Dragon Fire

Zhongnanhai, Beijing, China

President Tao Jian had risen to become the leader of the world’s largest one-party state on a reputation for incorruptibility and hawkish nationalism. Having gained the support of the economists and diplomats within the Party, he finally won over the military in March 1996 when the United States sent an aircraft carrier into the Straits of Taiwan during China’s missile tests. It was Tao, then a vice-minister, who suggested that the then President Jiang Zemin and Foreign Minister, Qian Qichen, be summoned for a dressing down. From the viewpoint of the Chinese military, if the Americans had the nerve to threaten China with an aircraft carrier, China had clearly shown herself to be too forgiving of Taiwan’s democracy and too soft in response to international pressure.

On the rare occasions when he had to meet an American official, Tao made it unequivocally clear, albeit as part of a joke, that if the United States attempted such a show of force again China would attack. His favourite parting remark, which he had mastered in English, was: ‘We may not be able to hit the Pentagon, but we can vaporize Hollywood.’ He became a key liaison figure in pushing through the new policy to down-size the army, modernize it and invest in missiles and a blue-water navy.

Like most Chinese leaders, Tao was a pupil of the works of Sun Tzu’s Art of War. But he had also been influenced by the Prussian officer Carl Philipp Gottlieb von Clausewitz, whose work Vom Kriege or On War advocated that war should be seen as an extension of political policy and not as an end in itself. Years ago, when Tao first read Clausewitz, he discussed it with translators and military experts to ensure that he understood the meaning. He then blended Clausewitz with Sun Tzu’s teaching that the supreme art of war was to subdue the enemy without fighting. ‘War is a matter of vital importance for the state,’ wrote Sun Tzu in 500 BC, arguing that the military was the instrument which delivered the coup de grace to an enemy previously made vulnerable. While Sun Tzu argued that ‘there has never been a protracted war from which a country has benefited’, Clausewitz insisted that ‘To introduce into the philosophy of war a principle of moderation would be an act of absurdity. War is an act of violence pushed to its utmost bounds.’

As Tao Jian contemplated his political objective with India, he thought about Hari Dixit. Dixit had offered to come to Beijing and had then cancelled without explanation. He had struck Pakistani positions across the LoC and emerged diplomatically unscathed.

The man might be a follower of neither Clausewitz nor Sun Tzu, but clearly he was a national leader of high brinkmanship and courage. The war about to be waged was not about Pakistan, but about India and China. Ultimately, it was the first skirmish in a fight for global leadership.