Getting our heads straight on China

■"Interceptor System Set, But Doubts Remain: Network Hasn't Undergone Realistic Testing," by Bradley Graham, Washington Post, 29 September 2004, p. A1.

■"China Readies Riot Force For Peacekeeping in Haiti," by Edward Cody, Washington Post, 30 September 2004, p. A21.

■"An Irresolute Foreign Policy," op-ed by Albert R. Hunt, Wall Street Journal, 30 September 2004, p. A17.

■"I.M.F. Asks China to Free Its Currency from Dollar," by Elizabeth Becker, New York Times, 30 September 2004, p. C1.

Our approach on China in the U.S. government, but especially in the Pentagon, is just plain nutty in many ways. Here is a country joining the global economy, our economic rule set, and reforming itself as we advocate, and what do we offer in return?

How about the latest boondoggle version of Star Wars? Does it work any better than the last? No. What's the total bill up to now? Over $100 billion dollars, or roughly 1/2 of the entire sovereign debt owed by the Gap to the Core. Are we going to deploy it anyway? Oh yeah, to fulfill Bush's 2000 campaign pledge. Who's it designed to stop? North Korea, but ol' China's on the wrong side of the ledger as well. Is this the likely way America is going to suffer a nuclear attack? Not if the experts are at all correct. That scenario will most likely involve terrorists with a suitcase version, not something coming in on a missile. So why push this instead of something better, like a security alliance in Asia if North Korea is the big justification? Wouldn't that make things easier with China? Who wants to make things easier with China!

Ah, now we get closer.

Remember, those dastardly Chinese have their troops in our neck of the woods now: a whopping 125 cops trained for riot control in their first total-package (command, control, logistics) participation in a UN peacekeeping mission.

Wow! An entire contingent of 125 cops. We're talking bigger than . . . uh . . . maybe . . . most of the small-city police forces in America!

But then . . . we must keep on eyes on China, and the China hawks inside this administration, who want China back on the table in terms of global security fears.

Listen to Albert Hunt:

Donít forget China. Remember back to the spring and summer of 2001. Administration hardliners, with Mr. Bush's apparent concurrence, told us China was the greatest danger in the world, a threat to American hegemony. That's why building an expensive missile-defense system was more important than less sexy matters like combating terrorism.

Privately, the hardliners still make those arguments; some say in a second Bush term, China will have to be confronted. No one has the foggiest notion what the man who has been president for the past 44 months believes.

What should we be pushing with China? Ultimately making its currency convertible as soon as it is feasible.

But why bother with that sort of arcane stuff when we can spend billions on a Star Wars system that even the Pentagon doesn't trust one whit.