Washington, Feb. 17 (CNA): One possible goal for United States policymakers is getting Communist China to move away the M9 and M11 missiles that are aimed at Taiwan, reported an influential American newspaper Saturday.
The Washington Post wrote that the elements of U.S. policy toward Communist China have remained constant since diplomatic relations were established in the 1970s, but key Bush administration officials have a markedly tougher tone on Beijing.
The report said that the new roster includes Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff and national security adviser, I. Lewis Libby, who was general counsel to the Cox Committee. The committee was a congressional panel chaired by Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Calif.) which investigated alleged PRC theft of U.S. nuclear secrets.
The Post said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has assigned Pentagon's strategic review to Andrew Marshall, who believes that the United States must be better prepared for a possible war in Asia and has drawn up hypothetical scenarios for war with Communist China.
Paul D. Wolfowitz, the nominee for deputy defense secretary, and Richard Armitage, deputy secretary of state-designate, joined 21 other renowned conservatives in 1999 in recommending that Washington "declare unambiguously that it will come to Taiwan's defense in the event of an attack or a blockade," it added.
"Taiwan has become a democracy, and that's inconvenient for some," Armitage told an Asia Society meeting last year. "We look at Taiwan not as a problem but as an opportunity to show that democracy counts."
The report said one possible goal for U.S. policymakers is getting Beijing to move away the M9 and M11 missiles that are deployed within range of Taiwan. A senior Defense Department official pointed out that if Beijing learns how to make the missiles more accurate, it would alter the cross-strait strategic balance and justify new arms for Taiwan.
Trade is another area that might soon disrupt U.S.-PRC relations, according to the Post. Although the Clinton administration signed a trade agreement with Communist China last year that paved the way for the latter's entry into the World Trade Organization, Beijing has not yet join the WTO and bring the agreement into force.
National missile defense programs also loom large. Some Bush administration officials want to include Beijing in negotiations on arms control and missile defense, but others see Communist China, which has been modernizing its two dozen nuclear missiles, as a rogue state, not a cooperative power, said the report.
"I tend to believe that it is not a good thing for a country to seek to destroy 20 percent of America," one newly appointed U.S. official was quoted as saying. "Do I have some understanding of why they do? Yeah, but I don't have to like it," he added. (by Nelson Chung)
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