Lacking an official explanation from the Chinese government, analysts are forced to divine Beijing’s motives. China’s actions do not appear to be aimed at coercing the United States to negotiate a space weapons treaty. If this were the case, it would seem that the Foreign Ministry would have issued a statement immediately following the test’s revelation. In fact, despite private consultations in Washington and Beijing prior to the U.S. announcement, the Foreign Ministry initially appeared ignorant of the matter. In contrast, when China detonated its first nuclear weapon in October 1964, its official statement read: "The Chinese Government hereby solemnly proposes to the governments of the world that a summit conference of all the countries of the world be convened to discuss the questions of the complete prohibition and thorough destruction of nuclear weapons, and that as the first step, the summit conference conclude an agreement to the effect that the nuclear powers and those countries which may soon become nuclear powers undertake not to use nuclear weapons either against non-nuclear countries and nuclear-free zones or against each other".

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Pollpeter, Kevin L. "Motives and Implications Behind China's ASAT Test." . January 25, 2007.

 

China’s ASAT test raises unsettling questions about China’s commitment to arms control, the ramifications of its rise as a major power, its military posture and foreign policy toward the United States and Chinese civil-military relations. Its secretive nature and hesitancy to admit to the test raises questions regarding whether China was ever serious about banning space weapons and whether it was actually engaging in “lawfare”—a strategy aimed at ensnaring the United States in legal commitments to which China never had the intention of abiding. Moreover, its official statements regarding the test only seem to add confusion to China’s stance on space weaponization. A Foreign Ministry spokesman stated that China “opposes weaponization and an arms race in outer space. Our position has not changed” (The Washington Post, January 23). Such actions also raise suspicions about China’s adherence to other arms control measures, such as its adherence to a similarly principled moratorium on nuclear testing.

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Pollpeter, Kevin L. "Motives and Implications Behind China's ASAT Test." . January 25, 2007.

 

Further, if the ASAT test was part of an effort to drive the United States into space-related negotiations with China, again it may backfire – at least in the near term. It is true that there has been a chorus of calls for the United States to now undertake efforts to ban ASATs, or at a minimum, ASATs that create debris. For example, Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., stated: "American satellites are the soft underbelly of our national security, and it is urgent that President Bush move to guarantee their protection by initiating an international agreement to ban the development, testing, and deployment of space weapons and anti-satellite systems." Industry weekly Space News also urged the Bush administration to change course and consider "whether new and verifiable accords – such as a ban on the testing of anti-satellite weapons in space," noting that it "only makes sense to ban an activity that increases debris that threatens the satellites of multiple countries." However, there are no signs that the administration intends to heed such advice. Rather, quite the opposite. ( More ... )

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Hitchens, Theresa. "U.S.-Sino Relations in Space: From "War of Words" to Cold War in Space." China Security. (Winter 2007): 12-30. [ 6 quotes ] [ page 22 ]

 

Second, implicit in this charge is also that the diplomatic effort was colluding with the military to pursue a space weapons program. Undermining years of China's reputation and hard work for dubious military gains fraught with high risk is utterly inconsistent with China's otherwise patient international diplomacy. Similarly, the test could not reasonably be a ploy – particularly by China's Foreign Ministry – to force the United States back to the negotiating table. Nations do not respond to threats by acquiescing, particularly when threatened by a weaker state. It would smack of appeasement, or worse, cowardly surrender, neither of which would be an option in any country's domestic political environment. There is no historical U.S. behavioral precedent that would lead China to believe the United States would respond constructively to such an egregious act. It is conceivable that the MFA acquiesced in light of the failure to sway the U.S. through diplomacy or, at worst, the MFA wasn't fully informed.

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Hagt, Eric. "China's ASAT Test: Strategic Response." China Security. (Winter 2007): 31-51. [ 5 quotes ] [ page 38 ]

 

Missile defenses also pose an obstacle to making diplomatic progress on ASAT weapons systems. The United States believes these defenses are critical to protecting itself from attacks by rogue states, but China fears they could also be used to deter it in any conflict with the United States, such as over Taiwan. In recent years, China, at first alone but later with Russia, has made several proposals to the United Nation's Conference on Disarmament on possible elements for a future treaty banning the weaponization of space. At times, the proposals have taken in all U.S. missile defenses, not merely U.S. consideration of deploying space-based interceptors. Beijing 's and Moscow 's June 2001 proposal, for example, required signatories not to "test, deploy or use in outer space any weapons, weapon systems, or their components." As part of the proposed treaty, a list of definitions was offered that included defining outer space as starting at an altitude of 100 kilometers and a weapon as any device or facility that could "strike, destroy or disrupt directly the normal functions of a target." These definitions are hardly controversial, but they would ban the United States from even testing its current defense shield, which is supposed to strike and destroy an incoming warhead at altitudes far higher than 100 kilometers.

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Forden, Geoffrey. "After China's Test: Time For a Limited Ban on Anti-Satellite Weapons." Arms Control Today. Vol. 37, No. 3 (April 2007). [ 7 quotes ]

 

Deterring the use of ASAT weapons also poses difficult challenges. China experts noted that China does not share the U.S.-Soviet experience with arms control, deterrence, mutual satellite reconnaissance, or dealing with incidents at sea. The U.S. military has internalized these norms into its doctrine and operations, but China does not necessarily accept or share them. While U.S. thinking about deterrence has traditionally focused on deterring conventional and nuclear aggression, deterrence might work differently in the space and cyber domains. The different context may complicate attribution and require rethinking thresholds for response.

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Lutes, Charles D. and Phillip C. Saunders. China's ASAT Test: Motivations and Implications. Washington, D.C.: Institute for National Strategic Studies, National Defense University, June 2007. [ 10 quotes ] [ page 5 ]

 

Concerns about arms races in space should be taken seriously, but there is no arms-control solution. China is pursuing counterspace programs not in protest against the George W. Bush administration's space policies but as part of a considered strategy designed to counter the overall military capability of the United States. The weapons that China seeks to blunt are not space based; they are instead U.S. naval and air forces that operate in China's vicinity. What is in space are the sensory organs, which find and fix targets for these forces, and the nervous system, which connects all the combatant elements and permits them to operate cohesively. There is simply no feasible way to ban or control the use of space for such purposes. Beijing's diplomats, who repeatedly call for negotiations to assure the peaceful use of space, clearly understand this. And the Chinese military appreciates better than most that its best chance of countering the massive conventional superiority of the United States lies in being able to attack the relatively vulnerable eyes, ears, and voice of American power. Consequently, Beijing will continue to systematically pursue a variety of space-denial programs, even as it persists in issuing clarion calls for the demilitarization of space.

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Tellis, Ashley J. Punching the U.S. Military's "Soft Ribs": China's Anti-Satellite Weapon Test in Strategic Perspective. Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 2007. [ 15 quotes ] [ page 1-2 ]

 

The implications of this logic devastate the hopes of arms-control theorists who believe that Chinese counterspace investments are primarily bargaining chips aimed at creating a peaceful space regime. In fact, they are just the opposite; they represent China's best hope for prevailing against the superior conventional military power deployed by the United States. For China to give up its emerging counterspace capabilities -- whether through unilateral abnegation or a negotiated arrangement -- would be to condemn its armed forces to inevitable defeat in any encounter with American power. This would mean, among other things, to risk the "loss" of Taiwan with all its attendant consequences for the unity of China and the survival of its Communist leadership. It would be equally unthinkable for Chinese leaders to abandon their efforts to stave off American forward-operating forces in the western Pacific or to allow the Chinese nuclear deterrent to be neutralized by emerging U.S. strategic defenses. Because these goals -- which are relatively conservative from Beijing's point of view -- are so critical to China as a rising power, it cannot be expected to trade away its counterspace capabilities for any arms-control regime that would have the effect of further accentuating the military advantages enjoyed by its competitors. ( More ... )

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Tellis, Ashley J. Punching the U.S. Military's "Soft Ribs": China's Anti-Satellite Weapon Test in Strategic Perspective. Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 2007. [ 15 quotes ] [ page 3 ]

 

First, because Chinese counterspace investments are deeply rooted in strategic necessity and not capricious state choices, the suggestion that President Bush ought to move urgently to guarantee the protection of American space assets by initiating an international agreement to ban the development, testing, and deployment of space weapons ought to be approached cautiously by his administration. Although well intentioned, such recommendations are illusory because China—its rhetoric notwithstanding—will not conclude any space-control agreement that eliminates the best chance it may have of asymmetrically defeating U.S. military power and thereby protecting its interests.

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Tellis, Ashley J. Punching the U.S. Military's "Soft Ribs": China's Anti-Satellite Weapon Test in Strategic Perspective. Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 2007. [ 15 quotes ] [ page 6 ]

 

Beijing's attitude toward space arms control will change only when one or more of the following conditions are met:

• China acquires the capacity to defeat the United States despite America's privileged access to space.
• The investments in Chinese counterspace programs begin to yield diminishing returns because the United States consistently nullifies these capabilities through superior technology and operational practices.
• China's own strategic and economic dependence on space intensifies to the point where the threats posed by any American offensive counterspace programs exceed the benefits accruing to Beijing's own comparable efforts.

Because these conditions will not be realized any time soon, Washington should certainly discuss space security with Beijing but should not expect that its negotiating investments will yield any effective space-control agreements in the near-term.

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Tellis, Ashley J. Punching the U.S. Military's "Soft Ribs": China's Anti-Satellite Weapon Test in Strategic Perspective. Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 2007. [ 15 quotes ] [ page 6 ]