In U.S. Congress, One Faction Stresses the Benefits of Trade, While Other Fears Military Threat By MURRAY HIEBERT Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL October 27, 2005; Page A4
WASHINGTON -- China's rise is creating fissures among Republicans in Congress over how the U.S. should respond.
The rifts mirror some within the Bush administration. But Chinese government officials seem more concerned these days with those in Congress, where passions about potential foreign rivals can sometimes force through harsher policies.
The emerging blocs in Congress are divided between military hawks who portray Beijing as a potential strategic threat and the Chamber of Commerce camp, which tends to see the Asian giant as a great economic opportunity.
Two different congressional groups were launched earlier this year to analyze and shape the policy debate over China's surging economic and political clout. The 31-member China Congressional Caucus, focusing on the People's Liberation Army's military modernization, is headed by Rep. J. Randy Forbes, a Virginia Republican. When discussing China, he mentions a scene from the movie "Jaws," in which the police chief nonchalantly throws fish bait into waters off the New England coast. A great white shark lunges out of the water, terrifying the audience. "That's kind of what China did to the world," says Mr. Forbes.
Illinois Republican Rep. Mark Kirk heads the 35-member U.S.-China Study Group. He says his group's main goal is to "reduce needless conflict with China based on wrong information." While the congressman says China's military upgrade is "profound and it's worrying," he argues that U.S. trade and diplomatic ties will turn "China into a less-menacing state." Healthy economic ties are also good for his district in Chicago, where three giant U.S. corporate players in China -- Boeing Co., Motorola Inc. and United Airlines parent UAL Corp. -- have their headquarters.
The two factions clashed earlier this year over a House resolution opposing the bid by Chinese state oil company Cnooc Ltd. to buy U.S. oil producer Unocal Corp., a deal that failed in part because of congressional opposition. Mr. Forbes says he backed the measure, which passed by a 398-to-15 vote, because the Cnooc takeover could have threatened U.S. access to oil supplies. He also says it would have given the Chinese "monitoring capabilities" for U.S. military installations near drilling sites in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico.
Mr. Kirk opposed the resolution, arguing that much criticism of the deal was based on inaccurate information. He says many legislators didn't realize that most of Unocal's oil and gas exploration activities were no longer based in the U.S. and that Beijing allowed American oil companies to invest in China.
The differing approaches to China on Capitol Hill mirror similar strains developing within the Bush administration. Two weeks ago, Treasury Secretary John Snow visited China, praising the government for economic restructuring and playing down congressional criticism over Chinese currency policy. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld arrived in China for his own visit last week, after months in which the Pentagon has bluntly criticized China's military buildup as potentially destabilizing for Asia. While Mr. Rumsfeld's remarks in a speech in China were less critical, he still fretted about Beijing's rising military power, saying that it "leads other nations to question China's intentions."
But these days, Chinese government officials are watching the split in Congress to see which group dominates -- the one run by Rep. Forbes or the one championed by Rep. Kirk.
Both men were elected to Congress in 2000. Mr. Forbes, 53 years old, was a lawyer in southeastern Virginia before entering politics. Mr. Kirk, 46, had a history in international relations, as a Naval Reserve intelligence officer, in posts at the World Bank and the State Department, and as an aide in the British House of Commons. Mr. Forbes tends to vote with the Republican Party's most conservative wing on economic, social and foreign-policy legislation, according to an analysis by the National Journal, a nonpartisan political magazine. Mr. Kirk, by the same study, splits his votes more evenly between conservatives and liberals.
Mr. Kirk praises Mr. Forbes's efforts for helping to focus more attention on China. Mr. Forbes criticizes the Kirk caucus as "cheerleaders" who "want more trade with China" that ultimately could provide Beijing the income to build its military machine.
Mr. Forbes, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, says in an interview that "we still don't know if China will be our best friend or our worst enemy."
Chinese officials say they need to modernize the military to block Taiwan -- which Beijing considers a breakaway province -- from declaring independence. But Mr. Forbes is convinced that China's recent purchases of diesel submarines and development of missiles are "much bigger than Taiwan." He argues that the upgrading of China's military poses "a huge threat" and is "all focused on the United States."
While he doesn't have specific policies to propose at this point, Mr. Forbes urges the Bush administration to do a more thorough assessment of China's impact on the American "military-industrial base" and how it should respond to China during the next decade. He emphasizes the need for a long-term shipbuilding plan for the Navy to compete with China's active program. With a major shipbuilding center nearby, his district is home to many shipbuilding workers.
Rep. Kirk, who first visited Beijing in 1984 as a congressional aide, says his group's main policy objective is to make U.S. relations with China the top diplomatic priority in Washington, as opposed to what he considers the current overemphasis on relations with Europe. "The two largest economies on earth should place the highest priorities on relations to each other," he says.
His group -- whose co-chairman is Washington State Democratic Rep. Rick Larsen -- supports increasing the resources available to the State Department to bolster the number of Chinese-language speakers in the foreign service, upgrade the U.S. Embassy's Web site in Beijing to cater to the "Internet addiction" of Chinese under the age of 40, and set up consulates in all Chinese cities with a population of more than 10 million.
China appears to appreciate the friendly outlook of Mr. Kirk's caucus. China's new ambassador to Washington, Zhou Wenzhong, has coffee regularly with the group. Its members were slated to have a 90-minute meeting in September with Chinese President Hu Jintao, before his visit to Washington was postponed after Hurricane Katrina.
Mr. Forbes hasn't yet met with Mr. Zhou. Two attempts were canceled because of scheduling conflicts. His group wasn't offered a meeting with Mr. Hu.