With that phrase, said twice in a letter from the U.S. Ambassador to China to the Chinese Foreign Minister on April 11, the Chinese government agreed to allow the 24 U.S. air personnel to leave Hainan Island on "humanitarian grounds" and return to the U.S. How may we interpret this verbal ping-pong in the light of U.S.-China relations over the past two centuries?

No sooner had I issued Comment No. 61 on April 1 ("The Militarist Camp in the U.S.") concerning the internal struggle within the Republican Party between economic conservatives and macho militarists than this incident occurred to illustrate my point. I had argued that not only did the two groups have different interests but that Bush, forced to choose, would lean towards the first group. And so he did. His initial language was tough, even provocative, but he quickly retreated into a very sage diplomatic stance. And with that, he was able to achieve half of what he wanted. Of course, as all the commentators observed, the same division was going on within the Chinese government, and the same camp prevailed. The editorial in the New York Times said, approvingly, that there was "some accommodation on both sides."

The same reaction to the accommodation occurred on both sides. In the U.S., although they pulled their punches publicly, the militarist camp was quite unhappy with Bush. The influential conservative Weekly Standard permitted itself to criticize him publicly for his weakness. And, from what is being reported in the press, there seems to be popular discontent in China, a feeling that the Chinese gave in too easily to U.S. pressure. What however was the immediate rapport de forces in this U.S.-China confrontation, and where does it fit in the evolving historical relationship of the two powers?

What did each side want, and what were their strengths? The U.S. ideally wanted an immediate return of the personnel and the plane. This is what Bush demanded when the affair began. The Chinese ideally wanted an apology plus a promise to cease further reconnaissance flights in the area. The outcome was in-between. Bush got the return of the personnel, albeit not immediately. The plane is still in Chinese possession, and may remain there for quite a while.

The Chinese got something a bit less than an apology, but a lot more than the U.S. wanted to give. The U.S. first offered nothing, then "regrets," then "sorry," and finally "very sorry." The U.S. made its statement only in English. The Chinese translated the "very sorry" in two different ways. They used one term, which is said to be roughly equivalent, for being "very sorry" about the loss of the Chinese aviator's life. They used another term, said to be stronger and closer to "apology," to translate the "very sorry" for landing without permission on Chinese territory. It is true, as Henry Kissinger remarked, that while these terms were very important in resolving the immediate issues, they will probably be forgotten completely in a few months.

What was behind this verbal tussle? Before the incident had occurred, Bush had already said that he did not think China was a "strategic partner" but rather a "strategic competitor." From an analyst's point of view, China is quite clearly both. The U.S. and China are both counting on a significantly closer economic relationship in the next twenty years in order to meet what each thinks are its needs. This is a fact that U.S. businessmen clearly impressed on Bush and which in the end probably determined his way of handling the situation. But then the same thing may have occurred in China.

So they are strategic partners in the world-economy, at least now and into the next few decades. But they are also strategic competitors in the military arena. The U.S. wishes to maintain its present role as the most powerful (indeed indispensable) military presence in East Asia. And the Chinese clearly wish to see this role diminish, even disappear entirely. And the route China is taking to do this is to build up its own military, try to defuse conflict in Korea, and ultimately to absorb Taiwan. So the militarists in each camp have strong geopolitical arguments to back up their case each time a tactical question arises.

The story of the two countries goes back to the beginning of the nineteenth century. At that time, New England merchants (spiritual and sometimes literal ancestors of today's U.S. big businessmen) first sailed in their clipper ships to China for trade. They were soon followed by U.S. Protestant missionaries. (It is useful to remember that, in U.S. Protestant seminaries in the nineteenth century and even in the first half of the twentieth, there was a hierarchy of assignments for their students: the best were sent to China and Japan, the next rank to India, and the weakest to Africa.)

What the U.S. merchants worried about most was access, and there were two potential deniers of access: Chinese officials, and other Western powers (and Japan). Against Chinese officials, the U.S. backed "reformers" (just as they do today). Against other powers, U.S. Secretary of State John Hay proclaimed the "open door policy" in 1899. Today, the other powers are in no position to deny the U.S. access, but Chinese officials still are.

Between the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 against the "foreign devils" (the Christian missionaries and their converts), which was in part a reaction to the "open door policy," and the entry of the Chinese Communist army into Shanghai in 1949, the U.S. was a bit unsure who the "reformers" were. In particular, were Communists modernizers or enemies? That is why the Republican right in the early 1950's denounced various U.S. diplomats, politicians, and scholars for "having lost China." This is the source of the refusal to recognize the Chinese government and the very strong commitment to the Taiwan regime from the beginning.

We tend to forget these days that the U.S. and China actually went to war with each other a half-century ago. It was when both entered the Korean conflict. We also tend to forget that the Chinese almost won that war, and that the best that the U.S. could do militarily was to end the war in a draw, more or less on the boundary line where it started. And that this armed truce continues to this day, although Chinese troops are long since gone from Korea and U.S. troops are not.

In the 1950's, China was number 1 on the U.S. list of enemies, higher than the U.S.S.R. But then China and the U.S.S.R. had their historic split in 1960, and by 1972, Nixon (long a spokesman of a militarist stance vis-a-vis China) went to Beijing, met Mao Zedong, and started this "strategic partnership," which was an anti-Soviet partnership. Each side had to adjust its positions accordingly. On the Chinese side, they began to open up to world trade once again (and therefore to U.S. trade). On the U.S. side, the U.S. dropped its two China policy, recognized the Chinese government (George Bush, father, was one of our first Ambassadors) and allowed the Chinese government to resume control of its seat in the United Nations.

The sticking point in all of this was the military implications. The U.S. did not abandon Taiwan, although it toned down the mode of its support. And China did not abandon its military aspirations, not only strengthening itself but seeking to strengthen others across the globe who might stick pins in the U.S. And that's where we are today.

The latest incident shows that neither side is able either to do without the other in the economic sphere nor to intimidate the other in the military sphere. The question is what will be the case twenty years from now? My own bet is that China will be stronger and the U.S. somewhat weaker. That is Mr. Bush's dilemma.

Immanuel Wallerstein

[Copyright by Immanuel Wallerstein. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to download, forward electronically or e-mail to others and to post this text on non-commercial community Internet sites, provided the essay remains intact and the copyright note is displayed. To translate this text, publish it in printed and/or other forms, including commercial Internet sites and excerpts, contact the author at iwaller@binghamton.edu; fax: 1-607-777-4315.

These commentaries, published twice monthly, are intended to be reflections on the contemporary world scene, as seen from the perspective not of the immediate headlines but of the long term.]

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