The United States and China in Power Transition - Strategic Studies ...

Japan is equally firm on this dispute. After all, Japan
has had effective control of those islands for almost
40 years now. (If China and Japan were to submit this
dispute to the international court, Japan would have
an advantage simply because of its effective control
of the disputed territory.) In October 2010, Secretary
of State Clinton made clear that the U.S.-Japan mutual
defense treaty is applicable to those islands. If China
were to use force to settle the issue, the United States
would come to Japan’s defense. China is certainly not
happy with this U.S. intervention. Yet it has to take
this into account. For the United States, since it has
insisted that this dispute be settled in a peaceful way,
the United States should stand firm on this position
and prevent a war between China and Japan so that
the United States does not have to fight either.
On the Tibet and Xinjiang Issues. China’s concern
with the U.S. factor in the problems of these two regions
is understandable. However, China should pay
more attention to its own policies and conduct in these
two regions, for unlike the disputed territories in the
Western Pacific, namely Taiwan and the islands in the
East and South China Seas, China has effective control
over Tibet and Xinjiang. If China does it right, it can
keep the Tibetans and Uyghurs happy in the Chinese
union. There is little the United States would do to
undermine China’s efforts. After all, the United States
has time and again stated that it does not challenge
China’s sovereignty over these two regions. Its concern
is mostly about human rights violations.
It is good that China has the Developing the Western
Region program going. It is fair to expect economic
development to improve the overall situation
in Tibet and Xinjiang. However, as the noted Chinese
dissident observer of Tibet and Xinjiang affairs Wang
Lixiong (王力雄) points out, economic development is
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