Western media make random guess at China's military spending

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, March 20, 2004

Western media make random guess at China's military spending

China's bigger military budget this year immediately aroused high concerns from foreign media, and many of them even derived "amazing discoveries" from the published figures.

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The just concluded NPC and CPPCC sessions have drawn high concerns from domestic and foreign media. As in previous years, some foreign media focus their attention on China's military budget increase. Chinese Finance Minister Jin Renqing announced on March 6 that China's national defense expenditure in 2004 was planned to rise by 21.83 billion yuan, 11.6 percent over last year. The news immediately aroused high concerns from foreign media, and many of them even derived "amazing discoveries" from the published figures.

Foreign media make a big fuss about China's increased military spending

AP, AFP and Reuters immediately reacted by releasing their reports on China's planned increase of military expenditure announced by the Chinese Finance Minister. AP ran an article entitled "Under the circumstance wherein the stress of China's financial expenditure is laid on rural areas and public health, military budget still grows by 11.6 percent", while AFP carried a report titled "China increases military expenditure to build hi-tech weapons". Reuters came a little bit late, but its article, titled "China decides to increase military expenditure by a large margin", outstrips the first two media institutions in terms of the length and depth of articles.

Preliminary statistics showed that in the 24 hours following the announcement of the news, the three news agencies published more than 100 reports, almost equivalent to the total reports on other issues concerning the two sessions. CNN, BBC and Japan's Kyodo News carried reports in varied forms, including special interviews with NPC deputies and CPPCC members, comments by military strategists and related graphics.

Among the multitude of overseas media institutions, America, Japan and Taiwan Province are most enthusiastic in their reporting. As soon as the news about the mainland's increased military spending came out, Taiwan's "defense ministry" spokesman reacted immediately by saying that China's planned military spending increase "brought negative influence to regional stability and peace". Some media from the island claimed, "the Communist-led army has made it clear that it is going to make war". Shortly after the spokesman's remarks, an American military expert called across the Pacific that to cope with threat from the mainland, Taiwan must "immediately build up its missile defense system and purchase anti-submarine equipment from America". Japanese media also declared that Taiwan will lose its control over the air and sea of the Straits in one or two years if it fails to expand input in "national defense". Analysts point out that the US and Japanese intention is known to everybody, that is to purposefully create tension, so that Taiwan authorities will spend more money on buying their weapons, and at the same time to keep Taiwan as a "chess" firmly in their own hands.

Exaggerating figures, guessing uses

An analysis of overseas media reports on China's military spending reveals two distinct features, that is, "exaggerating figures, and conjecturing uses".

Although the Chinese government has published detailed figures of military expenditure, Western media simply disbelieve them. An AP report, entitled "China increases military spending by 11.6 percent to raise its combat effectiveness", asserted that China did not announce its expenditures on the purchase and R&D of weapons and on other things. The report also quoted an official from the Pentagon as saying that China's actual military spending was three to four times that of the published figures". This opinion is quite representative among Western media organizations. Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun even claimed that China's military expenditure was five to six times greater than the published figures.

The Chinese government has frankly announced the purposes of its increased military spending, that is for staff salaries and pensions, activity maintenance cost and equipment purchasing fund, with the first two items taking a lion's share. But Kyodo News asserted that China increases military spending for two purposes. One is to buy attacking weapons such as advanced submarines and missiles. The other is to develop asymmetrical method of operation so as to deal with the military superpower. Reuters reported in a tone full of "anxiety", saying that the growth of China's military attacking strength will "bring complicated influence to the regional situation".

Compared with previous years, this year foreign media have linked China's increased military spending more closely with the Taiwan issue. AP and Yomiuri Shimbun believed that the mainland's increased military spending apparently took Taiwan as the primary target, and that the mainland troops would buy a large amount of advanced equipment in order to obtain air and sea control over the Taiwan Straits. An AFP report said not so bluntly though, it maintained that increasing military spending at such a moment at least indicated a posture China took on the Taiwan issue.

China's military spending increases not much

Unlike the uproar made by American and Japanese media, most countries in the world viewed China's military spending increase in a normal perspective. Neighboring countries, in particular, largely showed their unprecedented understanding of this.

As far as the general international environment is concerned, increase in military spending has become a common practice of various countries. Compared with the military expenditures of other big countries, China's is the lowest. America's defense budget for 2004 is US$401.7 billion, a 10 percent increase from the year before. This, plus funds spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, adds up to a total of US$488 billion, reaching a record high. Japan's defense budget for 2004 is about US$42.2 billion, ranking second in the world. While China's budget, even after being increased, represents only 6 percent that of America's and half of Japan's. Even Taiwan's figure set in its lately published arms purchase plan is much higher than the increased amount of the Chinese mainland's military spending. Moreover, the proportion of China's military spending to GDP is lower than those of America, Britain and other developed countries, as well as lower than those of the ROK, India and other developing countries. If calculated in accordance with military burden on nationals per capita or average spending on servicemen, China is ranked at the back, even lower than some Latin American and African countries. China's increased military spending is less than US$3 billion, while America's input of over US$4 billion is simply for a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

Judging from China's own conditions, military officer Luo Yuan pointed out that China's increased military spending is in line with its development strategy of boosting the overall national strength. China takes the road of peaceful rise, which contains two meanings. First, China will not seek for development via war; second, China will not plunder the strategic resources of other countries, but rather it relies on itself for development. In terms of the first meaning, China will never threaten others by war, neither will it allow others to pose war threats to it. So China must have the ability to contain wars. This set a very high demand on China's strategic capability. In terms of the second meaning, to build up a powerful national defense, China mainly relies on its own resources and engages in independent innovation. To engage in the development of and equip the country with high and new-tech weapons and enhance its strategic capability all need funds.

From the perspective of new military changes, Luo noted that currently all countries are engaged in army restructuring to adapt to modern high-tech warfare, with the military expenditure of most of them reaching an all time high since the Cold War. The Chinese army is in a transition period when it hasn't completed mechanization and yet it is faced with informationization challenges. It's normal and necessary for China to strengthen its national defense in order to avoid the "epochal gap" with other countries from further widening.

It's utterly groundless for Western media to accuse China of hidden military expenditure. The Chinese government has always adhered to the principle of strict control, administration and supervision over its defense expenditures, and has set up a complete management system and regulatory system. In operational procedures, the defense budget and its final account are examined and approved by the National People's Congress (NPC). A Western military expert long engaged in the studies of China's military affairs said that China is raising its transparency in both the army's internal affairs and its defense expenditure. The Chinese army is confidently marching on a correct road of openness and transparency.

By People's Daily Online

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