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China offers nuclear assurance to Rumsfeld
www.chinanews.cn 2005-10-21 09:34:54
(Source: China Daily/AP)
Visiting US Defense Secretary Donald H. rumsfeld visits the Summer Palace
on October 20, 2005.
Oct. 21 - The commander of China's nuclear missile forces told Defense
Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Wednesday that in an armed conflict China
would not be the first to use nuclear weapons.
Chinese Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission Guo Boxiong,
right, shows the way to U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, left, at
the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing on Wednesday October 19, 2005.
Gen. Jing Zhiyuan, commander of the Second Artillery, which operates the
country's growing arsenal of nuclear missiles, offered the assurance
while hosting Rumsfeld as the first foreigner to visit his headquarters,
according to two U.S. officials who participated in the meeting.
The officials briefed reporters afterward only on condition of anonymity
because of the visit's sensitivity. They said Jing told Rumsfeld no
foreigner had entered the command headquarters in its 39-year history.
Rumsfeld signed a large, new and otherwise empty guest book.
The Chinese rejected a Rumsfeld request to visit their national military
command center in the Western Hills.
Jing disavowed a recent public suggestion by another Chinese general that
the United States could be targeted for a nuclear strike if it intervened
in a conflict over Taiwan.
Rumsfeld aides who were present during the discussions quoted Jing as
saying it was "completely groundless" to say China was targeting any
country with its strategic nuclear forces.
Jing's operations chief, Senior Col. Kang Hong Gui, gave Rumsfeld a
briefing, complete with Microsoft PowerPoint graphics, on the command's
structure and missile forces training, without details about the numbers
of Chinese missiles.
Later, in a meeting with Rumsfeld at the Great Hall of the People,
President Hu Jintao said the visit to the Second Artillery headquarters
and Rumsfeld's other discussions in Beijing will "help the military
forces of our two countries to better enhance their mutual understanding
and friendship."
Hu and Rumsfeld also discussed President Bush's planned visit to Beijing
in November, and they agreed to speed up plans to increase military
educational exchanges, a goal Bush has endorsed.
On his first visit to China as defense secretary, Rumsfeld delivered an
address to the Central Party School and fielded questions from several
students and faculty members.
Chinese officials required U.S. reporters to leave the room after the
initial exchange, as planned.
Later, at a joint news conference at the Ministry of Defense, Rumsfeld's
counterpart, Gen. Cao Gangchuan, said U.S.-China relations are strong,
although he noted that it had been five years since an American secretary
of defense visited China. He called Rumsfeld's visit a "big event."
Asked about the Pentagon's assertion in a report to Congress last July
that China has vastly understated its defense spending, Cao said it would
be "simply impossible" to increase the budget on the scale cited by the
Pentagon because China is focusing its resources on fighting domestic
poverty.
"It is not necessary and not possible, actually, for us to massively
increase the defense budget," Cao said, speaking through an interpreter.
He defended the accuracy of China's report that its 2005 defense budget
is about $29 billion, compared with the $90 billion the Pentagon claims
is the true figure.
Even calculating it at a more recent exchange rate, the budget comes to
$30.2 billion, Cao said.
"That is, indeed, the true budget we have today," he said.
The atmosphere surrounding Rumsfeld's visit appeared friendly and
optimistic, with Cao saying the two countries have a broad range of
shared interests and a solid footing for building cooperation.
Rumsfeld applauded China's dramatic economic successes, noting that when
he first visited Beijing in 1974 as President Gerald R. Ford's chief of
staff, the streets were filled with bicycles, not cars.
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