conflict foretold america and china

8/12/2019 Conflict Foretold America and China

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In his novella Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Gabriel Garca Mrquez tells the

story of two brothers who are driven to murder the man who they believe

has deowered their sister. Everyone in the small town where the action

takes place believes that the intended victim will be murdered. But for a

variety of reasons, mostly mundane, nobody warns him or tries to prevent

the murder from taking place. It is not clear that the brothers really want

to murder the presumed culprit but they are driven to do so by a spiral of

circumstances, including a widespread public expectation that this is what

they will do. Though hardly an exact parallel, the novellas title may have aprophetic quality in describing a relationship between China and the United

States which seems increasingly to be governed by a security dilemma. This

dilemma is a phenomenon rst described by US academic and former

intelligence ocer John H. Herz. Herz related a situation whereby in a

context of uncertainty and bounded rationality, perceived external threats

generate feelings of insecurity in states that believe themselves to be the

target of such threats.1He identied six factors that contribute to a security

dilemma: a state of international anarchy by which he meant an absence

of supranational institutions capable of mediating relations between states;

a situation of uncertainty among states and fear about each others inten-

Conflict Foretold: America

and China

Nigel Inkster

Nigel Inksteris Director of Transnational Threats and Political Risk at the IISS. He served in the British Secret

Intelligence Service (SIS) from 1975 to 2006, and spent seven years on the Board of SIS, the last two as Assistant

Chief and Director for Operations and Intelligence. This article arose out of a talk the author gave at the Third

Seminar on National Security Strategy and the Development of Science and Technology at the National

University of Defence Technology, Changsha, China, from 1718 June 2013.

Survival | vol. 55 no. 5 | OctoberNovember 2013 | pp. 728 DOI 10.1080/00396338.2013.841802


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8 | Nigel Inkster

tions to do harm; a response by states that involves accumulating power to

mitigate the perceived threat which leads to a cycle of power competition;

the reality that such a response may not only fail to improve a states secu -

rity but also prove self-defeating and even tragic the word tragic beingused in the classical sense of a situation which has a prophetic inevitability;

the potential for causing war though war is not an inevitable outcome,

nor is the security dilemma the sole cause of war; and a dynamic and self-

reinforcing vicious cycle.

Herzs original formulation has been modied and embellished by a

number of subsequent scholars, among whom the best known are Herbert

Buereld, Robert Jervis, Kenneth Wal and John Mearsheimer. Three sep-

arate schools of security-dilemma theory have been identied.2

The rst school is fatalistic. This approach is epitomised by Mearsheimer,

an oensive realist who argues that uncertainty between states can never be

eliminated, and hence states are destined to engage in competitive power

accumulation. There is thus no such thing as a security dilemma per se, but

rather a security paradox whereby the accumulation of ever-greater power

can prove self-defeating.

The second school is mitigating. Defensive realists like Jervis, who claimsthat a security dilemma can create enmity between states which start out with

no intention to harm each other, have argued that a security dilemma can

be mitigated when the oencedefence balance favours defence, and where

the nature of such defence is clear. Jervis has also suggested that a range of

material and physical factors geography and technology can also exercise

a mitigating eect. He juxtaposes the spiral model in which states seek to

outdo each other in acquiring defensive and oensive capabilities with the

deterrence model, whereby states assume they are dealing with an aggressor

and focus on developing strong deterrence and a show of resolve.3

The third school is transcending. Scholars such as Emanuel Adler and

Michael Barne constructivists argue that security dilemmas can be tran-

scended via the creation of security communities in which states cede some

degree of sovereignty in pursuit of wider common interests.4NATO might

serve as an example of such a community, as might, in a more embryonic

form, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.


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Conflict Foretold: America and China | 9

It is important to recall that, as mentioned earlier, security dilemmas

cannot account for all wars that occur between states. The Second World

War has often been cited as a conict in which there was no pre-existing

security dilemma; Adolf Hitlers thinking was dominated above all else bythe concepts of Rache(revenge) and Lebensraum(living space), ideas which

made aggressive expansionism an inevitability. Other cases, starting with

the Peloponnesian Wars and Chinas Warring States period, t the model

rather beer, as, arguably, do more recent examples such as the Cold War or

the break-up of Yugoslavia. Whether the Sino-American security relation-

ship conforms exactly to the various denitions of the security dilemma that

have been advanced by academics is a moot point. But it is by no means an

irrelevant one if such a consideration helps us determine more clearly where

a relationship as globally signicant as that between the United States and

China may be heading, and provides policymakers and opinion formers

on both sides with a greater sense of self-awareness, thereby reducing the

potential for miscalculation and inadvertent escalation. That such poten-

tial exists is becoming increasingly clear. As Aaron Friedberg observes, the

United States and China are today locked in a quiet but increasingly intense

struggle for power and inuence, not only in Asia but around the world.5This is a contest taking place across all areas of activity political, economic,

cultural and military. But two domains in particular, space and cyberspace,

both intimately connected, merit aention because of their relative newness

and the ways in which they intersect with and inuence policies and behav-

iours across the board.

Space

Space has emerged as a domain characterised by a growing array of mili-

tary operations, and one in which tensions manifest in other domains are

increasingly played out. From a military and security perspective, space

remains a largely unregulated environment. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty,

negotiated at a time when there were only two spacefaring powers, has

limited utility in terms of regulating contemporary space activities. It

bans the deployment in space of weapons of mass destruction but says

nothing about the stationing of conventional weaponry there, nor does it


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10 | Nigel Inkster

regulate the use of terrestrial weapons against space-based assets. It pre-

vents states from claiming sovereignty over celestial bodies but oers no

guidance on how activities such as mining asteroids or even planets, a

possibility unlikely to be the preserve of science ction for much longer,might be regulated. There are now 11 spacefaring nations states with

a space launch capability and over 60 countries that own and manage

around 1,100 satellites whose functions govern many of the systems on

which states and populations depend for the conduct of daily life. And the

situation is further complicated by the reality that space is no longer the

sole preserve of nation-states, as private actors become increasingly active

in this domain. From a defence perspective, space is inextricably bound

up with the question of nuclear weapons and the associated questions of

missile-defence systems, and a new generation of US precision missiles

developed under the collective term of conventional prompt global strike

(CPGS) capabilities. And the degree to which space-based assets are both

dependent on cyber capabilities and also critical in enabling such capa-

bilities testies to the inextricable linkages between these domains and to

their growing relevance to national defence.

For the United States, space has come to represent a critical domain forenabling warfare in all other areas, with many of its terrestrial weapons

systems and other military capabilities dependent on satellite-based

communications. The 2006 National Space Policy of the George W. Bush

administration sought to reect this with the assertion that freedom of

action in space is as important to the United States as air or sea power. The

policy goes on to say:

The United States considers space capabilities vital to its national

interests ... [and] will: preserve its rights, capabilities and freedom of

action in space; dissuade or deter others from impeding those rights or

developing capabilities intended to do so; take those actions necessary

to protect its space capabilities; respond to interference and deny, if

necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities hostile to US national

interests.


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And, more ominously:

The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or

other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit US access to or use of space.

Proposed arms control agreements or restrictions must not impair the

rights of the United States to conduct research, development, testing and

operations or other activities in space for US national interests.6

Perhaps unsurprisingly, this policy was received with less than rapture

by the rest of the world; one British newspaper summed up its signicance

with the words space: no longer the nal frontier but the 51st state of the

United States.7

For China, the 2006 policy was conrmation of a long-held conviction

that the United States was seeking to perpetuate its decisive advantage in

space as part of an eort to pursue absolute security, at the expense of other

states.8 Of particular concern to China was the United States 2001 with-

drawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty as a prelude to developing

space-enabled anti-ballistic-missile systems. Beijing saw these systems not

as a purely defensive capability but rather as one which could be deployed,together with overwhelming US nuclear-missile capabilities and CPGS, to

neutralise Chinas much smaller nuclear arsenal. At a less existential level,

Beijing also saw missile defence as part of a US encirclement strategy which

would constrain Chinas room for manoeuvre within the Asia-Pacic gen-

erally, and in relation to Taiwan specically. This perception of threat is

further enhanced by annual US war games that include a space-warfare sce-

nario invariably involving China. Beijings nuclear policy has been one of

minimal deterrence, with a nuclear arsenal far smaller than that of either the

United States or Russia. A particular feature of Chinas nuclear approach

has been a consistent refusal to reveal the size and structure of this arsenal

as part of a strategy of ambiguity designed to raise doubts in the mind of

potential aackers about the possible existence of a second-strike capabil-

ity.9 In response to US behaviour seen as seeking to subvert the strategic

balance, China has expanded and modernised its arsenal, and has moved

in the direction of acquiring an unequivocal second-strike capability in the


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tion of space-based minerals. And the importance of national prestige as

a driver for Chinas space programme cannot be overlooked. Beijing has

repeatedly emphasised the peaceful nature of this programme and has

long campaigned for an international treaty banning the development ofweapons in space.13But the dynamics of the security dilemma make it hard

for the United States to take such protestations at face value, as evidenced by

statements such as that contained in the 2003 US Department of Defenses

annual report to Congress:

Publicly, China opposes the militarization of space and seeks to prevent

or slow the development of anti-satellite (ASAT) systems and space-based

ballistic missile defences. Privately, however, Chinas leaders probably

view ASATS and oensive counterspace systems in general as well as

space-based missile defences as inevitabilities.14

More recently, a report by Project 2049 for the USChina Economic and

Security Review Commission stated:

Chinas space ambitions are in part peaceful in nature. Yet technologies

can also be used with ill-intent, and military applications of dual-use

space technology are a principal concern: space technology increases the

capacity of the PLA [Peoples Liberation Army] to project power vertically

into space and horizontally beyond its immediate periphery.15

The Project 2049 report does not, of course, represent the views of the

US administration, but is likely to prove inuential with key constituencies

within the US Congress.

The trajectory between China and the United States in relation to space

has not been uniformly downward. The revised National Space Policy

released by the Obama administration in 2010 appeared to represent a

softening of the uncompromising unilateralism of the George W. Bush

administration, particularly in terms of the formers expressed readiness to

consider proposals and concepts for arms control measures if they are equi-

table, eectively veriable, and enhance the national security of the United


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14 | Nigel Inkster

States and its allies.16 Relations between NASA and the China National

Space Administration, which had proceeded in a desultory fashion for

several years, appeared to receive a boost as a result of this apparent shift.

This, plus a climate of markedly reduced tension in the Taiwan Strait, brieyled to a sense that greater levels of cooperation in space might be possible.

But a Republican-dominated Congress has proven resistant to such ini-

tiatives. And the Obama administrations pivot into Asia at its outset

more a statement of strategic intent than a substantial transfer of military

resources combined with tensions in the South and East China Seas, and a

US decision to expand the provision of a missile shield to its key Asian allies

to protect against threats from North Korea, have collectively given rise to

greater levels of mutual distrust.

The conditions for the United States and China to achieve closer

approximation in the domain of space cooperation do not seem propitious.

A multilateral treaty banning space weapons seems a remote prospect,

not least because with relatively lile eort currently being devoted to

the development of such weaponry, the political urgency that drove the

USSoviet arms-control agenda is absent. But even without any kind of

treaty, it may be possible to achieve some measure of pragmatic coopera-tion, either at a bilateral or multilateral level, in respect of specic issues

that constitute an equal challenge for all spacefaring nations. Chief among

these is the problem of space debris now estimated to consist of over

20,000 items over four centimetres in diameter which is entirely uncon-

cerned about national interests in terms of its potential to cause damage.17

In September 2010, the EU produced a draft Code of Conduct for Outer

Space Activities which, inter alia, called on member states to establish pol-

icies and procedures to minimise the possibility of accidents in space ... or

any form of harmful interference with other States rights to the peaceful

exploration and use of outer space based on three principles: freedom

of access to space for peaceful purposes; preservation of the security and

integrity of space objects in orbit; and due consideration for the legitimate

defence interests of states.18

After initial reservations, Washington has now expressed interest in

taking this proposal forward. And the United States is the only country


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with the capacity to track space debris in a systematic manner. The code of

conduct would not be legally binding but, given the limited prospects for

any kind of treaty, it may represent the best way of securing some kind of

consensus on what represents acceptable state and non-state behaviourin space. Such a code might outlaw the further production of space debris,

as well as providing for advance notication of launches, planned satellite

orbital placements and scheduled space manoeuvres.19As in cyberspace,

such informal agreements may oer the only realistic way of establishing

some rules of the road in what otherwise seems destined to be an increas-

ingly contested domain.

Cyber

The relationship between the United States and China in respect of the cyber

domain is more complex than it is in relation to space, if only because of the

multifarious and complex nature of the former environment, whose stabil-

ity and integrity is far from guaranteed, and which is populated by a wide

array of actors and interest groups. The United States and China have in

practice emerged as the primary exponents of very dierent philosophi-

cal approaches towards the Internet, particularly on the issue of Internetgovernance. The United States has focused on network security, freedom

of expression on the Internet and the continuation of the multi-stakeholder

governance model, whereas China has become a leading exponent of infor-

mation security, a concept widely seen as conferring on states the right

to determine what Internet sites their populations may access. China has

argued consistently for a top-down government-centric governance model

under the global auspices of the United Nations, and recognition of the

concept of Internet sovereignty.20

From the Chinese perspective, cyberspace is perceived as another

domain in which the United States is seeking to preserve a globally domi-

nant position at the expense of other states, an appreciation which seems

at least partly based on the 2011 US Department of Defense Strategy for

Operating in Cyberspace and the US Air Force cyber-operations concept,

which was summed up by then US Secretary for the Air Force Michael

Wynne in a 2006 speech entitled Cyberspace as a Domain in Which the


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16 | Nigel Inkster

Air Force Flies and Fights.21Chinas concerns span a wide spectrum, start-

ing with a continuing conviction that the United States may seek to exploit

its perceived control of global Internet architecture to deny China access to

the Internet, a suspicion seemingly based on a widespread but mistakenperception that the Internet is controlled by 13 so-called root servers,

all located in the United States, Japan or Western Europe. (The reality is

rather more complex and becoming more so).22Other concerns include a

sense of vulnerability arising out of continuing Chinese dependence on

US-designed hardware and software and, perhaps most important of all,

the conviction that the Internet serves as a vector for spreading hostile

propaganda which challenges the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist

Party, much of it emanating from the United States and its key Western

allies.23 Nor is China remotely persuaded by US advocacy of Internet

freedom. As Deputy Chief of the General Sta Lieutenant-General Qi

Jianguo observed in a recent article in Study Times:

Cybersecurity concerns national sovereignty as well as the security of

economic and social operations, and it concerns the quality of human

existence. The Wests so-called internet freedom actually is a type

of cyber-hegemony. In the information era, seizing and maintaining

superiority in cyberspace is more important than seizing command of the

sea and command of the air were in World War II.24

Chinas suspicions of US intentions in cyberspace have only been rein-

forced by the revelations of former Booz Allen Hamilton contractor Edward

Snowden about the scope of NSA and GCHQ coverage of global Internet

trac. An article in the 1 August edition of the Chinese Communist Party

theoretical journal Qiushiillustrates the extent of these suspicions:

The Internet was originally developed by US academia and was then taken

up by the military. Once the technology was mature, the United States

encouraged global informatisation and the spread of the Internet and got

other states commied to hitching a long-term ride on US networks. The

same thing happened with the international nancial system originally


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driven by the United States and the related US technology patents and

production standards, which were provided more or less free of charge

to other countries. Then, once the countries concerned had mainstreamed

these into their own economic systems they developed a reliance on these

systems which was exploited by the United States to obtain hegemonic

prots and to place these states in a position of dependency.25

The main area of current contention is the issue of cyber exploitation

operations or, more bluntly, cyber espionage. In particular, the United

States has for some while been publicising what have been described as

industrial-scale aacks on a wide range of US corporations, designed to

access intellectual property and details of negotiating positions in respect of

specic contracts for which they are competing. Until relatively recently, the

US government line, while maintaining that the overwhelming majority of

these aacks emanated from China, had always stopped short of aributing

them to the Chinese state. But since 2012 the US government has become

more outspoken. In February 2013, the US security rm Mandiant released

a report identifying a specic building in Shanghai connected to Chinas

signals-intelligence agency, the Third Department of the PLA General Sta,as the source of many of the cyber intrusions directed against the United

States.26 It is unclear whether Mandiant consulted the US administration

before releasing its report but the possibility cannot be excluded. A month

later, US National Security Advisor Thomas Donilon, in a speech to the Asia

Society, talked of the sophisticated, targeted theft of business information

and proprietary technologies through cyber intrusions emanating from

China on an unprecedented scale. He highlighted the threat this posed to

international trade, the reputation of Chinas own industries and overall

Sino-American relations, and called upon Beijing to desist.27The issue was

subsequently raised directly with the highest levels of Chinas leadership,

rstly during a telephone conversation between President Barack Obama

and President Xi Jinping, and shortly thereafter during Secretary of the

Treasury Jack Lews March 2013 visit to Beijing.28On 22 March, during a

trip to the same city, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Sta General Martin

Dempsey and PLA Chief of Sta General Fang Fenghui agreed to unspeci-


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18 | Nigel Inkster

ed cooperation on cyber security though Fang warned that progress

would not be swift.29

The public response of the Chinese government and media was to deny

all allegations and highlight the extent to which China was the victim ofcyber aacks, many emanating from the United States.30Beijing reiterated

the need for international agreement on the regulation of cyberspace, while

the United States argued for an agreement on norms of behaviour: not a new

treaty which could prove hard to negotiate, given the number of stake-

holders involved but rather a set of pragmatic arrangements based on the

presumption of the applicability of existing international law to the cyber

domain.31Neither of these apparent initiatives actually represents a depar-

ture from pre-existing positions, and it remains to be seen whether raising

the issue to the highest level will generate any disposition towards compro-

mise. China is resistant to US arguments that large-scale, state-sponsored

industrial espionage cannot be seen in the same light as normal state-on-

state espionage, and is profoundly sceptical of the US governments claims

that it does not undertake industrial espionage.32

The US decision to escalate the cyber espionage issue coincided with

an escalation of tensions on the Korean Peninsula, bringing into starkfocus the prospect that China might nd itself being drawn inadvertently

into direct conict with the United States as a result of North Koreas

provocative and irresponsible behaviour behaviour which could just as

easily manifest itself in the cyber domain. South Korean banks and TV

stations were aacked during the latest upsurge in tensions, apparently

by North Korean actors using Chinese IP addresses.33 Meanwhile, the

Internet-freedom group Anonymous addressed some highly incendiary

remarks to the North Korean leadership, claiming that it had obtained

the passwords for North Koreas intranet and government websites, and

writing rst we gonna wipe your data, then we gonna wipe your badass

dictatorship government.34It is far from clear whether Anonymous had

in fact obtained the access it claimed to North Koreas intranet, and in the

event there was no resulting escalation. But it is not hard to imagine cir -

cumstances in which a South Korean cyber aack or activity by an entity

like Anonymous which North Korea might interpret as ventriloquised


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by the US government elicits a response which escalates into a North

Korean cyber aack, seemingly emanating from China, against US critical

infrastructure. Such escalation would appear to cross a US red line with

unpredictable consequences.More immediately, the United States has taken steps to mitigate a per-

ceived back-door threat from Chinese-manufactured ICT components via

a provision inserted into the 2013 Consolidated and Further Continuing

Appropriations Act. The provision requires either the FBI or the heads of

agencies considering the purchase of such equipment to approve the prod-

ucts by assessing any risks they may impose on government users and data,

and has predictably resulted in Chinese complaints of

protectionism and a degree of opposition from within

the United States own business community.35 The

US telecommunications company Sprint announced

that it would no longer use technology sourced from

the Chinese telecoms champion Huawei, which for

some time has been ghting an uphill bale to achieve a greater level of

access to US markets comparable to that which it has achieved in the United

Kingdom.36 China has contrasted the diculties faced by rms such asHuawei and ZTE in penetrating US markets with the pervasive access to

Chinese markets enjoyed by US rms Cisco many of whose products are

actually manufactured in China and Microsoft.

US concerns about the vulnerability of intellectual property have argu-

ably been a factor in recent initiatives by the Obama administration to

pursue free-trade agreements the USEU trade pact and the Trans-Pacic

Partnership from which China is excluded. One purpose of these agree-

ments, in which issues of government subsidies and intellectual-property

protection play a signicant part, is to set high global standards to which

China would be impelled to conform.37 In an era where the prospect of

securing the Doha Round appears to be rapidly receding, the pursuit of

alternative bilateral or multilateral free-trade agreements is far from irra-

tional. But the US initiatives have been characterised by Chinese ocials as

the United States trying to rewrite global trade rules behind our backs.38

Meanwhile, China appears to be trying to use a near-global monopoly on

China is resistant

to US arguments


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20 | Nigel Inkster

ICT components manufacture and its position as one of only three coun-

tries with the ability to provide end-to-end 4G communications systems to

secure de facto acceptance of Chinese engineering standards, thereby rein-

forcing its position in global telecommunications markets.China was quick to identify the importance of the cyber domain in modern

warfare, with Colonel Liang Qiao and Colonel Wang Xiangsui, authors of

the seminal text Unrestricted Warfare, identifying US dependence on cyber-

space as a vulnerability to be exploited asymmetrically.39The asymmetric

advantage initially enjoyed by China has eroded somewhat as its own mili-

tary has become increasingly network-enabled in pursuit of a mandate to

develop the capacity to ght local wars under informationised conditions.40

PLA cyber doctrine has witnessed an evolution linking electronic and cyber

warfare in a concept referred to as integrated network electronic warfare.

This initial concept has expanded to incorporate information warfare in an

idea termed information confrontation, whose purpose has been described

as follows:

In future hi-tech warfare, oensive operations will often necessitate

pre-emptive destruction of the enemys integrated baleeld command

and control; systems and warfare networks ... And to aack its state or

military communications hubs, nancial centers and C4ISR [command,

control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and

reconnaissance] systems, so as to directly aect the enemys strategic

decision-making.41

The concept also appears to envisage the use of information to break an

opponents will becoming integrated into Chinas spectrum of capabilities

for more conventional military purposes. But the boom line is that the PLA

appears to view warfare within the cyber domain as an essential adjunct to

warfare in other areas rather than as a decisive capability that would render

warfare in other spheres superuous.

The US approach to cyber warfare is typically categorised, not least by

Chinese politicians and media, as inherently more aggressive than that of

China.42

Much is made of the fact that the United States was the rst country


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to set up a cyber command and, if accounts such as Confront and Conceal

by New York Times journalist David Sanger are to be taken at face value,

the rst nation to achieve physical damage as a result of action within the

cyber domain. Sangers reporting relates to the deployment of the Stuxnetvirus against the supervisory control and data acquisition systems con-

trolling Irans uranium-enrichment centrifuge cascades.43In fact in purely

military terms, the United States may to some extent be the victim of its own

rhetoric, combined with media hype and the justied perception that it

enjoys a decisive advantage in terms of cyber capabilities. The 2011 Strategy

for Operating in Cyberspace makes clear that the overwhelming focus of

the US Cyber Command is on defending US military networks from aack

with defence of civilian networks and critical infrastructure the respon-

sibility of the Department of Homeland Security.44Since the publication of

the strategy, a number of announcements have been interpreted mostly by

the US media as indicating that the Pentagons ambitions were more far-

reaching and more oensive in scope. The rst of these was a 12-page report

submied by the Department of Defense to Congress, as mandated under

the 2011 National Defense Authorization Act, which aracted headlines

such as Pentagon Conrms Military Action Is an Acceptable Response toCyber-Aacks.45A careful reading of that report suggests that such kinetic

responses would in fact be a reaction to aacks on forward-deployed mili-

tary systems rather than US domestic civilian systems.

A further example of exaggerated perception is the news, rst broken

in January 2013, that the US Cyber Command will undergo a signicant

expansion by the middle of the decade to comprise three components:

national mission forces to protect computer systems that undergird electri-

cal grids, power plants and other infrastructure deemed critical to national

and economic security; combat mission forces to help commanders abroad

plan and execute aacks or other oensive operations; and cyber protection

forces to fortify US Department of Defense networks.46Of the new teams to

be created, only 13 would have a remit to undertake oensive cyber opera-

tions overseas. Prior to that announcement, it transpired that President

Obama had signed Presidential Policy Directive 20, a classied document

which, in the words of unnamed ocials, establishes a broad and strict


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22 | Nigel Inkster

set of standards to guide the operations of federal agencies in confronting

threats in cyberspace.47Much of the reporting of this initiative focused on

the classied nature of the document and the expectation that it heralded a

more aggressive US stance on cyber security, whereas the real story seemedto be one of allocating departmental responsibilities and authorisations in a

more systematic and clear-cut fashion.

The United States has asserted on more than one occasion that war

within the cyber domain is governed by the Law of Armed Conict. China

has objected to this assertion on the grounds that cyberspace cannot be con-

sidered a military domain. In the words of one Chinese scholar:

Cyberaacks, despite being acts of aggression, do not threaten territorial

integrity or sovereignty; there can be no neutrality in cyberspace since

aacks would undoubtedly transit through neutral countries networks;

it is impossible to distinguish between civilian and military assets; and

the proportionality requirement is much more dicult in cyberspace

because of the expanse and penetration of the Internet and the diculty

in containing unintended eects of aacks.48

Other Chinese scholars are more ambivalent, with some giving a cau-

tious welcome to the Tallinn Manual on the International Law Applicable to

Cyber Warfare, published in 2013 by a group of 20 legal scholars, as some-

thing which at least oers some basis for discussion.49

The reality is that for both China and the United States, cyber warfare

in its more apocalyptic portrayal seems far from an immediate prospect

since such conict would inevitably be a function of a more general war

between the two countries something which, at present, clearly neither

side wants. In particular, media images of a testosterone-fuelled US Cyber

Command belie the more sober reality of an entity that is still focused pri-

marily on protecting its own networks from aack in conditions of actual

military conict. The real issue is how to manage a situation of continu-

ous cyber skirmishing in circumstances where the Law of Armed Conict

cannot reasonably be said to apply a manifestation of the new era of con-

stant conict and confrontation described by General Rupert Smith.50

This


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is a situation in which no agreed ground rules currently apply. And there

can be no doubt that the signals-intelligence agencies of the United States

and China not to mention those of many other states are engaged in a

process of constant cyber contestation, although, in the short term, an asym-metry of vulnerabilities arising out of a disparity in levels of technological

sophistication may seem to be working to Chinas advantage. Perhaps more

than any other issue, the two countries have to manage the problems stem-

ming from the fact that cyber exploitation or cyber espionage has created

a climate of suspicion and uncertainty which has begun to infect the entire

Sino-American relationship, and which brings with it the potential for an

escalatory dynamic about which almost the only certainty is that it would

not be conned to that one domain.

But although the diculties of achieving an accommodation in the cyber

domain cannot be underestimated, neither should it be forgoen that the

United States and China have strong mutual interests in maintaining a robust

and hygienic Internet environment as a crucial adjunct to an open, rules-

based global trading and nancial system on which both equally depend.

Both are vulnerable to discontinuities in global supply chains arising from

disruptions in worldwide connectivity. Both have signicant problemswith cyber criminality and, potentially, cyber terrorism. And although the

Chinese government seeks greater control over information content on the

Internet, it has no more desire than the United States to cut itself o from the

rest of the world. The Chinese Internet may be emerging as a very distinctive

phenomenon no less informative and entertaining for that but it is not a

no-go area for the rest of the planet, and Chinas netizens are not deprived

of contact with the wider world. It is not inconceivable that both countries

could build on these strong shared interests to begin re-establishing some

of the trust that has been lost. Indeed, given the geostrategic importance of

USChina relations and their pre-eminence in the cyber domain, one could

argue that progress in key areas relating to cyber security might serve as a

benchmark for global standards of conduct. Potential areas for cooperation

might include: identication of those facets of Internet functionality which

are critical to the interests of both countries and the scope for bilateral coop-

eration to ensure them; a readiness to address escalatory risks in the cyber


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24 | Nigel Inkster

domain looking into the abyss and to begin developing mechanisms

and processes for evaluating and mitigating such risks; a commitment in

principle not to target or aack each others critical infrastructure with the

establishment of mechanisms to dene this and the undertaking of eortsto develop appropriate verication and condence-building measures; and

a readiness to explore other ways in which mutual cyber activity might be

contained within what both parties regard as acceptable limits.

* * *

It should be borne in mind that Sino-American relations remain very far

from the hostility and confrontation which characterised the relationship

between the United States and the Soviet Union during much of the Cold

War. (It should not be forgoen that only two years before President Mikhail

Gorbachev inaugurated an era of dtente, Soviet leaders had convinced

themselves that the United States was planning to launch a nuclear rst

strike.) Levels of engagement and mutuality of interests are of a completely

dierent order of magnitude from anything achieved during the Cold War,

and relations are far more complex and nuanced. But the Sino-Americanrelationship has to be seen in terms of a dynamic involving one power in

relative decline, though still globally pre-eminent, coming to terms with

another which is rapidly rising and naturally driven to challenge the status

quo imposed and policed by the former. It must also be viewed in light of

two guiding political philosophies that are more or less in polar opposition

to one another. Even in the best of circumstances, this would be a recipe

for tension and competition, exacerbated by the chronic inability of each

states policymakers to see the world from the others perspective. Left unat-

tended, competition in key areas such as space and cyberspace have the

capacity to act as catalysts driving the relationship in an undesirable direc-

tion. Some degree of competition in these domains is inevitable and not

necessarily malign, especially if it drives scientic and technical innovation

with a capacity to benet humanity as a whole. But if the relationship is to

avoid becoming the chronicle of a death foretold, both parties will need to

demonstrate greater self-awareness than either has yet shown.


20/23


1 John H. Herz, Idealist

Internationalism and the Security

Dilemma, World Politics, vol. 2, no. 2,January 1950.

2 Ken Booth and Nicholas Wheeler, The

Security Dilemma: Fear, Cooperation and

Trust in World Politics(Basingstoke:

Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).3 Robert Jervis, Perception and

Misperception in International Politics

(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University

Press, 1976), pp. 58113.4 Michael Barne and Emanuel Adler,

Studying Security Communities in

Theory, Comparison, and History,

in Emanuel Adler and Michael

Barne (eds), Security Communities

(Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 1998).5 Aaron L. Friedberg,A Contest for

Supremacy: China, America, and the

Struggle for Mastery in Asia(New York:W.W. Norton & Company, 2011), p. 1.

6 The White House, U.S. National Space

Policy, 31 August 2006, hp://www.

fas.org/irp/odocs/nspd/space.pdf.7 Bronwen Maddox, America Wants

It All: Life, the Universe and

Everything, Times, 19 October 2006.8 Sha Zukang, US Missile Defence Plans:

Chinas View, Disarmament Diplomacy,

no. 43, JanuaryFebruary 2000.9 Li Bin, China and Nuclear

Transparency, in Nicholas Zarimpas

(ed.), Transparency in Nuclear Warheads

and Materials: The Political and

Technical Dimensions(Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 2003).10 IISS, The Military Balance 2013

(Abingdon: Routledge for the IISS,

2013), p. 253.

11 Charles R. Lister, US Missile Defence

and Space Security: A Security

Dilemma for China?, e-InternationalRelations, 18 March 2011, hp://

www.e-ir.info/2011/03/18/american-

missile-defence-and-space-security-a-

security-dilemma-for-china/.12 Will China Launch an Anti-Satellite

Test Soon?, Space.com, 4 January

2013, hp://www.space.com/19137-

china-anti-satellite-launch-test.html.13 Russia and China Introduce

Draft Treaty on Space Weapons,

Disarmament Diplomacy, no. 66,

September 2002.14 US Department of Defense, Annual

Report on the Military Power of the

Peoples Republic of China, 28 July

2003, p. 36, hp://www.defense.gov/

pubs/2003chinaex.pdf.15 Mark A. Stokes and Dean Cheng,

Chinas Evolving Space Capabilities:Implications for U.S. Interests,

Project 2049 Institute, 26 April 2012,

hp://project2049.net/documents/

uscc_china-space-program-report_

april-2012.pdf.16 The White House, National Space

Policy of the United States of America,

28 June 2010, p. 7, hp://www.

whitehouse.gov/sites/default/les/

national_space_policy_6-28-10.pdf.17 NASA, Space Debris and Human

Spacecraft, hp://www.nasa.gov/

mission_pages/.18 Council of the European Union, Code

of Conduct for Outer Space Activities,

11 October 2010, p. 7, hp://www.con-

silium.europa.eu/uedocs/cmsUpload/

st14455.en10.pdf.

19 Ibid.

Notes


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26 | Nigel Inkster

20 Information Oce of the State

Council, The Internet in China, 8

June 2010, hp://english.gov.cn/2010-

06/08/content_1622956_6.htm; Xiang

Jun, Wangluo Zhuquan Ye Shi GuojiaZhuquan,Jiefangjun Bao, 16 January

2013.21 Michael W. Wynne, Cyberspace

as the Domain in Which the Air

Force Flies and Fights, remarks to

the C4ISR Integration Conference

on 2 November 2006,Air Force

Magazine, hp://www.airforcemag.

com/SiteCollectionDocuments/

Reports/2006/November/Day03/

Wynne110206.pdf; US Department

of Defense, Department of Defense

Strategy for Operating in Cyberspace,

June 2011, hp://www.defense.gov/

news/d20110714cyber.pdf.22 See Kim Davies, DNS Root Server

Locations, hp://kim.id.au/ja/root-

servers.png.

23 Wangluo Dianfu: Burong Xiaoqu DeAnquan Weixie,Jiefangjun Bao, 10

August 2009, hp://www.fyjs.cn/bbs/

read.php?tid=200214.24 Qi Jianguo, Qian Suo Weiyou De Da

Bianju: Dui Shijie Zhanlue Xingshi He

Woguo Anquan Huanjing De Renshi

Yu Sikao, 21 January 2013, Qiushi

Lilunwang, hp://www.qstheory.cn/

zywz/201301/t20130121_207019.htm.25 Guo Ji, Wangluo Buying Chengwei

Meiguo Baquan Xin Gongju, Qiushi, 3

August 2013, hp://www.szhgh.com/

article/news/news/201308/26569.html.26 Mandiant, APT1: Exposing One of

Chinas Cyber Espionage Units, 18

February 2013, hp://intelreport.mandi-

ant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report.pdf.27 Thomas Donilon, The United

States and the Asia-Pacic in

2013, The White House Oce

of the Press Secretary, 11 March

2013, hp://www.whitehouse.gov/

the-press-oce/2013/03/11/remarks-

tom-donilon-national-security-advi-sory-president-united-states-a.

28 Jonathan Kaiman, Chinese President

Xi Jinping Tackles Cyber-aacks

in First US Talks, Guardian, 20

March 2013, hp://www.theguard-

ian.com/world/2013/mar/20/

chinese-president-xi-jinping-us-talks.29 Jane Perlez, U.S. and China Put

Focus on Cybersecurity, New York

Times, 22 April 2013, hp://www.

nytimes.com/2013/04/23/world/asia/

united-states-and-china-hold-military-

talks-with-cybersecurity-a-focus.

html?_r=1&.30 Chinas Cyber Security Under

Severe Threat: Report, Xinhua,

19 March 2013, hp://news.

xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-

03/19/c_132246098.htm.31 China Says Cyber Space Needs

Rules and Cooperation, Not War,

Xinhua, 9 March 2013, hp://news.

xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-

03/09/c_132220584.htm; Cynthia

Harvey, U.S. Calls on China to Stop

Cyberaacks, Datamation Magazine, 12

March 2013, hp://www.datamation.

com/news/u.s.-calls-on-china-to-stop-

cyberaacks.html.32 Qi Zhiping, Cyber Witch Hunt

Ignores Mote in Wests Own Eye,

Global Times, 2 April 2013, hp://www.

globaltimes.cn/content/772540.shtml#.

UhTTnUpGKiB.33 South Korea Blames North for Bank

and TV Cyber-Aacks, BBC, 10 April

2013, hp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/

technology-22092051.


22/23


34 Jack Taylor, Anonymous Declares

Cyber-war on North Korea, VR-Zone,

5 April 2013, hp://vr-zone.com/

articles/anonymous-declares-cyber-

war-on-north-korea/19498.html.35 Danielle Walker, China Unhappy

with New U.S. Requirement that

Its IT Gear Must Face Review,

SC Magazine, 1 April 2013, hp://

www.scmagazine.com/china-

unhappy-with-new-us-requirement-

that-its-it-gear-must-face-review/

article/287010/#.36 For an account of Huaweis eorts to

penetrate the US market, see Eric C.

Anderson, Sinophobia: The Huawei Story

(CreateSpace, 2013), Kindle edition.37 Geo Dyer, China Left Out of Obama

Free Trade Party, Financial Times,

1 April 2013, hp://www.ft.com/

cms/s/0/c9f5046a-9ae9-11e2-b982-

00144feabdc0.html#axzz2ccHRsNtc.38 Ibid.39

Liang Qiao and Xiangsui Wang,Unrestricted Warfare: Chinas Master

Plan to Destroy America(Los Angeles,

CA: Pan American Publishing, 2002).40 Warfare under informationised con-

ditions is that which is reliant on

ICT-enabled networks.41 Zeng Pingshun, Xiandai Xinxi

Duikang: Wangdian Yitizhan,

Jiefangjun Bao, 7 September 2004,

hp://www.chinamil.com.cn/site1/

ztpd/2004-09/07/content_4731.htm.42 Meiguo Jundui De Heike Zai Gan

Shemma?, Xinhua, 20 February 2013.43 David E. Sanger, Confront and Conceal:

Obamas Secret Wars and Surprising Use

of American Power(New York: Crown

Publishers, 2012), Chapter 8.

44 US Department of Defense,

Department of Defense Strategy for

Operating in Cyberspace.45 Fahmida Y. Rashid, Pentagon

Conrms Military Action is anAcceptable Response to Cyber-

Aacks, eWEEK, 22 November 2011,

hp://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/

Pentagon-Conrms-Military-Action-

is-an-Acceptable-Response-to-

CyberAacks-493894/.46 Ellen Nakashima, Pentagon

to Boost Cybersecurity Force,

Washington Post, 27 January

2013, hp://articles.wash-

ingtonpost.com/2013-01-27/

world/36583575_1_cyber-protection-

forces-cyber-command-cybersecurity.47 Ellen Nakashima, Obama Signs

Secret Directive to Help Thwart

Cyberaacks, Washington Post,

14 November 2012, hp://articles.

washingtonpost.com/2012-11-14/

world/35505871_1_networks-cyberat-tacks-defense.

48 Shi Haiming, a researcher at the

National University of Defense

Technology, quoted in Adam Segal,

China, International Law, and

Cyberspace, Diplomat, 8 October

2012, hp://thediplomat.com/

china-power/china-international-law-

and-cyberspace/.

49 Michael N. Schmi (ed.), Tallinn

Manual on the International

Law Applicable to Cyber Warfare

(Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 2013).50 Rupert Smith, The Utility of Force:

The Art of War in the Modern World

(London: Allen Lane, 2005), p. 1.


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28 | Nigel Inkster