range missiles with the delivery of 1988 of CSS-2 East Wind missiles to Saudi Arabia. Some U.S. officials suspect the Saudi CSS-2 are nulcear-tipped.
The White House voiced it objections to the CIA for holding the congressional briefing because the intelligence information is expected to fuel political opposition from Congress to President Bush's efforts to improve U.S.-Chinese diplomatic relations.
The military nature of the Algerian-Chinese nuclear program could disrupt U.S.-Chinese ties.
U.S. officials have sought Chinese cooperation in halting the proliferation of missiles and weapons technology but have been rebuffed by Beijing, which is more interested in obtaining her currency through the weapons sales, the officials said.
The exact location of the Algerian nuclear reactor facility was not disclosed.
But according to the officials who declined to be named, the Chinese government is providng the nuclear reactor to Algeria and the reactor
and a related research facility are the central components of the weapons program.The reactor facility was photographed by a U.S. spy satellite in the early stages of construction.
More alarming to the officials, however, are intelligence reports that the Beijing government is supplying nuclear-weapons technology and military advice on how to match nuclear weapons to various aerial and missile delivery systems, the sources said.
The Bush administration has protested the Chinese-Algerian nuclear cooperation through diplomatic channels to the Beijing government.
The intelligence indicates that the nuclear program is designed for more than the production of electrical power and will be used to build weapons.
`There are no electrical-power generation facilities at the reactor and no electric-power transmission lines are nearby,' said one official. `This is clearly a military nuclear reactor for weapons production.'
A key indicator of the military nature of the nuclear facility was the discovery of a Soviet-made SA-5 surface-to-air missile battery nearby, which signaled an apparent defense against aircraft or missiles.
According to the administration sources, the Algerians want to build nuclear weapons to counter a perceived threat from the radical regime of Libya's Col. Moammar Gadhafi. Relations between Algiers and Tripoli have been strained in the past.
Libya is developing a ballistic-missile program known as the Fatah. Mobile transporters and missiles have been photographed by U.S. spy satellites at what is believed to be a missile test center.
China also has provided technical assistance to Iraq and Pakistan for their respective nuclear weapons programs, according to the officials.
The State Department had no immediate comment on the Algerian-Chinese nuclear program.
-- From Time magazine, Apr. 22, 1991
[FROM TIME MAGAZINE, APR. 22, 1991] China: For Sale: Tools of Destruction
(BY BRUCE W. NELAN) Even if China raised no cheers for George Bush's concept of a new world order, it did not hinder allied action against Iraq during the gulf war. Its acquiescence, though often reluctant, included abstaining in a key vote in the United Nations Security Council. Now that the war is over, however, Beijing is breaking ranks on at least one front. New evidence indicates that the Chinese are peddling missiles and nuclear technology to Third World customers in defiance of multilateral efforts to ban such sales.
Beijing's experts have secretly built a nuclear reactor that is now nearing completion in the Algerian desert, American officials say. U.S. intelligence has also learned that China has sent Pakistan parts for its M-11 missile system, which can propel an 1,100-lb. warhead 180 miles, and is negotiating the sale to Syria of its M-9 missile, with a range of 375 miles. With the Chinese missiles, Pakistan could target major cities and military installations in India, and Syria could put all of Israel under threat.
Mobile launchers for the M-11 arrived in Pakistan last month along with dummy missile frames for practice launches. Pakistani air force technicians are now undergoing training in China. Both of the Chinese missiles are considered more accurate and reliable than the Soviet-designed Scuds that Iraq rained on Israel and Saudi Arabia during the war.
Washington's evidence on the reactor in Algeria comes from satellite photographs and other intelligence data. `Most of the structure is finished,' says a U.S. official. `We don't know if any nuclear fuel is there. We don't think it is in operation.'
What worries the watchers is that the reactor was built in secret and that its capacity--estimated at between 15 and 40 megawatts--is too small for generating electricity but too large for research. The likely conclusion, they say, is that its purpose is to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons.If China covertly delivers nuclear fuel to Algeria or transfers M-9 missiles to Syria, it is violating specific, public commitments. The sale of missiles to Pakistan would not break any formal Chinese pledges but would overstep the guidelines set by the Missile Technology Control Regime (mtcr) agreed on by 15 countries. Even though China is not a party to that agreement, under U.S. law the violation could trigger economic sanctions against Beijing.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry's traditional reply to reports of such sales is that they are `utterly groundless.' One reason for U.S. National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft's controversial visit to Beijing in December 1989 was his effort to head off the M-9 sale to Syria. He got a general promise that China would not sell medium-range missiles to Middle East countries and a specific statement that China had no plans to sell the M-9 to Syria.
Asked last week about the nuclear-reactor project, a Foreign Ministry official in Beijing said, `We have never heard of that,' and promptly changed the subject. Even in public, Chinese leaders make little pretense of being serious about controlling missiles and conventional armaments. They repeat pious slogans about eliminating nuclear weapons but otherwise imply that they will do what they wish with their `prudent and responsible' arms sales.
China never signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and did not take part in the recent mtcr conference in Tokyo. Because China did not attend, says Foreign Minister Qian Qichen, `it is not committed to implementing the agreement.'
In China's faltering economy, the military has strong incentives to sell weapons abroad, even if it causes political problems. `When an arms deal happens to clash with the country's foreign policy,' explains a Chinese defense analyst, `the military may operate independently, leaving damage control to the government.' Some experts also believe the generals have had more political influence over such decisions since they crushed the pro-democracy movement by rolling tanks into Tiananmen Square in June 1989.
China's defense budget is so low--officially just in excess of $6 billion for 1991--that the 3.2 million-member People's Liberation Army has for years raised extra money by producing consumer goods for sale at home and expensive weaponry for customers abroad. The defense establishment has thus become a major hard-currency earner, though its overseas sales to Third World countries fell from $4.7 billion in 1987 to $1.1 billion in 1989.
The pressure to modernize the arsenal by raising money through arms sales is stronger than ever. Chinese commanders were shaken by the performance of U.S. high-tech hardware in the gulf war. Just three weeks ago the government decided to increase defense spending 12%.
No matter who is making the decisions in Beijing, China's current recklessness is leading toward confrontation. The U.S. asked Beijing last month for an explanation of the Algerian reactor project but so far has received no reply. If the Chinese continue on their present course and complete the deals with Algeria and Syria, relations between Washington and Beijing could become chillier than at any time since before Richard Nixon first went to China: Reported by Jaime A. FlorCruz/Beijing and Jay Peterzell/Washington
-- -- From the Christian Science Monitor, Mar. 29, 1991
[FROM THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR, MAR. 29, 1991] China Will Ignore United States Pressure To Stop Selling Its Missiles
(BY JAMES L. TYSON) Beijing. China has spurned an accord limiting the sale of missiles overseas, even though Iraqi missile attacks during the Gulf war attested to the dangers of such trade.
The rejection by China conflicted with assertions by a leading United States diplomat, who met this month with Chinese officials as part of efforts by Washington to develop international restraints on missile sales.
China is one of just a handful of countries that have sold medium-range missiles abroad.
Foreign Minister Qian Qichen noted at a press conference Wednesday that China has not signed the missile technology control regime (MTCR) and did not attend a recent meeting in Tokyo of 15 signatories of the agreement. The MTCR limits sales in medium-range missiles and related technology.
`Those countries that did not attend the meeting should not be called upon to assume corresponding obligations to an agreement reached among some other countries,' Mr. Qian said.
However, US Assistant Secretary of State Richard Solomon said after a two-day visit this month that, `we have the missile-technology control regime and the Chinese have indicated that they will honor those parameters.'
The US is encouraging Beijing to join its effort to build a broad framework to control the spread of missile technology, Mr. Solomon said.
`As we try to find a multilateral mechanism to prevent the inflow of weaponry, China is going to have to be a player,' Solomon said on March 12.
China's missiles sales have long worried US officials seeking to limit the spread into volatile regions of weapon systems capable of delivering nuclear or other devastating warheads.
United States intelligence services learned in 1988 that China had completed a $2 billion sale of CSS-2 medium-range ballistic missiles to Saudi Arabia.
Since then, there has been no evidence that China has completed another similar deal, according to Solomon.
After dismissing the MTCR as unsuitable for China, Qian said, `As for China's arms exports, in this, China has always been acting in a very prudent and responsible way.
`Actually, I think I can say that China's arms sales are very, very limited, so we hope that the largest weapons exporters in the world can adopt responsible and effective measures of self restraint.'
The total value of China's arms sales to the third world from 1986 to 1989 exceeded the total for Britain or France, according to the Congressional Research Service.
China's trade in arms has declined in recent years, but it remains a major supplier of weaponry to developing countries.
Mr. BIDEN. I thank the Chair and my colleagues who may be listening.
I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The absence of a quorum has been suggested. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
END
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