U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III and his Chinese counterpart held their first face-to-face talks in 18 months on Friday amid mistrust over Taiwan, the South China Sea and other regional disputes .
Austin’s meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister General Dong Jun in Singapore comes after multiple Biden administration officials traveled to Beijing for talks on trade imbalances, U.S. restrictions on Chinese technology sales and China’s support for Russia throughout his term. War and other sources of tension in Ukraine.
President Joe Biden said high-level lines of communication between the United States and China must remain open to prevent a potential conflict between the world’s two most powerful militaries. However, military issues remain the most thorny area of tension in the relationship, and expectations for the meeting between Singapore’s defense ministers are low.
“These negotiations are not about compromise,” said Drew Thompson, a visiting senior fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore and a former Pentagon official who has dealt with the Chinese military. “This is an opportunity for both sides to exchange established topics. “
The military competition between the two countries stems from long-standing disputes that are not easily resolved. These include China’s claims to Taiwan, a democratic island that relies on the United States for its security, and Beijing’s increasingly assertive assertions over large swaths of the South China Sea, alarming its neighbors.
Admiral Dong became defense minister late last year after his predecessor suddenly disappeared amid an apparent widening investigation into corruption or other misconduct in the People’s Liberation Army. He was seen as lacking the authority to make major strategic decisions.
“He is not a member of the Central Military Commission, and he is not a member of the Politburo,” Thompson said, referring to the two most powerful members of China’s leadership.
The United States may just want to show that despite their differences, both sides are at least willing to talk.
For more than two years, the Pentagon has focused on supporting Ukraine and containing risks in the Middle East as Israeli forces battle Hamas. But China’s growing military power remains what Pentagon planners see as a “tempo challenge”: a long-term structural shift that, if not managed properly, could drag the United States into a war with another nuclear-armed power.
Pentagon officials have warned that Chinese People’s Liberation Army military aircraft and ships are becoming increasingly aggressive and reckless in closely following and harassing U.S. military ships and aircraft near China and allies such as Australia, often to gather intelligence.
Austin is likely to look to Admiral Dong for clear measures to avoid an incident that could trigger a crisis, including a possible communications link between U.S. Indo-Pacific Command and the People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command, which is responsible for military operations around Taiwan. sea and sky.
The Pentagon said at the time that when Mr Austin spoke with Admiral Tung via video in April, he “reaffirmed that the United States will continue to fly, sail and operate safely and responsibly within the limits of international law”.
But Chinese officials have been wary of making promises. They deny that China’s military actions are destabilizing and that other countries have the right to operate so close to China’s coast. They argue that agreeing to stricter rules on encounters between military aircraft and ships would only give U.S. forces greater permission to approach China’s coast and obtain useful images and signals.
The United States has by far the largest military in the world. The Pentagon’s budget is still about three times China’s annual military spending, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
But rather than having the same global commitment and operations as the U.S. military, Beijing is focused on projecting power in Asia, particularly toward Taiwan and across the sea, where it has territorial disputes with neighbors from Japan to Indonesia.
Admiral Tung is likely to reiterate the Chinese government’s longstanding opposition to continued U.S. support for Taiwan, particularly in the form of arms sales.
Admiral Dong’s predecessor, General Lee Sang-bok, was under US sanctions and refused to hold talks with Mr Austin in Singapore last year. Mr Austin and Admiral Tung spoke via video link in April. Mr Austin’s last face-to-face meeting with China’s defense minister was in November 2022, when he met General Wei Fenghe in Cambodia.
Friday’s meeting added another dimension to the conversation. This alone may be the only sign of progress.
