In 1949, Chairman Mao stood at the Gates of Heavenly Peace and delivered a rousing speech to usher in a new era. Rag-a-tag columns of the PLA (People's Liberation Army) marched past with an assortment of bedraggled uniforms and tunics, pride undented, after crushing the Nationalists in a civil war who were forced to retreat to the island of Formosa (modern Taiwan). Only four years earlier, they were brothers-in-arms in the struggle to repel the mighty Japanese army.
Today, a Mao suited President Hu Jintao declared: "A socialist China that faces the future and the world is standing tall and firm in the East." It was an extravagant showcase that started with a miltary inspection and ended in the evening with more fireworks displays than the opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympics itself. The last such parades were in 1999 and 1984.
The modern PLA is 2.3 million strong. The National People's Congress set a 2009 military budget of Y480.7bn (US$70bn), an annual increase of 14.9%. The figure in 1978 was Y16.8bn (US$2bn). Beijing adds its military expenditure accounted for 1.4% of GDP which is lower than the US' 4.6%, Britain's 3% and India's 2.5%
The Chinese take their weapons "stuff" as seriously as Russia and North Korea. In contrast, Independence Day in Washington tends to be entertaining with marching bands and servicemen; the French roll out a few tanks and cavalry plus their Foreign Legion on Bastille Day; the British don't bother holding anything because it's been over a thousand years since they were last invaded, so they deploy the Household Cavalry parade for the Queen's birthday instead; such is the confidence these countries have in their standing on the world stage. Germany and Japan are too embarrassed to put on such shows.
The PLA showed off its DF-31A mobile nuclear intercontinental missile with a range of 11,000km capable of striking any big NATO city. Mid-air refuelling tankers and fighter jets conducted a fly-by. China has recently began projecting its power with a blue-water fleet which patrolled the Red Sea last year to defend vital sea lanes against pirates. Plans are afoot to build the first aircraft carrier.
The 21st century for Asian nations pivots around better defining porous land borders, containing separatism, securing raw resources and mutually defending critical supply routes like the Gulf of Aden, Straits of Hormuz and Straits of Malacca from piracy and terrorism. Neighbourly spats are becoming increasingly common in the South China Sea. China has already tangled and flexed its muscles with Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines over disputed areas with potential oil and gas deposits. It has embroiled itself with US and Japanese vessels in defining its sea borders. Another flashpoint is Tawang, the most militarised Buddhist enclave in the world that is on the Tibet-India border which remains a sensitive issue with India. “The India-China frontier has become more ‘hot’ than the India-Pakistan border,” said Brahma Chellaney, a professor of strategic studies at the Center for Policy Research, a research organization in New Delhi. He has advised the Indian government’s National Security Council.
India-China border
With the export trade to the US and Europe severely curtailed, the opportunity is there to seize the intra-Asia trade especially with rising middle-class populations in China and India, to absorb some of the excess capacity. India-China trade in 2008 totalled US$52bn. A 2008 pre-credit crisis report from the indepedent UK-based Drewry maritime consultants put the the intra-Asia trade as worth 28.3 million teu (20 foot containers equivalent units) in 2007 and forecast to reach 50.7 million teu by 2013. In 2010, UPS will open its dedicated intra-Asia air hub at Shenzhen International airport. Sabre-rattling and historic suspicions aside...the markets of China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea and Taiwan currently account for more than half of UPS’s total intra-Asia volume. Just how delicate will China's "peaceful rise" be?
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