OPINION:
On May 26, Secretary of State Antony Blinken gave a much-anticipated policy speech regarding the Biden administration’s “China Policy.” The speech was timely, as by late May the administration had created more confusion about America’s policy toward the People’s Republic of China and Taiwan than at any time since the U.S. formally shifted recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979.
Unfortunately, Mr. Blinken’s George Washington University speech failed to allay concerns that the Biden administration doesn’t understand the Chinese Communist Party’s stated strategic end state: to dominate and displace the United States, and achieve global hegemony. Mr. Blinken’s speech, with its bumper sticker “Invest, Align, and Compete” bromide, was anything but Churchillian in identifying the existential threat posed by the CCP.
Mr. Blinken speaks eloquently, but his soothing statement of “diplomacy back at the center of American foreign policy” should be worrisome to anyone who paid attention to the rising China threat over the past two decades. The Biden’s administration clearly does not realize that the time for diplomacy is 20 years too late: The CCP is at war with the United States now — today!
Yes, it’s appropriate that a secretary of state’s speech emphasize diplomacy. But this speech came across as lacking in any serious intent to contest an expansionist, totalitarian China on the world stage. Specifically, the lack of emphasis on defense and deterrence signaled timorous weakness to Beijing and our friends and allies.
For context, less than 60 days into this administration, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin issued the “Global Posture Review of U.S. Military Forces.” This document states, “the United States will lead with diplomacy first, revitalize our unmatched network of allies and partners and make smart and disciplined choices regarding our national defense and responsible use of our military.”
Not exactly a strong “Deter if possible, fight and win if necessary” vision, but it sounded good to some. However, we’ve since witnessed the State Department take the lead in crises situations in Afghanistan with disastrous results, and in the Ukraine where State’s initial instinct was to offer President Volodymyr Zelenskyy “a ride” and let Russian tanks roll in. And now State has the lead in confronting China, with its massive navy and nuclear warfare arsenal that is preparing to invade Taiwan and confront America militarily worldwide. The Department of Defense has clearly been relegated to junior partner status.
Mr. Blinken’s speech includes other examples of stunning naivety, such as “countries of the world have avoided another world war and armed conflict between nuclear powers.” He accorded this apocalypse avoidance to diplomacy, giving no acknowledgment of hard power’s key role.
In fact, the speech clearly rejected the Reagan era’s principle of “peace through strength.” It contained very little discussion of hard power, and when it did, it was relegated to the end of the speech. It is morbidly amusing that DoD has been instructed to keep the PRC as a “pacing challenge” in order to ensure our military “stays ahead.” The pacing challenge charade reflects a fundamental lack of awareness of PRC military modernization over the past 20 years. The PLA Navy and Strategic Rocket Force are the largest on the planet.
Further, talk of “integrated deterrence” with allies and partners is unconvincing when the Biden administration recklessly reduces an already overstretched Navy from 297 ships to 280, weakens the U.S. Air Force’s refueling fleet, and cancels critical arms sales to Taiwan.
Regarding Taiwan, the speech is long on utopian rhetoric, but short on tangible actions that enable the U.S. to both deter and defeat a PLA invasion. Mr. Blinken ignored the threat from daily PLA bomber flights and aircraft carrier strike group operations that are increasingly surrounding Taiwan. He also ignored China’s new stance that its combat aircraft can fly anywhere in the strait or even over Taiwan.
Mr. Blinken did highlight a recently signed Indo-Pacific Maritime Domain Awareness program, one that tracks illegal fishing in the region — but not China’s Navy and Maritime Militia throughout the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
Most alarming was the secretary’s failure to mention anything at all about the PRC’s “nuclear breakout” this past year with the building of over 350 nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile silos in central and western China.
Instead of calling out the PRC as a Great Power Competitor as the previous administration had, Mr. Blinken stated, obsequiously, that the U.S. is not seeking to challenge or change China. He asserted the Biden administration seeks to “avoid” a Cold War. Unilateral concessions like this are public expressions of fear. They invite greater aggression from China’s Marxist-Leninist rulers.
The CCP is avowedly Marxist-Leninist, but astonishingly Mr. Blinken’s 6,700-word speech the words “communism,” “ideology” or “ideological” are never mentioned — not once. Compare that to former Secretary of State Michael Pompeo’s July 23, 2020, “Communist China and the Free World’s Future” speech, in which these words were repeatedly used to sharply contrast totalitarian statism and individualism, freedom and liberty.
Instead of addressing the ideological differences between the USA and the PRC, Mr. Blinken ended his speech by focusing on those areas where he believes our national interests converge, such as climate change, COVID-19, nonproliferation and countering illegal narcotics. He may believe this, but the CCP does not. The CCP’s stated goals are to defeat America and up-end the existing international order that has given the world the greatest period of peace and stability in history.
Mr. Blinken’s speech is a clear indicator that America’s ruling elites are returning to the same old course of blind engagement with — and appeasement of — the PRC that has led us to this dire situation.
To be fair, Mr. Blinken got one point right: He said that Mr. Biden calls this a “decisive decade.” I agree. We are in what I’ve called the Decade of Concern (2020-2030), where the CCP will decide to invade Taiwan and attack American forces in Asia.
Time is not on our side. The time for diplomacy is past. Now it’s time for strength.
• Retired Navy Capt. James Fanell is a former director of intelligence for the U.S. Pacific Fleet.
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