Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel at a news conference in Beijing on Tuesday with the Chinese defense minister, Gen. Chang Wanquan.
BEIJING — The United States and China clashed over Japan on Tuesday, as the Chinese defense minister asserted that Beijing had “indisputable sovereignty” over a group of islands in the East China Sea and that his country’s military stood ready to protect its interests in territorial disputes.
The minister, Gen. Chang Wanquan, said that China would not be first to launch an attack over the territorial dispute. But he accused Japan of “confusing the right with the wrong” in its assertion of control over the disputed islands in the East China Sea, which are known as the Senkaku in Japan and as the Diaoyu in China.
“China has indisputable sovereignty over the Diaoyu Islands,” General Chang said. He added that on the issue of what he called “territorial sovereignty,” China would “make no compromise, no concession, no treaty.”
He continued, “The Chinese military can assemble as soon as summoned, fight any battle and win.”
General Chang made his comments at a news conference with the United States defense secretary, Chuck Hagel, after a morning of meetings at the Ministry of National Defense. It is Mr. Hagel’s first trip to China as defense secretary.
At one point, Mr. Hagel appeared impatient, wagging his finger. “The Philippines and Japan are longtime allies of the United States,” he said. “We have mutual self-defense treaties with each of those countries” he continued, adding that the United States was “fully committed to those treaty obligations.”
Mr. Hagel accused China of adding to tensions in the region by unilaterally declaring an air defense zone in the East China Sea with “no collaboration, no consultation.” Such moves, he warned, could “eventually get to dangerous conflict.”
The exchange punctuated a visit that American defense officials had sought to present as a long-awaited deepening of military relations between the two countries. On Monday, Mr. Hagel became the first foreign dignitary allowed on board a Chinese aircraft carrier, and on Tuesday the United States and China announced a series of modest steps toward improving communications.
But there appeared to be no closing of the gaps on more contentious issues.
Mr. Hagel, for instance, called on China to be more open about its cyberwarfare capabilities, which American officials have said Beijing uses for commercial espionage.
Mr. Hagel portrayed the United States as transparent about its own capabilities in telecommunications security, pointing to a recent briefing that the Defense Department gave to Chinese officials on the Pentagon’s doctrine for defending against cyberattacks.
“More transparency will strengthen China-U.S. relations,” Mr. Hagel said. “Greater openness about cyber reduces the risk that misunderstanding and misperception could lead to miscalculation.”
Beijing, American defense officials said, still has not responded to Mr. Hagel’s invitation to reciprocate with a briefing of its own.
General Chang stood impassively next to Mr. Hagel during his call Tuesday for more openness on cybersecurity. When it was his turn to talk, he said that “the defense activity of the People’s Liberation Army in cyberspace abides” by Chinese law. “It will not pose a threat to others,” he added.
The disagreement with China over digital security issues puts Mr. Hagel in the difficult position of arguing with Beijing over what is acceptable to spy on and what is not. American officials have maintained that a barrage of attacks that originated in China aimed to steal technology and other intellectual property from Silicon Valley and from military contractors and energy firms in the United States. Many of those attacks have been linked to cyberwarfare units of the People’s Liberation Army, acting on behalf of state-owned, or state-affiliated, Chinese companies.
But the United States has not always been transparent about cyberespionage, either. Last month The New York Times and the German magazine Der Spiegel reported that the United States had infiltrated the networks of Huawei, China’s networking and telecommunications giant. Additional disclosures about American spying were revealed in National Security Agency documents leaked by Edward J. Snowden, a former contractor at the agency.
After his meetings at the Defense Ministry, Mr. Hagel went to the National Defense University in Beijing to give a speech and hold a question-and-answer session with a group of about 120 Chinese military officers. Most of the questions from the audience centered on the Senkaku-Diaoyu dispute, as Chinese officers repeatedly complained that American policy in the region favored Japan.
Late last year, China set off a trans-Pacific uproar when it declared that an “air defense identification zone” gave it the right to identify and possibly take military action against aircraft near the islands. Japan refused to recognize China’s claim and the United States has since defied China by sending military planes into the zone, unannounced.
In February, Capt. James Fannell, the director of intelligence and information operations with the United States Pacific Fleet, said in San Diego that China was training its forces to be capable of carrying out a “short, sharp” war with Japan in the East China Sea.
“The United States takes no position on individual claims” in the island dispute, Mr. Hagel said. But he repeated that it had treaty obligations to defend Japan and the Philippines.
Overlapping Airspace Claims in the East China Sea
On Nov. 23, China declared the right to monitor and request identification from aircraft flying above much of the East China Sea. China’s newly claimed airspace overlaps with similar claims by Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. South Korea expanded its zone on Dec. 8 in response to China’s claim. Related Article »
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