(removes extraneous word in paragraph 4) (The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own)
By John Foley
HONG KONG, March 8 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Who's afraid of China? Its neighbours perhaps, after Beijing announced an 11 percent increase in the military budget for 2012. And maybe the United States, which has declared a "pivot" of its forces back to Asia after years of keeping a low profile. They are right to worry, but wrong to react. China's rise has been peaceful, and will remain so provided it can maintain the delicate balance of its security triangle.
On one side of the triangle is the People's Liberation Army, with over 2 million personnel. On another is the ruling Communist Party, to whom the army reports. Then there are the people of China, who the army is there to defend, and at times keep in check.
Since the days of Mao Zedong, the Party has been the triangle's strong base. It, and not the government, directly governs the army. Mao said in the 1930s that the Party must control the gun, rather than the other way around, a message current Premier Wen Jiabao reinforced on March 5.
Mao's disastrous economic and cultural policies left the party weak and the military strong. But in the subsequent decades, the military has been in retreat. There are currently no generals on the top Politburo Standing Committee. Successive cuts since the 1980s have halved the PLA's manpower, and the overt public nationalism of certain top generals -- one infamously suggested China could use nuclear weapons against the United States in 2005 -- has been kept in check. The PLA has also been weakened by a series of corruption scandals, including the recent apparent ouster of lieutenant general Gu Junshan, and stripped of its major business interests.
Besides, in the fast growing Chinese economy, the proposed 11 percent spending increase amounts to a decrease in the military's stated share of GDP. While the military rise of China makes for good headlines, the Middle Kingdom is still at the periphery of the global military picture. The United States spends at least five times as much as China on the tools of war.
But while the PLA is becoming less visible at home, it is becoming more active abroad. It is now prominent in peacekeeping missions, anti-piracy patrols and disaster relief work. China's hunger for resources has exposed it to countries such as Sudan and Iran, where its workers now come under threat from attack from guerrilla forces.
There are also cross-border political issues, which are often influenced by the threat or reality of military conflict. The multi-nation argument over the resource-rich Spratly Islands in the South China Sea is a clear example. The military role in China's complaint that groups in Pakistan are promoting unrest among China's Moslem population is more opaque, but could become significant.
The need for a stronger military presence in the world puts new strains on the domestic triangular balancing act. A repeat of the anti-imperial revolution in 1911, triggered by an army mutiny, isn't likely, but a slowing economy could create more flash points, since the popular will can influence the party's military agenda. Unrest spawned by home-grown factors like food shortages and layoffs have a history of channelling nationalist sentiment with alarming speed, with targets generally including Taiwan and Japan.
Incoming president and civilian Xi Jinping must also keep his military cool in the face of overheated U.S. rhetoric. Some American provocations can be laughed off, for example a recent book by ex-Goldman Sachs partner Peter Kiernan, "Becoming China's Bitch". Others are more challenging -- the U.S. military's return to Australia and the Philippines, patently pointed towards China.
The largest current risk is not that China adopts an expansive foreign policy -- it has neither the desire nor the means -- but that it overreacts to others' actions. China hawks recall with a shudder the waves of nationalism that followed the crash of a U.S. military jet near the Chinese island of Hainan in 2001, or the bombing of China's Belgrade embassy in 1999.
China's commitment to peace is also changing. The country has for decades promoted non-intervention. But that can be a potent weapon. China's refusal to countenance military action in Syria over the brutal Assad regime has done much to undermine the efforts of the United States. If the global policeman loses his badge, the world will be in for heightened geopolitical risk.
For now, the doomsday clock isn't ticking. China and the United States are each other's best customers, so open conflict would risk causing mutually assured destruction. But mutual self-interest doesn't guarantee peace. Neither does the perhaps $2 trillion of U.S. government debt held by Beijing. But that does give China plenty of financial weapons to use before it reaches for the gun.
CONTEXT NEWS
-- China announced an 11.2 percent increase in its military budget for 2012. Spending would be around 670 billion yuan ($106 billion), according to Li Zhaoxing, a spokesman for the Chinese national parliament that began its annual meeting on March 5.
-- Military spending has grown at an annual 13 percent over the past three years, compared to 20 percent growth in overall fiscal spending, according to an analysis in China Daily, a state-owned newspaper.
-- A report by the U.S. Department of Defence in August estimated that China spent $160 billion on the military in 2010, compared with an official budget of $92 billion.
-- Reuters: Asia 2012 military spending to top Europe's-report
-- For previous columns by the author, Reuters customers can click on
(Editing by Edward Hadas and David Evans)
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