The Bush Administration's Lazy Pessimism

I'm consistently disappointed with the Bush administration's strategic and proliferation policies, but because they are pessimistic. Everyone is entitled to see such issues from a different perspective. What I really dislike about Bush administration policy is that it is such a lazy pessimism.

Case in point, it came out in today's New York Times that the Bush administration as well aware of China's preparations to conduct its successful ASAT test back in January. This shouldn't be too surprising, considering how much the United States spends on national technical means and imagery analysis. I've pointed out before that the Bush administration has demonstrated a tendency to value enhancing national preminence over constrainting proliferators and would-be competitors.

There is nothing inherently wrong with pursuing the "all options on the table" approach to issues like missile defense and the weaponization of space. The problem is that the utility of such an approach declines significantly if don't pursue the options that would otherwise be taken off the table. Dr. J over at the Arms Control Wonk really captured this idea today:

The real argument is that the Bush Administration wanted to “maintain maximum flexibility.” The hoary appeal to “keeping our options open” drives me nuts—keeping some options open requires closing others. Adults recognize that they can never keep all the options open. Policy-making is about making choices.

After all, Chinese anti-satellite weapons will restrict US freedom of action in space, too, just as would a ban on certain military missions. That we chose not to pursue a ban—either because we thought it might fail to prevent China from acquiring ASATs, because we’d rather have certain military systems or for any other reason—is not keeping our options open, it’s choosing some options at the expense of others.

The negative impact of lazy pessimism apparently doesn't stop at the weaponization of space and nonproliferation. Fred Kaplan wrote a scathing profile in today's Slate detailing of how the Bush administration completely bungled plans to deploy midcourse interceptors in central Europe:

On the verge of signing a deal to place 10 anti-missile missiles in the Czech Republic and Poland, the Bush administration is getting hammered on all sides. The European Union is furious that Bush is circumventing NATO and dividing the continent. Russia's defense minister, Anatoly Serdyukov, is calling the plan "a serious destabilizing factor which could have significant impact on regional and global security."

In response, the White House is pledging to discuss the terms with NATO and rushing to offer the Russians rewards if they drop their opposition.

"We were a little late to the game," the New York Times quotes a senior administration official. "We should have been out there making these arguments, making the case more forcefully before people began framing the debate for us."

[snip]

Even Bush was pretty good at this game at the outset of his presidency. When he entered office in January 2001, his top priority was to build a missile-defense system. Doing so would involve withdrawing from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the centerpiece of U.S.-Russian arms-control accords dating back 30 years. Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld wanted to renounce the treaty from the get-go. But then-Secretary of State Colin Powell urged Bush to engage with the Russians and to calm their fears before taking such a dramatic step. So, Bush visited Putin in June. Powell initiated negotiations for what became the Moscow Treaty, which sharply reduced both sides' offensive nuclear arms. By the time Bush gave formal notice that he was withdrawing from the ABM Treaty, on Dec. 13, Putin took the news with a shrug. He'd been persuaded that the move was not part of a renewed buildup against Russia. And there wasn't much he could do about it, anyway; his army had crumbled, his economy was a wreck.

Now, the geopolitical backdrop has shifted. Thanks to soaring oil prices, Russia's economy is booming, and its nationalist confidence is hardening. Its commercial ties with Iran have given Putin bargaining leverage over the West on a strategically vital issue. In short, if Bush wanted his cherished missile-defense plan to gain an easy entrée to Russia's backyard (or, to see it another way, the front yard of its former empire), he should have come "to the game" on time; he should have followed the standard playbook.

[snip]

What the Russians really fear about this plan is the vast American presence that goes with it. The anti-missile interceptors—the same models as the ones now in Alaska—are gigantic, as big as the old intercontinental ballistic missiles and, like them, buried in substantial blast-hardened silos. To deploy 10 of them, along with a huge X-band radar system, will require an enormous military base, heavily staffed, apportioned with the usual complement of U.S. Air Force infrastructure and American amenities.

In short, the United States would be gaining a substantial foothold deep inside Eastern Europe, closer than ever to the Russian border.

The members of the European Union are upset for similar reasons. Just as the EU is nurturing its own integrated defense council, and as NATO is taking a commanding role in Afghanistan, here come the Americans—so it seems—negotiating a separate deal with the Czechs and Poles, splitting not only the European Union but also the continent.

I agree with all of Kaplan's points, but his characterization of the Moscow Treaty is a bit too generous. The treaty itself is a flimsy document with no verification mechanism and no requirement for warhead destruction. It also allows either side to pull out with only three months notice, instead of the traditional six and the treaty expires on the same day that it must be fully implemented.

In fact, the Russians practically had to twist the Bush administration's arm to get them to sign a legally binding agreement on strategic nuclear reductions. Arms Control Today picked John Bolton's brain about the matter back in 2002 when he was Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security:

ACT: Secretary Powell said last week that he expects the United States and Russia to sign a legally binding accord to reduce the number of offensive strategic weapons that they deploy. In earlier months, the administration had suggested that it would prefer an informal agreement because Cold War-style treaties are unnecessary, given our new relationship with Russia. Why has the administration changed its mind?

Bolton: Well, I don’t think we have changed our mind. I think the point about not wanting Cold War-style treaties remains entirely valid, and the reason for that is that, in many respects, the way those treaties were negotiated reflected the geostrategic environment of the Cold War. That environment is now very much different, and our relationship with the Russian Federation is very much different. In those circumstances, you don’t want to be negotiating a kind of formal agreement that actually exacerbates diplomatic tensions as much as it might have the prospect of relieving them. So, the issue is looking for the right kind of agreement that reflects the new relationship, which could well take the form of a treaty or something other than a political declaration. We’re still in the process of deciding that. We’re having conversations with the Russians. We’ve told them for quite some time we’re open as to form. They have also said they’re open as to form. We’ll have to see how it works out.

ACT: What did Secretary Powell mean by “legally binding agreement”?

Bolton: Well, that would be something that could be a treaty, could be an executive agreement, might be something else that would embody the offensive weapons numbers.

ACT: Is there a preference for a treaty or an executive agreement on the U.S. side?

Bolton: At this point, we’re still open as to form. I’m sure as we get closer to May that decision will be made.

ACT: When we are speaking about a legally binding agreement, are we talking about the numbers of the warheads, are we talking about transparency, are we talking about verification? What exactly is the substance of this?

Bolton: Well, I think we’re still contemplating exactly what we mean by that—what the most appropriate format would be, how it would be structured, and that sort of thing. And I think that’s all part of the negotiating process.

I definitely recommend reading the rest of the interview, especially the part where Bolton gets into a verbal tussle with Wade Boese about the possibility of a 'resurgent' Russia.

I'm also going to track this down tomorrow at work, but I could have sworn that the general officer representing the Missile Defense Agency in Europe has been dual-hatted as NATO's lead for European missile defense. One of my coworkers just brough him in for a series of meetings at the Pentagon last month, so she should remember his name and his formal titles.

In search of the DF-31's spotty record

My analysis of the credibility of the DF-31 in the face of China's recent ASAT has definitely gotten some attention lately. Although Dr. Jeffrey was kind enough to entertain my thoughts, he did voice a legitimate doubt about one of my points:

I wasn’t aware that the booster for the previous tests [in 2002] had been unsuccessful, but if Robot Economist is right … that explains why the DF-31 remains to be deployed.

Now that I look back at my information on the DF-31 tests back in 2002, I am starting to question the veracity of my sources. This all started after I reviewed the DF-31 test timeline prepared by Globalsecurity.org:

Given the evident challenges associated with the DF-31 program, and the variety of operational missiles that are expected to derive from this development effort, it is plausible that there have been a number of flight tests of components associated with the DF-31 prior to an all-up full range test of the complete DF-31 missile.

1. It is reported that the new missile was test-fired for the first time on 29 April 1992. Because of quality problems in its components, the missile exploded after launch.
2. The second launch also failed due to similar problems.
3. Beginning in June 1995 four other missiles were test-fired successfully.
4. A test on 10 November 1995 possibly included endoatmospheric reentry decoys.
5. A test on 10 January 1996 possibly included endoatmospheric reentry decoys.

[snip]

13. In May 2001 it was reported that China was preparing a flight test of the DF-31, with test preparations at the Wuzhai Space and Missile Center in central China having been detected by US intelligence. Some [not particularly credible] reports claim that a newly-formed electronic warfare unit test-fired DF-31 with inputs from "military reconnaissance satellites that cruise above the Taiwan Strait" as part of the "Modern 1" exercise conducted on 28 June 2001.
14. A flight test in January 2002 failed.

Not one to rest on my laurels with this snippet of information, I whipped out LexisNexis and attempted to hunt down the initial reporting on this failed flight test. Among a few 150 word bare-bones wire reports from the BBC World Service on Russian observation of the January test, I came across this article from conservative The Times (of London):

SECTION: WORLD; Pg. 6

LENGTH: 367 words

HEADLINE: Chinese test new missile threat to US shield

BYLINE: Oliver August * Beijing

BODY:

Chinese scientists are close to a breakthrough in rocket technology that would allow Beijing to overcome President Bush's proposed anti-missile shield, American military analysts say.

The People's Liberation Army is believed to be in the final stages of developing an intercontinental ballistic missile with multiple warheads, matching Russian, American and British nuclear technology. One Washington analyst said: "It looks like the Chinese are much further (ahead) than we originally thought."

China's most advanced missiles have a range in excess of 8,000 miles, which puts them within striking distance of the continental United States. Chinese scientists are working on equipping these missiles with multiple independently targeted re-entry vehicles (Mirvs), meaning that the warhead can separate into more than a dozen individual weapons in space.

At present China has around 20 long-range missiles, a number that experts say would allow the American shield to protect against the Chinese arsenal. Washington aims to be able to guard against attacks by rogue states employing up to 24 missiles.

If Beijing upgraded all its missiles with multiple warheads, the analyst said, "it could easily overwhelm the shield. That would change the balance of power in Asia."

US government agencies have followed China's progress in missile technology closely before a decision on the development of the missile shield.

Beijing is said to have stepped up Mirv tests in recent weeks. Earlier this month the Japanese media reported a test flight, during which a Chinese missile completed the first half of its trajectory before disintegrating upon the deployment of the separate warheads.

It was a Dongfeng-31, which has a range of more than 5,000 miles. China is also said to be preparing for a test of the naval version. US intelligence officials are said to have spotted preparations for the test at a Chinese naval port.

Washington first highlighted China's attempt to develop Mirv technology in 1998, when it claimed that Beijing had obtained Russian SS18 missile technology.

The topic is expected to be discussed during President Bush's visit to Beijing next week.

LOAD-DATE: February 12, 2002

I guess I should have known to better than to trust a periodical that has Rupert Murdoch's dirty little fingerprints on it, even a fairly reputable institution like The Times. In order to do this issue true justice, I decided to poke around the Japanese side of the Internet and hunt down an reporting on the January 2002 test.

The first place I looked was the Japanese publication Nuclear Weapon and Nuclear Test Monitor, which is a great Japanese language source on most things nuclear weapons-related. Nestled in their testing log for January-February 2002 is this bullet (page 4):

２月１日　中国が先月、射程約８千キロの「東風（ＤＦ）３１」ミサイルの多弾頭（ＭＩＲＶ）化の為の飛行実験を行ったことを明らかに。実験は失敗。

Translation: February 1 It became apparent last month that China conducted a flight test of a MIRVed version of the 8000 kilometer range DF-31 missile. The test was a failure.

The Japanese are not known for their concision or their directness, I think those are droids I am looking for. There is only one problem: My search options for the Japanese language news are pretty limited, so this is where the trail goes cold - for now. I will look into this again soon, but for now, I need to finish the readings for Mike Mochizuki's class tomorrow or he will be pissed.

Hu's in charge?

I've been sitting on this post for a while now, but I thought my two cents might be of interest:

The New York Times ran a piece yesterday questioning whether the Politburo of the People's Republic of China had complete control over this month's ASAT test:

The American officials presume that Mr. Hu was generally aware of the missile testing program, but speculate that he may not have known the timing of the test. China’s continuing silence would appear to suggest, at a minimum, that Mr. Hu did not anticipate a strong international reaction, either because he had not fully prepared for the possibility that the test would succeed, or because he did not foresee that American intelligence on it would be shared with allies, or leaked.

In an interview late Friday, Stephen J. Hadley, President Bush’s national security adviser, raised the possibility that China’s leaders might not have fully known what their military was doing.

I think Mr. Hadley needs a lesson in comparative politics. In some countries around the world, political power is not clearly defined by the national constitution or laws. China, for example, is a corporatist state run by different political cliques that are born from personal relationships, patronage networks and common economic interests. These cliques are constantly jockeying for position within the state (and party, in this case). Needless, performance is a large determinant of the length of a Chinese politician's career.

Excuse the acerbic comment, but I doubt the Chinese premiere would be allowed to blunder into a hornet's nest like Iraq and keep his job for a year, let alone four. I'm also skeptical of Hadley's view because Hu Jintao has a very close relationship with the head of China's Second Artillery Corps. The Corps' current commander, Lieutenant-General Jing Zhiyuan owes both his third star and his position on China's Central Military Commission to Hu. If you want to know more about the dynamics of the current CMC, check out this article in the Asia Times article written just after Hu wrested the commission from his predecessor Jiang Zemin.

The Times article continues and produces an alternative answer to China's silence that is far more likely:

Chinese political and military analysts, who would not speak on the record about an issue the Chinese government still regards as secret, said they considered it unlikely that the army’s Second Artillery forces, in charge of its ballistic missiles, would conduct a test of a sophisticated new weapon without approval from the highest levels.

But they suggested that the test might have been approved in principle, with little advance preparation for the diplomatic fallout in the event it was successful. That entails not just new military worries; the destruction of the weather satellite left debris in space that could damage satellites from other nations.

“It’s the kind of silence that makes you wonder what’s happening inside the country,” said another senior American official who has been monitoring the case. “I’m sure the Chinese leadership knew there were tests under way, in a general sort of way. But they don’t seem to have been prepared for a success, and they clearly had not thought about what they would say to the world.”

I think the unnamed political military analysts may be on to the most likely cause of China's public silence - a failure to coordinate information between the military and Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

We are talking about a government whose budget documents are treated like state secrets, so I wouldn't be surprised if the military held the details of their test too close. It is quite possible that Hu and his politburo associates just assumed briefing packages on the test would change hands at the right time and paid the matter no mind.

I can think of two more plausible explanations, although there are plenty of possible explanations:

1) As my recent research into a DF-31 test has shown, the Chinese military isn't known for being forthcoming when it comes to its missile activities. It is possible that they didn't even think of how the test would impact international politics and security relationships.

2) The Chinese military calculated that the damage done by a failed, but publicly announced test would outweigh the impact of international outrage at an successful unannounced test.

Either way, I think Mr. Hu has enough tact and political savvy to know that his government's initial silence and bungled reaction have tarnished their 'peaceful rise' tag line.

Wrap-up on the Chinese ASAT test

I've gotten a few e-mails from readers wondering why anAsianist like me has been following the fall out of China's ASAT test so closely. The honest truth is that rocketry and astrophysics are in the blood of the R. Economist family. My father is a satellite engineer and almost all of his 7 siblings are either atrsophysicists, rocket scientists, or managers at NASA.

I know that may sound really interesting to some, but it can loose its edge very quickly at family gatherings when you realize you're the only one in a crowded living room without an engineering degree. That and I received a total of 12 telescopes between my 5th and 20th birthdays (thanks Uncle Jeff...). I am pretty proud of my Cosmos DVD collection though.

That anecdote aside, I have a few parting thoughts about how this test fits into the strategic picture:

Out with the new, in with the old

According to Jamie MacIntyre, China's successful January 11th test wasn't its first using ground-based ballistic missiles. There were apparently three failed tests prior to this one using the unproven Kaitouzhe-1 space launch vehicle as the kill vehicle [ed. note: This is not my claim, it is part of Globalsecurity's analysis of China's ASAT program. I have merely adopted it for the sake of a larger argument. My apologies for any confusion.]. The many of the key components for the Kaitouzhe are based on the new road-mobile DF-31 ICBM, which has had its share of problems, including some failed test launches back in 2002.

The Chinese decision to abandon newer Kaitouzhe design in favor of the twenty year-old DF-21 looks like a significant vote of no confidence in the DF-31 to me. As many have noted, including Matthew Thompkins, the Economist and myself, technological innovation in China is lagging. For the 1.3% of GDP they spend on R&D, very few innovations and inventions in China are truly "groundbreaking."

Chinese engineers have a knack for making steady marginal improvements to pre-existing technology, as well as crafting 'middleware' that marries systems together, original designs are still thin on the ground. The contrast between the (new) DF-31's weak performance and the drastic improvement in the (old) DF-21's circular error probable demonstrated by this month's test appear to validate this notion.

Trump card, not assassin's mace

Michael Dana's "Shock and Awe: America's 21st Century Maginot Line" makes a good point about the weaknesses of U.S. policy, but it reinforces the meme of Chinese interest in asymmetric warfare. In particular, it plays up a common fear around the Pentagon that China is covertly building up a portfolio of asymmetric capabilities that it will suddenly unleash in a bid to retake Taiwan. I am very skeptical of this view because I think Chinese leaders and thinkers correctly realize that war with the United States would be disastrous for both sides, regardless of who actually ends up 'winning' (Zheng Bijian is a little too optimistic, but ultimately right).

It is true that the Chinese military is pursuing capabilities that could be described as 'asymmetric,' but I think their intentions are far from hostile. To steal the phrase from Dr. Jeffrey, Chinese strategic policy has generally been to maintain a minimum means of reprisal against any potential adversary. Considering the way in which U.S. technical prowess on the battlefield has grown significantly since the first Gulf War, this policy is not too surprising.

It is ultimately cheaper for the Chinese to come up with relatively simple, but disruptive technical solutions to counter the sophistication of the U.S. capabilities. If their intent was truly hostile, they wouldn't have wasted the element of surprise by targeting an old weather satellite in a controlled test. It wouldn't have been much harder for the Second Artillery Corp to target one of our keyhole satellites as it flew over Asia.

Since the fallout from this month's test hasn't exploded into a major political crisis (so far), the Chinese may use it as formula for future capability demonstrations. It has definitely raised fewer public suspicions of Chinese intentions than the Titan Rain hack attacks did back in 2003. This is definitely an issue tech-junkies and China-watchers will have to keep on their eyes on in over the next few years.

More on the Chinese ASAT test

Now that us weapons nerds have had some time to sleep on yesterday's revelation, we're starting to things in context. Surprisingly, Defensetech plays up the importance of the ASAT test some while MSNBC's Jim Oberg downplays it. Since I had to write a one-pager about the issue to my boss, I will throw my assessment out to the public:

The test itself was pretty controlled:

1) The satellite's flight path was predictable

2) It passed very close to the launch site

3) The target was emitting a trackable signal

4) Modifications were made to the satellite's flight path to line it up with the kill vehicle launcher

As space interceptions go, the Chinese had a pretty good handicap on this test. It is unlikely that this success will translate into any sort of immediately fieldable capability. If the spotty record of our ground-based missile interceptors demonstrate anything, it is the difficulty of intercepting even predictable space targets. Although last week's success was impressive, we should hold off judgement until the Chinese can produced multiple, sequential successes.

I would also dispute Defensetech's characterization of this test as next-gen. In fact, I would categorize it as distinctly last-gen. The last time the U.S. looked into ground-based interceptors was back during Nike Zeus development in the early 1960s. Ground-based missiles are problematic for ASAT purposes because of their limited firing envelope.

Couple that with the detrimental effects the large amount of debris generated by kinetic energy interceptions have on communications and you can see why we went after options like the fighter-based ASM-135 missile. The ASM-135 would not only have been deployable anywhere a U.S. aircraft carrier was present, it would also ensure that the space debris would be someone else's problem.

Ironically, the success of this tech time warp presents two important facts:

1) There is truth to claims from the intelligence community that the Chinese have significantly improved the circular-error probable of their ballistic missile guidance systems. I have no idea what the Chinese used in this test, but my guess is that they supplemented the missile's normal guidance package with a radiation seeker. Even if this true, the performance of the DF-21 or DF-3 guidance package must have been improved significantly to get the kill vehicle close enough for a homing mechanism to work.

2) This is a continuation of recent trends in the innovative application of older weapons technology for new disruptive purposes. The Chinese will undoubted benefit from both the capability itself and the fact that the United States will divert R&D resources to ASAT countermeasures from other R&D programs. In essence, this situation has the potential of becoming the next big Katyusha rocket or IED challenge.

I don't mean to wander too far away from the ASAT issue, but doesn't this raise even bigger questions about U.S. transformation efforts than it does about Chinese capabilities? Questions such as, is the Air Force's Transformational Satellite Communications System really transformational if it can be crippled by such a last-gen threat?

Update: I fixed my grammar a little. As you may imagine, science and tech officesin the Pentagon, including mine, have been burning the midnight oil over the last 36 hours.

Chinese ASAT test: Minimum means of reprisal

Don't bother talking to a weapons geek or seasoned China watcher for the next 12 hours or so because chances are they are scouring the web for details about China's successful anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon test. Despite having a class at GWU tonight, I have been picking around the Internet for every bit of detail I can find.

According to the Washington Post's article on the subject, the National Security Council mentioned the kill vehicle was likely a medium-range ballistic missile:

[Gordon] Johndroe of the NSC said that the Chinese satellite was destroyed using a ground-based medium-range ballistic missile, which slammed into the object 537 miles above earth on Jan. 11.

If the kill vehicle travelled about 537 miles up from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center (overheads of the site are blotted out on Google Maps, lol) and 4 degrees west (about 250 miles at 28.2 degrees North latitude), its flight path to intercept was roughly 600 miles. I may have only taken "Great Ideas in Physics" (read: physics for poli sci majors) back in undergrad, but by my math, the kill vehicle must have had a surface-to-surface range of well over 1000mi. With a little bit of data and Tsiokolsky's rocket equation, it would be easy to estimate its actual kill vehicle.

If the Chinese used one of their ballistic missiles as a kill vehicle as the NSC suggests, they must have used a DF-21/CSS-5 or a DF-3A/CSS-2. If this is true, it raises an interesting question about the future of the Chinese ballistic missile arsenal. The PRC is currently rocking about 40 DF-3s and 50 DF-21s, so they will have to restart missile construction to keep up with the material demands of further testing.

The upshot here is that things are looking less like the Rumsfeldian translation of "shashou jiang" (assassin's mace) and more like its conventional translation (trump card). As Dr. Jeffrey would say, this test is a demonstration of how Chinese defense policy seeks the minimum means of reprisal against the U.S. and not the doomsday fantasies of some in the Pentagon.