■"Analysts missed Chinese buildup," by Bill Geertz, Washington Times, 9 June 2005, sent by reader Matt Valkovic.
■"How's China to Make Sense of U.S. Signals?," by David Wessel, Wall Street Journal, 9 June 2005, p. A2.
■"Arms Fiascoes Lead to Alarm Inside Pentagon," by Tim Weiner, New York Times, 8 June 2005, p. A1.
The Geertz piece is just too weird for words. Not for Geertz, who is typically breathless, but whoever spoon-fed him this nonsense: the great scandal by which a host of Chinese military developments were "missed" by a team of analystsóor actually who buried them by "playing down or dismissing evidence."
This "discovery" of such scandalous (even treacherous?) behavior by these obvious pinkos apparently comes out with the latest Pentagon report on Chinese military capabilities, which, as we know, is totally authoritative because . . . uh . . the Pentagon knows everything!
Geertz gives us the list of "missed developments," none of which is new news to anyone familiar with Chinese military developments of the past few years. I've seen descriptions of these developments in plenty of briefs over the past several years.
Apparently this report about the report speaks of "surprise" repeatedlyó12 times in fact!
Apparently, all these "new" "missed" "surprises" are in the latest Pentagon presentation to Congress on China's military buildup.
Say, isn't it interesting that all these "new" "missed" "surprises" are appearing right now, as the big-ticket weapons and platforms that are really designed for high-end war against a "near-peer competitor" are coming under greater budgetary scrutiny and facing likely cuts in coming years, as indicated in the projections of the FY06 budget sent to the Hill this year?
Apparently, we were all kept in the dark by this small "close-knit" (dare I say, cabal?) of China experts in the U.S. Government who purposely buried these developments out of their affection for China.
This article is complete bullshit, but a clear sign that the demonization of China by the Big War crowd in the Pentagon is gearing up big time. Programs of record to protect, my friends, so if it gets a bit messy in the process, then so be it. Cold Warriors don't die, and they don't fade away. They just hide until their programs are about to get cut and then they goówhat elseónuclear on the truth.
You want to see something truly well-reasoned on China and our schizo treatment of it, then read David Wessel in the WSJ. This guy's got a big brain, whereas Geertz is truly on tube feeding.
If Geertz wants to report on something truly scandalous, he should be working the Pentagon the way Tim Weiner does. Weiner tried to reach me on this piece a couple of weeks ago, but we never connected. I didn't really have anything to tell him on the piece, though, since I'm far more familiar with the threat definition and intell stuff than I am on the acquisition and testing stuff. Another brilliant piece by Weiner. I told him I was happy to speak with him because I respect his work so much.