-Senators Say China Diverted U.S. Nuclear Technology to Submarines in Violation of ’85 Accord
-But Beijing’s big and growing reliance on energy from the Middle East leaves China vulnerable to regional strife and worries over sea lane security
May 11, 2015 by Keith Johnson
The world passed a milestone of sorts last month, as China finally surpassed the United States as the top global importer of crude oil. But what really matters for Beijing — and the world — is less the volume of Chinese imports than where that oil is coming from.
In that sense, China’s continued and, indeed, deepening reliance on volatile regions of the world for energy supplies, especially the Middle East, points to continued security vulnerabilities for Beijing for decades to come. That’s true despite efforts to diversify where China gets its energy from, and breakneck efforts by Chinese leaders to transform the country into a true maritime power.
In April, Reuters reported, China imported a record 7.4 million barrels of oil a day, just nipping the 7.2 million barrels a day imported by the United States, long the world’s oil glutton. By most accounts, that marked the first time China has imported more oil than the United States. By other measures, including net imports of all petroleum products, China had already elbowed its way into first place in late 2013.
Regardless of the exact timing, the emergence of China as the top crude importer is unlikely to be a one-off event. Oil production is still booming in the United States, reducing import dependence to levels last seen when President Richard Nixon was scandal-free. China, in contrast, continues to consume more oil despite an economic slowdown and efforts to shift the economy away from heavy industry and more toward services.
More important than the 7 million barrels is the fact that Chinese dependence on overseas oil, and especially on oil from the Middle East, has only grown in recent years. In 2007, according to Chinese customs data scoured by the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, China imported 3.2 million barrels a day with 1.46 million barrels, or 46 percent, coming from the Middle East. In 2014, even before the recent record, China imported an average of 6.1 million barrels of oil a day. Of that, more than 52 percent — or 3.2 million barrels — came from countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Iraq.
In other words, despite years of effort to source more energy from places like Africa, Latin America, Central Asia, and Russia, China gets more oil today from the Middle East than all the oil it imported just a few years ago.
Those diversification efforts “will help stem the rate of growth of dependence on Middle East oil, but they don’t change the fundamentals,” said Bruce Jones, director of the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution and author of The Risk Pivot. “China will remain heavily dependent on Middle Eastern oil and gas for 30 or 40 years at least.”
In practical terms, that makes China acutely vulnerable to fallout from any energy-supply disruptions in the Middle East, without being able to do much about it. Earlier this month, for example, Iranian ships detained a cargo ship passing through the Strait of Hormuz, a key oil-transit chokepoint. That prompted the U.S. Navy to escort some ships through the passage for a few days; now the Navy is just monitoring sea-lane security there. A recent study on Chinese naval operations concluded that “regional conflict is the most likely and most dangerous threat to sea-lane security.”
China has spent years trying to build a blue-water navy that could operate far from home. Since 2008 it has maintained a long-distance anti-piracy patrol off the coast of Somalia precisely to help limit the threat that pirates pose to shipping. But despite heroic efforts, including the launch of its first aircraft carrier and a rapid naval modernization, China is still decades away from matching U.S. naval capacities, which leaves it hostage to regional instability.
“There is a fundamental asymmetry between China’s reliance on Middle East oil supply, and its very minimal capacity to do anything to contain or mitigate political risk in the region,” Jones said.
More broadly, the strategic nightmare that has haunted Chinese leaders for two decades shows no sign of going away.
Former Chinese President Hu Jintao first fully articulated in 2003 what has become known as the “Malacca Dilemma.” That laid out Chinese fears that some unnamed power — such as the United States — could use its dominance at sea to blockade the narrow-but-critical sea lane in the Strait of Malacca near Singapore, through which about three-quarters of Chinese oil imports pass. Continued economic growth is the central pillar of legitimacy for China’s leadership; any serious and sustained energy-supply disruption would strike at the underpinnings of Beijing’s hold on power.
The “Malacca Dilemma” is behind some of China’s highest-profile diplomatic moves, from closer energy ties with Russia to the construction of a New Silk Road across Central Asia and a Maritime Silk Road across the Indian Ocean. But as the latest oil-import numbers show, those initiatives will likely only trim China’s vulnerability at the margins, without being able to address for at least a generation the existential worry that’s part and parcel of the country’s miraculous economic transformation.
Ultimately, China’s deep and continued reliance on energy imports, and especially crude from some of the most unstable parts of the world, will likely push Beijing to ramp up its diplomatic and military engagement not just in Africa or the Indian Ocean but in the broader Middle East. For a United States anxious to escape that morass and complete its own pivot to Asia, that might not be such unwelcome news.
http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/05/11/china-tops-u-s-as-biggest-oil-importer-middle-east-opec-sloc/
https://tiananmenstremendousachievements.wordpress.com/2015/05/12/chinas-world-biggest-oil-import-problems/
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Putin and Xi Meeting in Moscow Reflects Increased Russian-Chinese Cooperation
11 May 2015 by Warren Mass
Russian President Vladimir Putin (second from right) sat side-by-side with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Moscow’s Red Square on May 9, as the leaders of two of the world’s most powerful nations reviewed the Victory Parade celebrating the 70th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany at the end of World War II.
In a world that prefers to ignore the threat of communism (whether overtly, such as China’s or hidden below the surface and managed by former KGB officer Putin in Russia) and prefers to constantly sound the alarm about Iran’s “nuclear ambitions,” ISIS, and al-Qaeda, Britain’s Telegraph made a revealing observation in its May 9 report about the Putin-Xi meeting: “Once again, the Russia-China axis is the main threat to the West’s vision of peaceful and prosperous international relations.”
The Telegraph also reported that President Bill Clinton had attended the Moscow Victory Parade back in 1995, standing alongside Chinese President Jiang Zemin and the Russian Federation’s first president, Boris Yeltsin, but that this year, America boycotted the event because of Russia’s occupation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula, as well as its support of the Assad regime in Syria and for threatening to sell air defense systems to Iran.
In contrast to the U.S. absence, the communist world and its allies were well represented at this year’s Moscow parade. In addition to Xi, among those who attended were Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela, and Raúl Castro of Cuba. John F. Burns of the New York Times wrote in 1980 that Mugabe had earned the reputation “as a Marxist ideologue whose guerrilla forces, in their brutality against black and white civilians, had few counterparts in modern warfare.” Maduro is the successor to the late socialist strongman Hugo Chávez, and has continued his predecessor’s Castro-backed revolutionary regime. And Raúl Castro needs no introduction.
The Telegraph described the gathering by noting: “The line-up of leaders alongside the two men [Putin and Xi] was a walking representation of a new anti-American alliance that has formed bit by bit since the invasion of Iraq demonstrated the frightening ease with which Washington could destroy hostile leaders far away.”
An article about this year’s Moscow Victory Parade in the Atlantic saw it as an illustration of growing Russian-Chinese cooperation. It observed:
As Russia’s relationship with the United States and its European allies grows worse, its ties to China have never been closer. On the eve of the parade last Friday, the two countries announced 32 separate bilateral agreements, including a non-aggression pledge in cyber warfare. The deals complement a $400 billion deal made last May, when Russia agreed to ship 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas each year between 2018 and 2048 to China. And next week, Russian and Chinese naval vessels will conduct live drills in the eastern Mediterranean Sea.
“We are strong if united but weak if isolated,” the article quote Xi as saying.
During the Cold War, when Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev told Western ambassadors in Moscow in 1956, “We will bury you!”; when the Soviets tested a 50-megaton nuclear bomb in 1961; when the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba prompted the Cuban Missile crisis in 1962 and created fears of an impending nuclear war; and when hot versions of the Cold War resulted in Communist China supporting armies fighting against U.S. troops in Korea in the 1950s and Vietnam in the 1960s, any close cooperation between the Soviets and Chinese would have been considered extremely alarming.
Today, though Russia is but a newly branded version of the old Soviet Union (an article in The Economist in 2007 noted: “Political power in Russia now lies with the FSB, the KGB’s successor”), and China is still openly in communist hands, no potential danger from these superpowers can compete for media coverage with the daily reports of threats posed by ISIS and Iran’s “nuclear program.”
Though figures can vary according to who is compiling the statistics, reliable estimates indicate that Russia has approximately 1,600 nuclear warheads, and China has about 250. These nations also possess what are called “nuclear triad” delivery systems for these weapons — strategic bombers, intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).
The world’s oft-cited major threat to world peace, Iran, in contrast, has nary a nuclear warhead, nor any means of delivering one. Furthermore, its nuclear fuel enrichment program has not produced material of sufficient density to produce nuclear weapons. Iran has reportedly begun the process of enriching uranium fuel to a 20-percent level of U-235 required for a reactor in Tehran that is used to make medical isotopes, but that is considerably below the threshold where it would pose any threat to other nations. Weapons-grade uranium is enriched to about 90 percent U-235.
During the 2012 presidential campaign, candidate Ron Paul said in an interview with CNN’s John King, USA: “There is no evidence whatsoever that the Iranians have or are on the verge of getting a nuclear weapon, according to our own military people, our own CIA, according to the UN.”
That same year, Paul vehemently opposed a bill to impose sanctions on Iran. Paul called the sanctions bill, which passed the House 421-6, the “Obsession with Iran Act 2012.”
The former representative said in a speech: “What we continue to be doing is obsess with Iran and the idea that Iran is a threat to our national security. Iran happens to be a Third World nation. They have no significant navy, air force, or intercontinental ballistic missiles.”
As for ISIS, that other threat to world peace that is in the news almost daily, there is no dispute that it is a terrorist organization of the most radical type and is responsible for countless atrocities wherever it has gained control in Iraq and Syria. However, that other bogeyman, Iran, has actually been active in supporting Shiite militias fighting against ISIS in Iraq. Iran has also supported other enemies of ISIS, most notably Syria’s strongman, Bashar al-Assad.
In an effort to unseat Assad, the United States supplied the anti-Assad forces, linked under the umbrella Free Syrian Army (FSA) with weapons and training. However, several factions within the FSA then supported ISIS, a leading opponent of Assad, and handed over large numbers of weapons to ISIS.
Instead of intervening in the Middle East, where it is often difficult to tell who is friend and who is foe, and where intervention often results in “blowback,” the United States might do better to focus its attention on a real enemy: international communism. From the looks on things in Moscow recently, the worldwide communist network is alive and well.
http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/europe/item/20857-putin-and-xi-meeting-in-moscow-reflects-increased-russian-chinese-cooperation
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Senators Say China Diverted U.S. Nuclear Technology to Submarines in Violation of ’85 Accord
Beijing’s nuclear proliferation could scuttle renewal of U.S.-China accord
May 13, 2015 BY: Bill Gertz
China has illegally diverted U.S. civilian nuclear technology to its nuclear submarine program in violation of a 1985 cooperation agreement, according to Senate testimony Tuesday.
Additionally, China appears to be violating an international Nuclear Suppliers Group commitment by exporting additional nuclear reactors, some with U.S. technology, to Pakistan, according to Republican and Democratic members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The Chinese nuclear violations were revealed during a hearing on the 1985 U.S.-China nuclear cooperation agreement that is set to expire at the end of the year. The Obama administration is seeking a new agreement, known as a 123 agreement, after the section of the Atomic Energy Act regulating nuclear technology sharing.
The 1985 agreement was held up for 13 years over concerns China was proliferating nuclear technology to rogue states such as Iran and North Korea. It was finally approved during the administration of President Bill Clinton.
The delay was the result of Congress imposing a certification provision requiring the president to allow nuclear transfers only after he certified China was not engaged in nuclear proliferation activities.
Committee Chairman Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) said several members of the committee are concerned about Chinese violations of the current agreement.
“We have a country like China that is not honoring the spirit of the law,” Corker said. “They’re not honoring previous agreements with the nuclear group. We know they’re going to take this information and use it for military purposes. We know that, even though the agreement says they won’t do it.”
Corker questioned two Obama administration officials about whether nuclear cooperation would be suspended if Chinese violations are confirmed.
Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.) revealed that the possible Chinese nuclear diversion involved reactor cooling pumps produced by the Curtiss-Wright Corp., an American company that makes the pumps for U.S. nuclear-powered submarines.
“They also produce a scaled-up version of this pump for the AP1000 reactors Westinghouse is selling to China,” Menendez said. “Could China reverse engineer the pumps that they are receiving from Westinghouse for their own nuclear submarine program? Is Chinese military seeking to divert these civilian nuclear technologies to its naval reactor program? Do you have any information on that?”
Thomas Countryman, assistant secretary of state for international security, who appeared at the hearing, said: “I do, and we discussed it in some detail in last night briefing, sir,” a reference to a classified committee session held Monday.
China is engaged in a major nuclear submarine buildup that includes four new types of nuclear attack and ballistic missile submarines, according to the Pentagon’s annual report on the People’s Liberation Army. The report, made public this week, said China currently has five nuclear-powered attack submarines and four nuclear missile submarines. Four additional attack submarines are planned and five missile submarines are being built. The first missile submarine patrols are set to begin this year.
Sen. Ed Markey (D., Mass.) was more specific about the nuclear technology diversion. “Concerns have been raised that China may be diverting U.S. nuclear power technology to its nuclear naval program,” he said. “Would such a transfer violate the peaceful use provisions of the 1985 Nuclear Cooperation Agreement?
Countryman, the State Department official, said the transfer would violate the current agreement and the proposed successor agreement.
Sen. Ben Cardin (D., Md.) also questioned whether the nuclear cooperation agreement with China should be renewed. “While progress has been made, China’s nonproliferation policies remain problematic,” he said.
“Multiple State Department reports document Chinese companies and individuals who continue to export dual use goods relevant to nuclear and chemical weapons and ballistic missile programs in Iran and North Korea,” Cardin said.
Cardin also said he is concerned by Chinese plans to export nuclear power plants based on technology supplied by the U.S. company Westinghouse.
“Under a deal signed in 2007, Westinghouse agreed to transfer its reactor technology to China,” Cardin said. “This allows Chinese firms to increase their share of the nuclear work with the ultimate goal of exporting reactors themselves.”
Regarding reactor sales to Pakistan, Cardin said China claims the exports do not violate the Nuclear Suppliers Group guidelines. “However, as China makes plans to export nuclear reactors, reactors based upon U.S. technology, to other countries, one has to wonder about its commitment to nonproliferation standards it has signed up to,” he said.
Henry Sokolski, director of the private Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, said the Senate testimony made clear that the committee is concerned that China has violated the 1985 agreement.
Sokolski said it appears the panel is preparing to add conditions to any approval of a new agreement designed to prevent further nuclear technology diversions and rein in Chinese nuclear reactor exports.
“The hearing made it very clear to anybody listening that the Chinese have violated their pledge not to divert U.S. power reactor technology to the submarine naval reactor program,” Sokolski said.
He added that the committee appears to be preparing to impose conditions on approval of a successor 123 agreement, such as the certification provision attached to the 1985 accord.
Markey also said that China in the 1990s helped Iran’s nuclear program and that U.S intelligence reports “have expressed continuing concern that Chinese government and private entities have proliferated technologies concerning and related to nuclear weapons to countries of concern.”
One example is the arms proliferator Karl Lee, a Chinese national, who has facilitated illicit nuclear and missile transfers to Iran.
China’s government has done nothing to shut down the Karl Lee arms network, he said.
Markey also said the five PLA officers indicted by the Justice Department last year for hacking U.S. companies were after nuclear data from Westinghouse.
“These thefts occurred in 2010 and 2011 and included information related to the Westinghouse AP1000 nuclear reactor,” he said. “During the identical time frame that these thefts were taking place, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission authorized dozens of Chinese nationals to have unescorted access to five U.S. nuclear power plants for two months—unescorted access to five U.S. nuclear power plants.”
The incident of unescorted Chinese nationals at the power plant is being investigated by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, he said.
Markey also said the Pentagon has reported that Chinese hackers broke into Department of Energy networks.
“I think it’s very important so that we understand especially whether or not they have tried to access nuclear weapons information from the Department of Energy or other sensitive military information, and that would be both Energy and State, but also Defense and other related agencies,” Markey said.
“So, I am not confident that I can support this agreement,” he added. “I think it needs additional strengthening if we are going to be confident that the policy that we have right now doesn’t help China far far more than it’s [their] long-term nuclear and ballistic missile nonproliferation agenda, which we put at the highest pinnacle of American foreign policy.”
Corker also said the agreement may be modified by the Senate. “My sense is that as we move ahead, there may be a series of conditions that the Senate may want to place on this particular agreement,” he said.
A spokesman for Corker, asked about the diversion of nuclear technology, said the senator’s questions were based on unclassified assessments that addressed China’s “intent to divert” civilian technology to the military.
A State Department spokesman did not return an email seeking comment.
A Chinese Embassy spokesman also did not return an email seeking comment.
However, Chinese President Xi Jinping has said in recent speeches that China should use more of its civilian technology to support PLA military modernization programs.
http://freebeacon.com/national-security/senators-say-china-diverted-u-s-nuclear-technology-to-submarines-in-violation-of-85-accord/
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