The Military Lens: Doctrinal Difference and Deterrence Failure in Sino-American Relations (review)

In this respect international affairs are no different from other realms of human relations: issues must be seen not just from one’s own point of view, but from the point of view of the other side. This is certainly true as an analytical matter, and all the more so in seeking to persuade, deter, or compel.

The challenge is all the greater with different cultural and ideological settings; for example, China and the United States. When their interests diverge, political, economic, and strategic factors can significantly complicate their ability to resolve or at least reduce their differences. This is true for a wide range of issues, from exchange rate policy to Iran’s nuclear program. In the former, Western governments are well advised to understand China’s domestic development and anti-inflationary imperatives against the backdrop of a century’s struggle for self-reliance; in the latter, they need to appreciate China’s extreme energy vulnerability and historic allergy to external interventions. In these two cases, many needed policies can prove to be in China’s interest as much as the West’s, but the wise course is to set their advocacy firmly in a Chinese rather than simply a Western context.

Christopher Twomey takes us back to 1950, when Sino-U.S. confrontation was at its height over Korea and Taiwan. Arguing that states view the world through the lens of their own military doctrine, he details how that lens at times “blurs the view, complicating statecraft, signaling, interpreting the adversary’s signals, and assessing the balance of power” (p. ix). His case studies are well chosen: the United States crosses the 38th parallel in Korea, China crosses the Yalu, and China postpones the invasion of Taiwan. For comparative reference, he then analyzes two cases in another region: the 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars.

Twomey draws an interesting contrast between Sino-U.S. interactions over Korea and over Taiwan. In the former, he points out how contrasting “theories of victory” spurred China to downplay the superiority of U.S. weapons and to discount U.S. threats of nuclear and strategic air attacks, and also led the United States to downplay Chinese manpower advantages and to discount Chinese threats of intervention if U.S. troops crossed the 38th parallel. In the latter, he describes similar “theories of victory” defined by naval confrontation in the Taiwan Strait, with no misperceptions or miscommunications and ultimately no war. In the Middle East cases, he contrasts the period from 1956 through the early 1970s, when similar Egyptian and Israeli war strategies minimized underestimates by either side, followed by substantial Egyptian changes to a surprise, limited-aims strategy for the Yom Kippur War.

Doctrinal differences—large and small—are a recurrent focus in Twomey’s analysis. Their importance is clearest in the context of conflict and interaction between military forces. Less persuasive, however, is the view that contrasting or similar military doctrines can determine the course of the confrontation as a whole. Without downplaying the significance of military doctrine, two other factors seem much more important: interests and capabilities. As Twomey acknowledges, Chinese leaders believed the security of their country was endangered by the United Nations Command’s advance to the Yalu; similarly, Chinese reunification has been a top priority. Whereas in Korea the Chinese were able to mobilize millions to restore the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, in Taiwan they lacked the necessary air and naval units to traverse the Strait and defeat Nationalist forces. Doctrinal differences or similarities had little to do with these fundamental facts.

Another complication is the difference between what might be termed “rhetorical” and operational policy. Where states are weak, their leaders may be inclined to overstate their capabilities and understate those of their enemy for the sake of greater deterrence. For example, Twomey contrasts U.S. deployments of nuclear-capable B-29 bombers to the West Pacific with the early...