Update: Angry Chinese Blogger covers the anti-satellite issue.

Original post: It is no secret that China poses a challenge to American hegemony in East Asia, and for Korea watchers it has been painfully apparent that China is best positioned to at least attempt to force North Korea to denuclearize - as its largest trade partner and the almost sole supplier of fuel - but while China feigns at pressuring the DPRK, in reality the status quo is preferred, albeit with a less belligerent North Korea.

In March three things happened to raise the profile of the threat China poses to American power, meaning a wider audience is finally coming to the realization that a rising China will pose more serious problems (excerpts below):

• Joel Brenner, head of the Office of National Counterintelligence Executive (NCIX), stated that, “China’s intelligence services are the most active in the world in spying on the United States.”
• USMC General James Cartwright, Commander of USSTATCOM, testified before the Senate Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee concerning the “impressive” array of space weapons – including space based nuclear weapons – China is developing specifically to target and cripple U.S. communications.
• The Bush administration, finally, imposed tariffs on some illegally subsidized Chinese exports in what has been described as a, “major escalation of trade pressure on China.”

While I harbor no illusions that any of this was orchestrated with the notion of pressuring China to exercise its influence on North Korea to a much greater extent, that is indeed one of the potential arenas that the current direction may take us.

The threat posed by China’s intelligence services targeting America:

China’s intelligence services are the most active in the world in spying on the United States and are aggressively targeting advanced technology. . . Joel Brenner, the new head of the Office of National Counterintelligence Executive, told the Washington Times that the intelligence services of Cuba, Russia and Iran are next in line.

[. . .]

“The technology bleed to China, among others, is a very serious problem,” he was quoted as saying, adding that the FBI is improving its efforts to identify and protect sensitive technology.

[. . .]

Brenner said he also is pushing for greater use of counter-intelligence techniques to target terrorist groups, and to devised ways to stop computer espionage.

[. . .]

Russia’s intelligence service remains “very aggressive” against the United States, and “the Iranians also have a mature and capable service,” he said. All “are running significant operations against us,” the Times quoted him as saying. (emphasis added)

The threat to U.S. communications infrastructure from China’s array of space weapons:

China is developing an “impressive” array of space weapons, including missiles and jammers, and is moving toward placing nuclear weapons in space to attack U.S. satellites, the commander of U.S. strategic forces told the Senate yesterday.

The Chinese military has “undertaken what we would call a very disciplined and comprehensive continuum of capability against … our space capabilities,” Marine Corps Gen. James Cartwright yesterday told the Senate Armed Services strategic forces subcommittee.

Their capabilities go “all the way from temporary and reversible effects — [Global Positioning System] jamming, things like that, [communications] jamming, all the way through direct ascent ASAT,” he said, referring to anti-satellite weapons. “Eventually, they’ll probably be looking at co-orbital” weapons — missiles that orbit near a satellite and then explode.

[. . .]

Additionally, China already has deployed weapons at the lower end of the anti-satellite scale — weapons that jam or disrupt satellites.

In his testimony, Gen. Cartwright questioned whether the Chinese space-arms program should lead the United States to develop similar weapons.

“We have the technical capability,” he said. “My belief right now is knowing what we believe we know about this threat after the demonstrations that it is premature to start thinking about an arms race in space. …We do not have to have a space response to that threat.”

[. . .]

Gen. Cartwright’s comments yesterday contrast with his remarks in October, when he said reports China had fired a laser at a U.S. satellite in an apparent ASAT test were “uncertain.” Gen. Cartwright, who is in charge of U.S. nuclear-warfighting forces, also suggested the United States might choose to use nuclear missiles to stop a country such as China from using missiles fired from hard-to-reach interior bases to destroy U.S. satellites.

“If there are many targets that are out of the reach of our bombers, conventional forces … in large countries, the question would be, as an example, how many satellites would we be willing to lose before we went to a nuclear alternative, because the only thing we have to reach those targets is nuclear,” he said. (emphasis added)

The Bush administration’s trade tariffs on China, and why China’s illegal subsidies are damaging to the American economy:

The Bush administration, in a major escalation of trade pressure on China, said Friday that it would reverse more than 20 years of American policy and impose potentially steep tariffs on Chinese manufactured goods on the ground that China is illegally subsidizing some of its exports.

[. . .]

[The] announcement has the immediate effect of imposing duties on two Chinese makers of high-gloss paper, one at 10.9 percent and the other 20.4 percent, calculated by adding up the supposedly illegal subsidies.

But trade and industry officials say future actions based on the department’s new policy could lead to duties on imports of Chinese steel, plastics, machinery, textiles and many other products sold in the United States, if as expected those industries seek relief and the department finds that they are harmed by illegal subsidies.

[. . .]

“This is simply an application of our law,” [Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez] declared. “The message that we have been sending all along to all of our trading partners is that we want fair trade and that we will use every tool at our disposal to guarantee that our workers and our companies have a level playing field.”

[. . .]

Some lawmakers also complain bitterly that China unfairly ties its currency to the dollar, which aggravates the trade imbalance by making exports to America cheaper and imports to China more expensive. But American officials say there is no thought being given to citing currency policies as a form of subsidy that would bring about import duties.

[. . .]

Although the tariffs imposed by the decision today are effective immediately, the action is subject to review by the Commerce Department, and a formal decision is due in October. But the administration’s position is not expected to change unless it is ordered to do so by a court or by the World Trade Organization. (emphasis added)

The Chinese have, of course, disagreed that they illegally subsidize goods and have asked the U.S., “to reconsider the decision and reverse it as soon as possible.” China is expected to challenge the tariffs in both U.S. federal court and the World Trade Organization, although analysts do not expect China to reply by imposing like tariffs on American products.

China also maintains that its military buildup poses no threat to the U.S.

“We pursue a national defence policy (of) … increased military transparency.”

Of course you do. And as North Korea says, their nukes increase regional security.