The Great Chinese Sea Power Debate: a review essay

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Notes

^*Michael Crisp is currently a doctoral candidate on scholarship at Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia. In 2008, he spent half a year in residence at Fudan University, Shanghai conducting research for his Ph.D. thesis on the implications of a rising China for Australian grand strategy. In 2009, further research was undertaken in Taiwan on an International PHD Research Scholarship at National Chengchi University.

^1. Professor Ye's views feature prominently in a recent article in a major Chinese journal that summarizes and discusses the views of the key proponents and critics in the sea power debate. Like the books under review, it is a useful source of citations. See: Shi Chunlin, ‘Jin shi nian lai guanyu Zhongguo haiquan wenti yanjiu shuping’ [‘A review of the past decade's research on the question of Chinese sea power’], Xiandai Guoji Guanxi [Contemporary International Relations] no. 4, (2008).

^2. Liu Huaqing, Liu Huaqing Huiyilu [The Memoirs of Liu Huaqing] (Beijing: Liberation Army Publications, 2004).

^3. As paraphrased by Holmes and Yoshihara, pp. 28–29.

^4. The ‘island chain’ concept it should be noted is not specifically Mahanian, although the ‘offshore defense’ concept of which it is a component was very much influenced by Liu's engagement with Mahan's ideas according to Holmes and Yoshihara. The authors acknowledge that the layered defense strategy of Soviet Admiral Sergei Gorshkov (whom Liu studied under) probably had some influence in the formation of the island chain concept.

^5. This is less reassuring than it might appear, as PRC military textbooks have previously defined an enemy ‘first strike’ in both physical and political terms. As one authoritative source puts it: ‘… if any country or organization violates the other country's sovereignty and territorial integrity, the other side will have the right to “fire the first shot” on the plane of tactics.’ See the official English translation of: Peng Guangqian and Yao Youzhi (ed), The Science of Military Strategy, (Beijing: Military Science Publishing House, 2005), p. 426.

^6. The 2004, 2006 and 2008 defense white papers can be accessed at: http://china.org.cn/e-white/index.htm.

^7. Both these title translations are the ones the journals themselves use.

^8. Both of these points are identified in: Jon Tetsuro Sumida, Inventing Grand Strategy and Teaching Command: The Classic Works of Alfred Thayer Mahan Reconsidered (Washington, DC: The Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1997), ch. 5. This is a highly readable and concise summary analysis of the whole corpus of Mahan's works.

^9. Ye critiques these positions in the sea power debate on pp. 111–114 and 258–263.

^10. Shao Yongling and Shi Yinhong, ‘Jindai Ouzhou luhai-fuhe guojia de mingyun yu dangdai Zhongguo de xuanze’ [‘The fate of modern European composite land–sea powers and contemporary China's choices’], Shijie Jingji yu Zhengzhi [World Economics and Politics] no. 10, (2000).

^11. Yang Yong, ‘Fahui hailu jianbei youshi shi daxing hailu-fuhe guojia de biran xuanze’ [‘Development of superior advantage on both land and sea is the necessary choice for a large-scale composite land–sea power’], Heilongjiang Shehui Kexue [Heilongjiang Social Science] no. 3, (2004).

^12. Zhang Wenmu, ‘Lun Zhongguo haiquan’ [‘On Chinese sea power’], Journal of Ocean University of China (Science Sciences Edition) no. 6, (2004). The adjustment of Zhang's views in response to criticism is identified in Shi Chunlin, ‘Jin shi nian lai guanyu Zhongguo haiquan wenti yanjiu shuping’. While Holmes and Yoshihara cite three articles authored by Zhang in their book, they for some reason overlooked this one, which represents an important qualification of his views. Zhang's notion of ‘unlimited extension’ within China's claimed sovereign domain remains highly problematic in its implications for the security interests of other regional powers however.

^13. Xu Qiyu, ‘Haiquan de wuqu yu fansi’ [‘A rebuttal of errors made in thinking about sea power’], Zhanlue yu Guanli [Strategy and Management] no. 5, (2003).

^14. Ye states that the longer the status quo is drawn out the greater the risk that the positions of the rival claimants (most of whom have occupied parts of the disputed territories) will become increasingly legitimized in the eyes of the international community. The shortchanging of China's interests refers to current resource extraction activities in disputed areas by other claimants. Ye, however, also sees the need for caution on China's part as necessitated by the prospect of provoking a collective resistance posture from ASEAN.

^15. See China's ‘Law on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone’, enacted 25 September 1992, available at: www.asianlii.org/cn/legis/cen/laws/tsatcz392.

^16. A classic and instructive articulation of this interpretation of peaceful means can be found in: E. H. Carr, The Twenty Years' Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations, with an Introduction by Michael Cox (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2001 [1946]), pp. 192–199.

^17. See: Feng Liang and Zhang Chun, ‘Zhongguo haishang tongdao anquan jiqi mianlin de tiaozhan’ [‘Challenges facing China regarding the security of sea lines of communication’], Guoji Wenti Luntan [International Review], (Autumn 2007); Zhang Jie, ‘Zhongguo nengyuan anquan zhong de Maliujia yinsu’ [‘China's energy security and the Malacca factor’], Guoji Zhengzhi Yanjiu [Studies of International Politics] no. 3, (2005). See also China's ‘Country Energy Profile’ at the US government's Energy Information Administration's website, available at: www.eia.doe.gov.