Candidates debate US-China policy
- By Mitchell Blatt
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E-mail China.org.cn, August 30, 2015
China also got into a dispute with Clinton over the Senkaku Islands, known in Chinese as the Diaoyu Islands. In 2010, she declared the islands were covered under America's defense agreement with Japan, a view Obama reaffirmed in 2014. In response, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei stated in 2013 that Clinton was "ignorant of facts and indiscriminate of rights and wrongs."
If Clinton is elected president, she can be expected to continue many Obama administration policies but perhaps with a slightly more hawkish stance.
On the Republican side, Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush have taken particularly hawkish stances to foreign policy in general and various island disputes in particular. When China established an Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) over the Diaoyu Islands, Rubio was one of four Senators signing a protest letter.
This April, Rubio wrote an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal arguing that "Asia Needs a Strong U.S.-Japan Alliance." He also supported Japan reforming its constitution to allow for it to support the United States militarily. He also dismisses China's inclusion of islands in the South China Sea in its territory as "an illegitimate claim." He said that America should keep naval vessels active in the area to prevent Chinese control.
So far the two countries have been able to avoid direct confrontation, but the greater the military presence, the greater the potential is for miscalculation.
Besides territorial issues, Rubio also wants to push China on democracy-related issues. He said, "We must never shy away from demanding that China allow true freedom for its 1.3 billion people."
That is the kind of language he applies to countries like Cuba, objecting to the US re-establishment of diplomatic relations with the island. Many would view his commitment to American-style democracy in countries with their own systems as futile and naive, especially after years of diplomatic isolation of Cuba proved fruitless in this regard.
Scott Walker, who visited China once on a trade mission as Governor of Wisconsin, thinks that the U.S. can maintain peace with China through strength. In an interview with The National Interest, he stated, "Conflict in the Asia-Pacific region will be less likely if China understands that we are ready to defend our national security interests and those of our friends and allies." He wants the US to continue to spend heavily on defense in order to maintain an advantage over China.
Many Republicans maintain similar views, the major exception being Rand Paul, who offers a more polished version of his father Ron Paul's non-interventionist world view. From his perspective, trade, not military, is the key to forging good relations.
"As trade began to blossom with China, many conservatives, myself included, came to admit that trade improves our economic well-being AND makes us less likely to fight," he wrote in The National Interest in 2014.
Before he was elected to Congress, Paul had played with the idea of withdrawing American troops from South Korea, Japan and elsewhere around the world. Since his election, he has had to moderate those views. Withdrawing troops would be unpopular with voters, not to mention dangerous to the power balance if it created a vacuum.
The candidates will debate their views over the coming months, and that should give American voters more time to evaluate their proposed policies. A peaceful relationship between the U.S. and China must be maintained, but how that relationship is maintained is a question that will continue to be debated.
The author is a columnist with China.org.cn. For more information please visit:
http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/MitchellBlatt.htm
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