Editorial: Top US General - North Korea is Making Progress on Asymmetric Capabilities

By Ankit Panda

The commander of U.S. Forces Korea highlighted North Korea’s progress in developing asymmetric military capabilities.

Speaking in Seoul last week, Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, the top commander of U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) and the Combined Forces Command (CFC), remarked that the United States and South Korea were concerned by North Korea’s recent progress in developing asymmetric military capabilities. Gen. Scaparrotti offered insights that reveal the current South Korean and U.S. understanding of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, a man who despite having been in power for over two years, remains an enigma. Despite this, North Korea strategy has remained mostly consistent in recent years, with a focus on asymmetric capabilities.

“Kim Jong-un, unlike his father Kim Jong-il, is overconfident and unpredictable,” Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti remarked, adding that Kim, “realizing that he cannot win in a conventional war, [has] focused on his military development and training on asymmetric capability. I would tell you that the North Korean military is making progress in these areas.” Specifically, Gen. Scaparrotti noted that the United States’ “top concern is that we have very little warning of the North’s asymmetric attack, which could start a cycle of action and counter-actions. This underscores the need for the alliance to maintain a high level of readiness.” 

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Editorial: Why China Should Conclude a Code of Conduct with ASEAN

By Thuc D. Pham

There a number of reasons why Beijing should complete an ASEAN-China COC for the South China Sea.

The diplomatic push that China has made at recent regional gatherings highlights its efforts to revitalize regional trust and confidence following recent tensions in the South China Sea. But the real work that China should begin is the quick completion of the Code of Conduct between ASEAN and China in the South China Sea.

Chinese President Xi Jinping seemed to be extending an olive branch at the 22nd APEC Summit in Beijing. The Economist noted his desire for better relations, in particular with the U.S., Japan, the Philippines, and Vietnam. In addition, when Xi pledged $40 billion for the Silk Road Infrastructure Fund in order to improve its economic links and connectivity across Asia, countries such as Bangladesh, Cambodia, Laos, Mongolia, Myanmar, Pakistan and Tajikistan were found to be hopeful. Meanwhile at the East Asia Summit in Naypyidaw, (Myanmar), Chinese Premier Li Keqiang proposed a friendship treaty with Southeast Asian nations, a defense hotline, and offered $20 billion in loans. Notably, before departing to Myanmar he wrote for The Jakarta Post, proposing to make next year the “Year of China-ASEAN Maritime Cooperation.”

The diplomatic choreography that China has performed can plausibly be explained as an endeavor to ease the threat perception caused by its assertiveness in territorial and maritime disputes in the East and South China Seas. Unilateral proposals alone, however, are not effective in addressing this threat perception. As ASEAN Secretary General Le Luong Minh said in an interview with The VOA “We have seen a widening gap between political commitments and actual actions – I mean the real situation at sea. And that is the challenge we have to overcome,” China needs to back up these initiatives with stronger efforts to conclude the Code of Conduct in the South China Sea as quickly as possible. Why? 

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Editorial: Vietnam’s Navy Crosses the Line

Gepard class Frigate: Dinh Tien Hoang (HQ 011)

By Carl Thayer

Vietnam is stepping up its defense cooperation, particularly on maritime issues, with friends near and far.

In mid-November Vietnam dispatched two of its most modern warships on an unprecedented three-nation goodwill visit to Indonesia, Brunei and the Philippines.

On November 5, two Gepard-class guided missile frigates, the Dinh Tien Hoang (HQ 011) and the Ly Thai To (HQ 012) weighed anchor at Cam Ranh Bay and set sail for Jakarta’s Tanjung Priok port crossing the equator (the line) while enroute. The ships embarked a complement of two hundred and twenty-eight officers and sailors under the command of Rear Admiral Nguyen Van Kiem, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Vietnam People’s Army Navy. The frigates also embarked a naval Ka-28 anti-submarine helicopter, a first for the Vietnamese Navy on a goodwill visit.

The dispatch of the Gepard-class frigates is a clear indication that Vietnam has decided to step up its defense diplomacy. The goodwill visit to Southeast Asia is in reciprocation of port visits by warships from Brunei, Indonesia and the Philippines to Vietnam. According to the People’s Army newspaper, the purpose of the visit was to “build trust and enhance friendship, cooperation and mutual understanding and confidence between the People’s Army Navy and the navies of Indonesia, Brunei and the Philippines.”

Earlier in March, Vietnam dispatched a hospital ship (HQ 561) to participate in Exercise Komodo a multilateral naval exercise held under the auspices of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) defense ministers and their eight dialogue partners (ADMM Plus) and hosted by Indonesia.

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Editorial: Xi Jinping's Evolution of Chinese Grand Strategy

By Dingding Chen

A more confident China will continue to seek regional and global leadership while firmly defending its core national interests.

Chinese leaders held their second work conference on foreign policy in 8 years — a rare occurrence by any measure (the previous one was held in 2006). What should one make of this important conference and Chinese President Xi Jinping’s speech therein? Different analysts (here, here, and here) have offered different interpretations, with most focusing on how to link Xi’s speech to China’s recent foreign policy behaviors. Such interpretations have merits, though they tend to miss the big picture in Xi’s speech, which is about China’s new grand strategy in the coming decades.

As Premier Li Keqiang said during the meeting, Xi’s speech has important guiding meaning for China’s foreign policy both presently and in the coming years. What this means is that the speech is meant to establish the guiding principles of Chinese foreign policy, very much like Deng Xiaoping’s “keeping a low profile” guiding principle in the early 1990s. The major difference, of course, is that Xi seems to have shifted away from the “keeping a low profile“ principle, though government rhetoric would suggest otherwise. What has been emphasized is the need to be active and creative in foreign affairs because without this it would be impossible to realize the Chinese dream and the great national rejuvenation which Xi has emphasized.

One new and important message from the speech is that now there is a clear strategic goal for China’s foreign policy. Unlike the U.S., China does not have the tradition of making its strategic goals known to the outside world. It used to be case that China’s foreign policy was primarily meant to serve China’s economic development, which was the most important goal above all else. Now things have changed. The new goals are the “two centenary goals” which are more specific and ambitious than just economic development. The contrast is particularly salient if one compares Xi’s speech this time with the 2006 speech on foreign affairs by Hu Jintao in which no strategic goal was mentioned. 

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News Story: With Samsung Sale, Hanwha Is S. Korea's New 'Defense Giant'

By JUNG SUNG-KI

SEOUL — The landscape of South Korea’s defense industry has drastically changed, as Samsung sells off all of its defense arms.

Samsung announced Nov. 26 that it will sell Samsung Techwin to Hanwha, the 10th largest conglomerate in Korea, as part of efforts to restructure the electronics-based business group.

Under the deal worth 2 trillion won (US $1.8 billion), which also affects the sale of Samsung’s petro-chemical companies, the electronics giant agreed to sell a 32.4 percent stake in Samsung Techwin, maker of the K9 self-propelled howitzer and aircraft engines, for $765 million to Hanwha.

Samsung Techwin owns a 50 percent stake in Samsung Thales, an electronics weapon maker jointly funded by the French Thales Group. That means Hanwha also gains managing rights over Samsung Thales.

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News Story: China's CX-1 Missile Now Exportable

By WENDELL MINNICK

TAIPEI — China’s new CX-1 supersonic anti-ship cruise missile is ready for export to America’s friends and foes alike, with potential markets including Iran, Pakistan and African and South American countries.

On display at the recent Airshow China in Zhuhai, the missile resembles India’s BrahMos cruise missile with a large intake in the nose, referred to as the “axial symmetrical inlet” in the brochure. However, that appears to be the only similarity, according to Chinese-language media outlets, which mention differences in wing, guidance vanes and jet vanes of the two missiles.

Russia’s NPO Mashinostroyenia (NPOM) and India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation jointly developed the BrahMos, basing it on the NPOM’s Yakhont (P-800 Oniks) missile.

Vasiliy Kashin, a researcher at Moscow’s Centre for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, disputed Chinese media reports that denied a connection. He said the CX-1 is likely based in part on the BrahMos surface-to-surface missile, “but Russia did not sell this to China or offer enough data to China to build one.” However, Russia has sold the missile to other states in the region, including Indonesia and Vietnam, “so it is conceivable one or more of those states could have provided some details to China,” he said.

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Editorial: Jokowi’s Maritime Doctrine and What It Means

CGI of Indonesia’s future SIGMA Frigate (File Photo)

By Joshua Kurlantzick

Indonesia’s new president has attempted to launch a bold new foreign policy doctrine.

Despite coming into the Indonesian presidency as a man with minimal foreign policy experience, Indonesian president Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has attempted to launch a bold new foreign policy doctrine. Since the end of the Suharto dictatorship, Indonesian presidents have slowly rebuilt the country’s clout in regional and international affairs, which diminished greatly in the chaotic post-Suharto era. Former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, though considered mostly a failure as a domestic reformer, did restore Indonesian leadership of ASEAN and play a significant role in helping mediate several regional conflicts.

Still, no president since Suharto proclaimed so bold a foreign policy doctrine as the former Jakarta mayor just did at the East Asia Summit. The Jokowi doctrine, focused on Indonesia’s maritime trade, infrastructure, and security, announces an intention to vastly expand Indonesia’s maritime power. Whether the country has the resources and the political will to put Jokowi’s grand vision into action remains a serious question.

The Jakarta Post has published (an) excellent overview of Jokowi’s maritime doctrine. Jokowi and his advisors developed the doctrine during his presidential campaign and the new president outlined the doctrine in his speech at the East Asia Summit in Myanmar earlier this month. The doctrine posits that Indonesia is a maritime “fulcrum” between Indian Ocean powers (namely, India) and Pacific powers like China and the United States. It also proposes that both oceans should be areas of peace and free trade, and that Indonesia will help protect the natural resources of the seas. The Jokowi doctrine also commits Indonesia to vastly expanding its naval assets, supposedly in order to secure freedom of navigation and trade on these seas. 

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Editorial: Pakistan-Iran Border Stress

By Aziz Muhammad Jawad

There are tensions between the two neighbors. There need not be.

Pakistan and Iran are important neighbors on the rim of South Asia and the Middle East, with deep cultural, linguistic, religious and traditional ties. Recently, though, Iran has bolstered ties with India, engaging Indian military expertise in the development of a strategic road. The road connects Iran’s Chabahar sea port and Afghanistan at the border town of Zaranj, running very close to Pakistan’s border in the process. The presence of Indian element on its Balochistan border with Iran, unrest in its Balochistan province, and multiple claims of foreign interference in the internal security of that troubled province all add up to create a serious question mark over the future of security relations between Pakistan and Iran.

Since the revolution, Iran has been unafraid to explore multiple avenues to fulfill its perceived security needs, including proxy, guerilla and urban warfare. From using Hezbollah against Israeli forces to supporting the Assad regime in Syria, Iranian policy has had an outsized role in the Middle Eastern security environment. Although few Pakistani security experts believe that Iranian Shia exposure can dislodge Sunni dominance in Pakistan, the Pakistani public is very aware of the curse of sectarian violence and many believe it is a result of foreign interference.

Historically, Pakistan was among the first countries to recognize Iran’s revolutionary regime. Amazingly, the Zia regime – itself often considered the cause of much sectarian violence – not only accepted Iran’s revolution but also sent a high-level official delegation to endorse friendly relations with Iran. Pakistan banned many local anti-Shia militant organizations and was evenhanded in its approach to both Sunni and Shia militant organizations. Anti-Shia groups such as Sapah-e-Sahaba and Lashker-e-Jhangvi were banned and many of their operatives were detained in operations by Pakistani security forces. Anti-Sunni groups such as Sapah-e-Muhammad faced the same treatment. Both sides had been linked to assassinations and bombings. Neither Pakistan nor Iran ever allowed sectarian issues to disrupt their relations, even at the peak of sectarian Shia killings in Pakistan. 

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Editorial: India and Pakistan - A Debilitating Relationship

By Saim Saeed

After a brief flicker of optimism, bilateral relations have soured once again.

In early November, a suicide bomber detonated himself at a checkpoint on the Pakistani side of the Wagah border, killing sixty people. Immediately after, Hamid Gul, the former chief of the ISI, Pakistan’s powerful military-controlled intelligence agency, gave an interview on Pakistani television accusing India of being behind the attack. “We offered our hand in friendship, and this is how they repay us,” he said. Despite the fact that the attack was claimed by three different militant groups based in Pakistan, many Pakistanis shares Gul’s sentiments. And given how bad relations between the two countries have been recently, that should not surprise.

For a brief moment after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s election victory, there was optimism in both India and Pakistan. In an unprecedented move, Modi invited his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif to attend his inauguration ceremony. The previous year, when Sharif was contesting his own elections, he made bettering relations with India – “normalization” as both Pakistan and India call it – a campaign promise. Many thought that with two governments both interested in normalization, both having secured solid majorities in their respective election victories and facing little domestic political opposition, it was finally time for the nuclear-armed rivals to move forward.

Unfortunately, it has all been downhill since. Modi has virtually ignored Pakistan, scuttling scheduled talks on the pretext that Pakistan was communicating with separatists from the disputed Kashmir region. He issued a series of statements accusing Pakistan of “waging a proxy war of terrorism,” including a speech in the Kashmiri town of Kargil, where both countries fought a mini-war in 1999. An opportunity to meet in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September was spurned; both countries have been tight-lipped over a possible meeting at the upcoming SAARC summit in Kathmandu next week, neither showing much optimism.

The diplomatic fallout has had lethal consequences. Within the past few months, border security forces have engaged in heavy shelling across the border, killing dozens of civilians and security personnel, shattering a ceasefire that has held for the better part of a decade. Given the initial optimism, why has the relationship soured so quickly? 

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Editorial: Can China and the US Neutralize the Ring of Gyges?

By Vasilis Trigkas

Plato foresaw how the technological imperative can risk a fragile peace.

We shall have to share out the fruits of technology among the whole of mankind. The notion that the direct and immediate producers of the fruits of technology have a proprietary right to these fruits will have to be forgotten.

Arnold Toynbee

Media commentaries about the U.S.-China accord on limiting carbon emissions have been almost dithyrambic, with some justification. The world’s two superpowers have agreed for the first time in modern history to work together to manage a global problem that no nation state can resolve alone. However important this agreement is, strategic distrust between China and the U.S. remains the single most significant risk to peace in our time and neutralizing it will demand much more than an emissions reduction agreement.

At the center of this dangerous forma mentis is an ever-accelerating competition between Beijing and Washington for science & innovation, technological supremacy, and “full spectrum dominance.” A strategic initiative like the AirSea battle dogma, together with hypersonic weapons and China’s anticipation of a century of sustained intellectual warfare, only exacerbates a securitization game that if left unchecked could confirm Thucydides’ ominous prediction about the perils of hegemonic transition.

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