U.S., China Must Cooperate as World Powers, Gates Says

BEIJING, Jan. 10, 2011 — The Unit­ed States and Chi­na are world pow­ers that need to coop­er­ate, Defense Sec­re­tary Robert M. Gates said here today.

Defense Sec­re­tary Robert M. Gates, left, is greet­ed by Chi­nese Gen. Ma Xiaot­ian, the Chi­nese army’s deputy chief of staff, at Bei­jing Inter­na­tion­al Air­port, Jan. 9, 2011. Gates arrived for a four-day vis­it to meet with senior Chi­nese lead­ers. DOD pho­to by Air Force Mas­ter Sgt. Jer­ry Mor­ri­son Click to enlarge

At a news con­fer­ence with after their meet­ing at the Bayi Build­ing, Gates and Gen. Liang Guan­glie, China’s min­is­ter of nation­al defense, spoke of the impor­tance of strong, reli­able mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary con­tacts between the nations. 

“Our two nations now have an extra­or­di­nary oppor­tu­ni­ty to define our rela­tion­ship not by the obsta­cles that at times divide us, but by the oppor­tu­ni­ties that exist to fos­ter greater coop­er­a­tion and bring us clos­er togeth­er,” Gates said. 

Both men not­ed that Chi­nese Pres­i­dent Hu Jin­tao and Pres­i­dent Barack Oba­ma want good mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary ties between the nations. 

Lat­er, Gates met with Chi­nese Vice Pres­i­dent Xi Jin­ping at the Great Hall of the Peo­ple. “We’ve seen the Unit­ed States and Chia coop­er­ate to address sev­er­al issues on the inter­na­tion­al front that pose dan­gers both region­al­ly and across the world,” Gates said to Xi. “These are exam­ples of what we can accom­plish when we work together.” 

The Chi­nese cut off mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary ties after the U.S. gov­ern­ment sold defen­sive weapons to Tai­wan last year. Gates has stressed that the mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary rela­tion­ship must con­tin­ue in good times and bad. 

“We are in strong agree­ment that in order to reduce the chances of mis­com­mu­ni­ca­tion, mis­un­der­stand­ing or mis­cal­cu­la­tion, it is impor­tant that our mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary ties are sol­id, con­sis­tent and not sub­ject to shift­ing polit­i­cal winds,” Gates said. 

Liang seemed to agree. Through a trans­la­tor, the Chi­nese defense min­is­ter said both coun­tries desire a healthy mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary rela­tion­ship. “We both rec­og­nize that enhanc­ing and main­tain­ing dia­logue and com­mu­ni­ca­tion at all lev­els is of great sig­nif­i­cance in the devel­op­ment of mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary rela­tions,” Liang said. Both sides share a respon­si­bil­i­ty to build mutu­al trust, he added. 

The Unit­ed States and Chi­na have more unit­ing them than divid­ing them, both men said. The Unit­ed States and Chi­na agreed to coop­er­ate on coun­tert­er­ror­ism, coun­ter­pira­cy, human­i­tar­i­an oper­a­tions and dis­as­ter assis­tance. The Unit­ed States pro­posed, and the Chi­nese agreed, to study begin­ning a strate­gic secu­ri­ty dia­logue “as part of a broad­er strate­gic and eco­nom­ic dia­logue that cov­ers, nuclear, mis­sile defense, space and cyber issues,” Gates said. 

The two agreed to pick up and move out on sev­en high-pri­or­i­ty areas for devel­op­ing mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary rela­tions that Gates nego­ti­at­ed with Gen. Xu Cai­hou, vice chair­man of the Cen­tral Mil­i­tary Com­mis­sion, in Octo­ber 2009. They include high-lev­el vis­its, insti­tu­tion­al­ized exchange pro­grams and mil­i­tary education. 

The high-lev­el vis­its will begin soon with Gen. Chen Bingde, the Chi­nese army’s chief of staff, vis­it­ing the Unit­ed States in the com­ing months as the guest of Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chair­man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. 

The two men sought to insti­tu­tion­al­ize and nor­mal­ize con­tacts between the two mil­i­taries, agree­ing that the defense con­sul­ta­tive talks, the defense pol­i­cy coor­di­na­tion talks and the mil­i­tary mar­itime con­sul­ta­tive agree­ment can serve as impor­tant chan­nels of com­mu­ni­ca­tion between the two nations. Liang announced that the two nations agreed to hold the mil­i­tary mar­itime work­ing group meet­ing and the defense pol­i­cy coor­di­na­tion talks in the first half of this year. 

The Unit­ed States and Chi­na also will put togeth­er a joint work­ing group that will dis­cuss the guid­ing prin­ci­ples and frame­work for mil­i­tary-to-mil­i­tary rela­tions and pro­duce work­ing doc­u­ments for approval. 

Gates and Liang both stressed that the coop­er­a­tion will expand mutu­al inter­ests and avoid mis­un­der­stand­ing and miscalculation. 

Chi­na and the Unit­ed States share many com­mon inter­ests and con­cerns that can best be addressed coop­er­a­tive­ly, Gates said, not­ing that the two nations can work togeth­er address­ing the chal­lenges posed by the spread of nuclear, space, cyber and mis­sile tech­nol­o­gy. They also can work to main­tain peace and secu­ri­ty on the Kore­an penin­su­la by facil­i­tat­ing engage­ment between the two Kore­as and work­ing toward the de-nucleariza­tion of the Kore­an penin­su­la, he added. 

Chi­na and the Unit­ed States also can coop­er­ate to pre­vent Iran from obtain­ing a nuclear weapon and to defuse glob­al con­flicts and tensions. 

U.S. ser­vice mem­bers can expect more joint exer­cis­es with the Chi­nese military. 

“Not only will joint exer­cis­es improve key capa­bil­i­ties on both sides,” Gates said, “they will also lead to safer prac­tices for our sea and air forces and over time cul­ti­vate trust and lead to more oppor­tu­ni­ties for defense cooperation.” 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs) 

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