This article was originally written on 15 May 2005 and published on blog.luxzenburg.org. It is republished here as a historical document and reflects the author’s ideas at the time of writing.
The New York Times is publishing articles from the Council on Foreign Relations about the military threat posed by China. One article describes how China has significantly expanded its military expenditure and capabilities over the past fifteen years — from a basic army to an advanced fighting force that can match the US in defensive power, though its capacity to operate outside China remains limited for now.
The article contains a remarkable quotation. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld asked pointedly on 4 June in Singapore: “Since no country threatens China, one must wonder: why this growing investment? Why these continuing large arms purchases? Why these robust expansions?”
This comes from the defence secretary of a country spending 8 billion dollars a week on a war in Iraq that they cannot even justify to their own population. China spends, according to the article, around 30 billion per year on defence — let us even assume 100 billion for the wildest estimates. The US spends 200 billion on the Iraq war effort alone — separate from the Pentagon’s base budget of well over 400 billion dollars.
Another point the article raises to stoke fear of the ‘Yellow Peril’: the Chinese military numbers 2.3 million personnel. Exactly the same as the American military — which, however, can operate on 400 billion dollars compared to China’s 100 billion.
Why does a defence secretary leading such a colossal and wealthy organisation hold a country with the same number of people, the same resources and the same threats to account? Why do American media never question this kind of statement? I can think of only one reason: they stoke fear among their own population to justify exorbitant expenditure, and to deflect attention from that expenditure. And by ‘any other country’ they mean every country — because even Europe is portrayed in this article as the fallen ally betraying the US by being willing to sell weapons to China.
The US seems to see ghosts on its path, dreaming on that the world loves them and that they must save the world.