Back To Playing The Human Rights Card

The Obama administration in the person of Secretary of State Hilary Clinton has moved human rights back into play in the Great Game with China.  This, of course, is a reversal of the earlier stance underscored by Ms Clinton in her remark early on in the Obama years that human rights would not be allowed to "interfere" in our relations with the Trolls of Beijing.

There is no doubt that the new emphasis on human rights pleases the folks on the Left.  In addition to the domestic benefits of rediscovering that the Trolls are willing to repress any and all dissent, raising the issue of how the Chinese regime treats its citizens allows the US to attempt the insertion of a wedge between the more or less reform minded Trolls such as prime minister Wen Jiabao and the high command of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA.)  Such a wedge may prove beneficial to American interests next year when the five year term of the rather weak and pathetic President Hu comes to an end.

While that possibility exists it is too slight a reed to support any significant US policy regarding China.  To put it bluntly but not inaccurately, the leadership of the Han tribe is not overly concerned with the views of the US or any other barbarian state in the amorphous area of human rights.

The reason for this is simple.  The cohesion of the Han tribe is the absolute centrality of Chinese society, polity, and economy.  For centuries the structural integrity of the Han has been seen as the cause of Chinese success and, conversely, any cracks in that integrity have been held responsible for Chinese failures.  The social and political compact between rulers and ruled hinges on the capacity of the rulers to insist upon cohesion and the willingness of the ruled to accept cheerfully and fully the imposed collective integrity.

A member of the Han tribe who rejects or demurs from the requirements of cohesiveness has placed himself outside the tribe if not in opposition to it.  The non-Han who happens to live in China, who perforce is a subject of the Han, has no voice in the matter.  The role of the non-Han (roughly ten percent of the population) is to accept his lot in silence, grateful for whatever crumbs fall from the master's table while showing always a willingness to obey his betters.  (Perhaps the non-Han can take some comfort from the fact that he lives within the Central Empire and not among the denizens of the outer darkness, the assorted barbarians of the world.)

The Han view is not one of recent origin.  It has typified Chinese thinking for a long, long while.  The notion of the Han as superior, of China as the Central Empire, was well developed back when the British were painting themselves blue and burning captives in wickerwork cages, since the days when Rome was a hick village on only one hill.  The idea of the Han tribe, of the cohesion of the Han as central to the success or failure of China, has a long and honored history.

It is not surprising that the constellation of ideas which comprise the concept of the Han tribe and its necessary cohesion based on a compact binding rulers and ruled in a web of collective obligations has brought in its wake a large measure of xenophobia, a larger measure of supremacist ideology, and a hefty amount of indifference to the human rights of non-Han or the Han so ill-advised as to dissent from the imperatives of the tribe.

More than any other institution in China, the PLA is the custodian of the most robust expressions of Han supremacy.  This means that the PLA is the most nationalistic as well as the most militaristic component of the Chinese state.  As is the case with all continental powers, the army is the ultimate guarantor of both nationhood and statehood.  But, this dynamic is magnified in China.  Mao recognized this in his famed dictum that "political power comes from the muzzle of a gun."

In an ideal world cohesion comes from consensus.  In the less than ideal world called reality, consensus is not always enough.  Consensus must be reinforced by coercion from time to time.  The military, today the PLA, is the instrument of coercion.  Over the two dozen centuries of China's existence as an organized polity, the fate of the Han and their ruler have depended upon the capacity of the army to coerce effectively.  The fate of the nation, the fate of the state, have waxed and wained according to the capacity of the army not only to defend borders, but, more importantly and often, to coerce effectively--to suppress dissent and force non-Han to accept subordination.

The current system of Chinese political organization came to pass because the PLA was more effective in coercing acceptance of Mao's version of Communism than was the army commanded by the Nationalists.  China exists as it does today not because the PLA outfought its armed opponents, although it did so.  China exists as it does primarily due to the efficiency with which the PLA suppressed dissent, forced consensus, and restored cohesion.

The PLA was the midwife of the Revolution.  Since then it has been the ultimate protector and custodian of both nation and state.  Had it not been for the effectiveness of the PLA in its internal security role, the wheels would have come off Mao's state during the Great Famine following the Great Leap Forward or as a result of the bloody consensus destroying excesses of the Cultural Revolution.  And, it should never be forgotten that it was the tanks and bayonets of the PLA which in 1989 crushed the pro-democracy movement and bought the regime the time it needed to pursue economic liberalization with the results we are so well acquainted today.

The PLA at the senior levels knows perfectly well that the ambitions of the Trolls for regional hegemon status as well as its lofty plans for securing a Great Power role equivalent to if not surpassing that of the US depends upon its capacities.  Likewise, the PLA command structure is well aware that the Trolls depend upon it to suppress the non-Han and squash any Han dissenters.

This implies that the level of civilian supremacy in China is not so high as Secretary of Defense Gates has pretended in public.  The actual relation between civilian government and military high command is more like a co-dominion with Trolls and military chiefs being essentially equal.

From this one can draw a necessary inference: While both President Hu and Prime Minister Wen may genuflect before the totems of reform, democracy, and other warm fuzzies, when and if push comes to shove, the PLA is secure in its belief that it can impose and enforce the necessary degree of Han cohesiveness.  As a result, the American hectoring about human rights can be ignored with impunity.

To a degree which surpasses the civilian Trolls, the commanders of the PLA are realpolitikers.  They are also ideologues.  This is a very dangerous combination.  The high command of the PLA is of the view that China is entitled to be regional hegemon.  It has a right to Taiwan.  China is the Central Empire.  These axioms mean that China must accept the probability of conflict with the US.  The set of "givens" means the PLA must be prepared for war with the US.

The massive modernization of the PLA (fueled in large part by money from US consumers) is plainly aimed at the US.  The continued acquisition of evermore sophisticated weaponry and other military equipment (some of which is the result of poorly considered co-production and similar agreements) is also aimed at the US.  There is not a single aspect of Chinese military procurement or reorganization which is not far in excess of any realistic defensive need.  Rather, each and every aspect of China's military reorientation and enhancement effort is offensive in nature.  The only credible target of an offensively oriented Chinese military is the US.

In the face of this set of very unpleasant developments, the Obama administration's putting the human rights card into play during President Hu's state visit is less than pathetic.  Rather the "new found assertiveness" promised by Secretary Clinton and President Obama is redolent of the tactics of desperation and hints at a strategy utterly lacking intellectual content.

We should consider ourselves fortunate if the Chinese president refrains from laughing.