Interest in afghanistan and the women there. Hello, im here at the center for new American Security. A washington dc based nonpartisan and bipartisan think tank. I have the most profound strategic challenges confronting the United States is managing the rise of increasingly assertive and powerful china. How to deal with the military power is the reason for todays special event. The 11th and newest book by Peter Navarro is entitled crouching tiger what chinas militarism means for the world. Distinguished scholars from china, Toshi Yoshihara and Benjamin Goldberg team. First, let me say a few words to frame the china debate in the context of todays events. This is december 7, a reminder of both strategic surprise and how a rising asia power might seek expansion of control throughout asia. The concern today is a reemerged nationalistic and increasingly provisional list china is bent on establishing a larger sphere of influence. Seeking to restore china to greatness simultaneously seeking to rejuvenate the nation and preserve the party. In addition to comprehensive reforms at home there is a reassertion of territorial claims and in effect militarily pushing back the us which and you areenjoyed a longstanding preponderance of power in the asia region. It seems to gain control and the South China Sea. Although china is riddled with myriads of challenges, whether the trajectory will lead to a great power war, while experts disagree on the inevitability of conflict we cannot avoid the potential impact. Before pearl harbor many thought the idea of work between japan and the United States unimaginable which is by the book by Peter Navarro is so important. Uniquely fashioned a career out of multimedia enterprises, and he is published ten previous books, including several related to china. Peter navarro is here to tell us more about crouching tiger what chinas militarism means for the world. Peter. Thank you. The pleasure and honor to be here. I appreciate the center for a new American Security sponsoring this. Patrick was kind enough to put up with us. We get stranded beyond the beltway my got here two hours late. Horrible weather. He let us go into his office and redecorate the whole thing. We put everything back. But the interview was even better than his hospitality. My Mission Today really is to talk about an issue which i think is one of the most pressing of our times and one which i hope will become front and center in the 2016 president ial election. The mission here is to use the crouching tiger book to discuss these things against the backdrop of what is today in american history, a serious and somber day celebrating the anniversary of the pearl harbor attack. I am going to leave together the themes of the book itself and show you a number of historical parallels. That has to do with the fact that china is the worlds manufacturing floor, and as we recall quantity is a quality of its own. Never face the ability to produce so prodigiously as china can today. That is what i will do for you today. I want to talk about how the book came about. As patrick indicated, my mo is to, when i do a serious policy book, one of the most important things is to go out and talk to experts. As preparation for this book i interviewed close to 40 of the top experts in the world. It reflects a Broad Spectrum of opinion. People from the us institute of piece and the Naval War College and everyone in between. Just amazed at how they were willing to do this, but we would sit for an hour or two getting footage, and the book reflects the wisdom. It is an interesting experience. Policy walks. Analysts. Trying to reach the public about this issue. I wrote it as a geopolitical detective story. The best testimonial is the one that Toshi Ishihara said, it is a fun read. It is a dark subject, but it is actually very acceptable. But im going to do for you today, when you talk with people outside your expertise to try to convince them whether it is Congress People or staff people, whoever it is, thinking about this problem in a way that is acceptable and understandable. The framework is one that is straight out of the international relations. Are they also possibly bad, trying to take territory from the neighbors and if there is bad intentions have to turn to the capability question. If china is week we dont have to worry, but china is strong we have to look at the strategies that china is adopting in order to fight what it sees as the warhead which gets into the realm of words you have heard, the jargon access aerial denial and asymmetric warfare. Once i get to that point there is an issue we have to focus on. I go through the flashpoints for war whether itwhether is South China Sea, east china sea, taiwan, north korea, and finally to try to cut throuw you present with seems to be an eventual conflict with china which is where well talk about the pathways to piece. I am going to move through this fairly briskly. Lets begin with the intentions question. We start with, there is absolutely no question, china needs to have a strong military. No question about that. The british took the port, the opium wars is doing the same thing today, using coercion to take territory from people. Germans and french were absolutely brutal us was right there as the junior imperialist at the time and of course we know the history of which appended. The chinese attitude is never again. I have written a wonderful book, red star over the pacific which basically is a look at chinas emergence as a naval power through the lens of the father of the American Navy and his counterpart in china who basically saw the early on in china was opened back in the 70s, saw the need for a globalized navy. The whole idea and i think it is absolutely correct, in order for a global power like the us or china to prosper you need to have some commanding control of the sea lanes. There is no question that china would build their navy. So lets give the dragon its too. That is okay. We should not fear that. The problem comes about as dean chang from the Heritage Institute says, it is one thing to to build densive weapons and quite another to build offense of weapons aimed at basically intimidating neighbors and pushing the us. It was fascinating. A romance should revisionist power. They sought to take territory from their neighbors. Theres not a lot of difference between Imperial Japan and chinas vision. They control taiwan, much of indochina. Their armies and military and navy are poised to drive them out so if you look at china china has made it clear. The film talks about how preposterous that is. But that is a revanchist claim that they are pursuing. They even claim the continental shelf. There is no question that china has the intention of taking territory from its neighbors. They share a fear of the us intervening. The barrier is set up a perimeter so you can see the parallel. There is no question that there should be concerned. And so we have to go to the question of capabilities, and i think there is a hubris year within the beltway let me count the ways. The interview with him the largest arsenal of muscles in the world. The anti ship Ballistic Missile and the hypersonic cruise missile. That is what tells what Ashley Tellis calls the tip of their spear. But then you move on. Commander call had an interesting talk about mine warfare. Thats her grandfathers mind. Walk me through how they let a hundred ships go by 70 miles an hour through the water it is a mission killed. Applicable in the islands. We come back to an interesting parallel. Restoration japan, that this produced by the british and french that you china is doing the same thing. Is the Fastest Growing fleet in the world. Then you got the exotic stuff, one of my favorite interviews was with chang at the Heritage Institute. And he made the delicate distinction between satellite weapons, hard kill versus soft kill. When china created the largest amount of space debris in World History per knocking out one of their weather satellites, but he talks about how difficult it is to do soft kill. Aegis nudge. The reason why is they understand we control the strategic high ground. They think in order to deal with that, but it is destabilizing. But the chinese dont think like that. We had deals with the soviets. China sees it as another front. Lastly on the kinetic warfare front there is cyber warfare which as we speak their hitting the pentagon, businesses, and have stolen virtually every major Weapon System we have. You name it. Just go down the list. That gets back to the hubris of the United States policing we will maintain superiority. If they are stealing Weapon Systems and have superior manufacturing capabilities, you do the math. And finally, there is what they call three warfares. Kind enough to have me to his house and sit with me and talk about them. What i remember the most was, it is not the best weapons that when, it is the best narrative. And its something the chinese take seriously. The capabilities that are growing rapidly, but then theres talk about strategy. Even if china never approaches us in terms of technology, that still does not matter if they practice asymmetric warfare. Theres a wonderful segment in the film, in the interview talking about how an anti ship Ballistic Missile, 10 million able to hit a 10 billion Aircraft Carrier, and what he said was, theywas, they can build more muscles then we can Aircraft Carriers. Again, talking about parallels, the long last torpedo was the predecessor of the anti ship Ballistic Missile. The japanese new they needed technology to win and that was a way of our ranging the opponent just by. Bad intentions, strong capabilities. A strategy which is unabashedly aimed at pushing us out. One of the fascinating things and this is relevant to where we are right now in washington because with the statement said is the idea is to not put up a heart shielded push us out. Simply to create uncertainty. And then we have a white house that hands and hawes and is indecisive. So, lets turn now to the flashpoint. China get shut down the wildcard because they provide 40 percent of the food and fuel. Something Michael Ohanlon shared with me the Bush Administration was actually aware, but that was over. And in 2003 while the Bush Administration was preparing to invade iraq what did north korea do . They spirited eight hundred thousand spent fuel rods, centrifuge that and got that material to places we can know now no longer find. That was the day that became a nuclear power. It has taken over ten years for them to get to where they are. They will get further. One of the most chilling interviews was a gentleman from Johns Hopkins university. There going to get good in seattle. He said, yeah. Nothing we can do about it. North korea is very much a trigger point. If you swing around the yard , yes, it is 1. 3 square miles of territory. Well, it is also 200 miles of an exclusive Economic Zone and a concentric circle , resources and also on the southern flank of taiwan. If china is able to grab that and turn it into a fortress garrison, it would create vulnerabilities for japan. So that probably have already seen what happened in 2010 and 2012 over that. They announced riots. Nationalists going crazy. It basically is called the cows time. We are there now. They are there now circling some of these fortress garrisons. You have the issue of taiwan china calls it the renegade province. Depressed and afraid for two reasons. They see china slowly encircling them in ca us which may no longer have the resolve the stand with taiwan. They proposed a grand bargain. Fortunately everyone else i talked to do not think i was a good idea, but it does reflect the fact that if push comes to shove we might not have American Forces standing up for taiwan like bill clinton in 1996 or eisenhower in the 50s. And taiwan, there are a lot of reasons, but it is not just about the morality or ethics or commitment to democracy. That is the center of the 1st island chain. You give that away, give that Aircraft Carrier way and that will open the whole pacific to a chinese navy which is now very much bottled up. So there are even issues with india. It is fascinating. China claims it holds. Estate of india. Where to china go . Southern tibet. The Biggest Issue is the actual water. China controls the water supply. The entire southeast asia. Building dams and doing all sorts of things, making the river run dry. You have india and china, 40 pes population water constrained. So those are the flash points. I will walk you through the pathways to piece. There are three that we cannot depend on. They are the ones that i think we are depending on now because the neo isolationist argument, just walked back. John mesh armor talked eloquently about how attractive that is ideology but was real about why it should not be done, the strategic reasons, economic reasons, that is the most vibrant area that, 50 percent of the population Michael Green points off correctly Pacific Ocean is not a barrier. There is a reason why they are forward based. And just continental Ballistic Missile goes off in north korea or china, is attracting stations in japan and asia and elsewhere. So feel isolationism will be attractive to American People had to deal with afghanistan, iraq, syria, but we have to be there, and sheila smith is right dead in the center of things. Now, the two i think of the most serious are the Economic Engagement argument and the Nuclear Deterrent argument. The Economic Engagement argument is trade trumps invade idea. He simply go back and see the same rhetoric about how trade between kaiser germany and Great Britain and france would prevent the great war from happening, but one of my funniest interview these was texas ham. For those of you who know him, you will understand what im saying. In a great line about dont underestimate the ability to do stupid stuff when operating groups. There is a more subtle argument as to why trade does not always trump invade if you have a country like china heavily dependent upon natural resources, that actually increases the prospect of work. One of the reasons causing germany went to war was Great Britain was going to possibly embargo food, took oil and france tried to take some of the iron ore. So trade is not always trump invade, and we should not depend upon it. The other one is the highest want to think about. Schooled me on the stability instability paradox. Which is the idea if you have stability at the nuclear level, if china has the ability to launch a 2nd strike against seattle or San Francisco know they need to do is hit one, that deters us from watching a 1st strike should they going to taiwan or somewhere else. And both tell us that Nuclear Strike capability that china has now developed more fully actually opens the door for conventional war in asia. And i think that is exactly right. You can debated, but it should give you pause. So the last thing, what do we do. The interesting thing is, the unifying thought here comes from the chinese himself and it was brought to me to people who could not have more different outlooks, and if you know them you will know what, i mean. Johns Hopkins University and Michael Pillsbury who does work for the pentagon and a fine book for himself. Both of them brought up this whole notion of comprehensive National Power. The idea that if youre going to deter china from its aggression and be able to maintain a presence in the western pacific this country has to have comprehensive National Power. It is not just about building weapons. So what does that mean . It begins, us china commission, he is an expert on this. The idea that it all starts with a Strong Economy. You have to have a Strong Economy to generate growth, wage increases, tax base in order to afford whatever military and Harbor Defense you need. What is killing us now, not so ironically enough is chinas unfair trade practice. You cant say join the World Trade Organization in 2001, millions unemployed. Going at 2 percent set of three and a half. And if you are growing at three and a half percent it would not be having this conversation. That would be life on easy street. But it is not just that we must deal with economics on the trade issues but the other parts of the comprehensive National Power that matter, strong education which creates the innovation the tribes the economy. That is really so critical, and in the Business Climate which allows innovation and growth. You cant have a tax system which drives o