The PLA at Home and Abroad - Strategic Studies Institute - U.S. Army

y a sense of past wrongs, such as the disruption of
the flow of Blackhawk repair parts in 1989, or ongoing
military relations with Taiwan. U.S. proposals in this
area could be interpreted as signs of weakness requiring
more concessions from the United States, which
would sooner or later make contacts unsustainable for
the United States. Habitual imbalances in reciprocity
and transparency can be expected from the Chinese,
but these will be increasingly counterproductive for
the Chinese as its military capabilities grow. China
will have to act more like a responsible military power
or the lack of it will undermine the benign perception
of its intentions that it is trying to cultivate.
Multilateral contacts in logistics, however, provide
a more realistic venue for the two militaries for the
foreseeable future and can indirectly contribute to
incident avoidance between the two militaries. Consequently,
U.S. military efforts to cooperate with Chinese
in the area of military logistics should be limited
to practical requirements associated with U.S.-China
cooperation to support UN and other regional and
international missions, such as the Gulf of Aden antipiracy
mission. This type of effort offers the most
pragmatic area for some level of logistics cooperation
based on practical cooperation, rather than bilateral
military exchanges.
ENDNOTES - CHAPTER 11
1. “PLA Seminar on Speeding Up Reform of Modern Logistics,”
PLA Daily Online, November 4, 2008.
2. Daniel Hawthorne, For Want of a Nail: The Influence of Logistics
on War, New York: Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill, 1948, p.
xii.
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