U.S. Relations With the People's Republic of China (2009)

U.S. Department of Defense
Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs)

News Transcript

Presenter: Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell
October 14, 2009

DoD News Briefing with Press Secretary Geoff Morrell from the Pentagon

Good afternoon. Sorry I'm late. Pleasure to see you all. I have a slightly longer-than-normal opening statement, then I'll be glad to take your questions.

On Monday, October the 19th, Secretary Gates will travel to Hawaii, where he will participate in the Pacific Command change-of- command ceremony. Admiral Timothy Keating will relinquish his duties as commander of Pacific Command and will soon retire, after giving more than 40 years of service. At the ceremony, the secretary will pay tribute to Admiral Keating's accomplishments and the outstanding work of the men and women of PACOM. Admiral Robert Willard, who was most recently commander of Pacific Fleet, will assume the helm of our nation's oldest and largest combatant command.

The secretary will then travel to Tokyo for his first visit with the newly elected Japanese government. The secretary will have meetings with the prime minister, as well as the ministers of Defense and Foreign Affairs, during which they will discuss the security of the region and the ongoing transformation of the U.S.-Japan alliance.

He then visits Seoul, where he will co-chair the 41st, pardon me, annual Security Consultative Meeting with the minister of National Defense for the Republic of Korea. In the wake of North Korea's recent missile launches, the secretary will reinforce America's commitment to the alliance and South Korea's defense.

On Thursday, Secretary Gates will travel to Bratislava, Slovakia, for a NATO defense ministerial that will likely focus primarily on the alliance's mission in Afghanistan. He will remain there through Friday and return to the United States that evening.

On Monday of the following week, October the 26th, the secretary welcomes General Xu, the vice chairman of the People's Liberation Army Central Military Commission to Washington. General Xu is China's second-highest ranking uniformed officer and is scheduled to be in the United States between October 24 and October the 31st. There are a number of high-level meetings scheduled with General Xu and other senior U.S. officials, including a dinner hosted by Secretary Gates.

Since the secretary's visit to China approximately two years ago, he has been committed to fostering a better and deeper strategic dialogue with that country, especially a better trust and transparency between our two militaries. Towards that end, General Xu will visit a number of U.S. military installations and organizations around the country, including the United States Naval Academy, Fort Benning, Strategic Command, Nellis Air Force Base, the North Island Naval Air Station in San Diego, and finally, Pacific Command.

And with those scheduling matters now complete, I'll be happy to take your questions.

Anne

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Q: Yeah, can you give a little bit more on General Xu? I mean, what's the -- what's the reason for this visit, and what do you hope to get out of it? And can you talk about -- a little bit about the concerns about some of the military programs that the Chinese have put in place, and whether that's going to be discussed during the visit?

MR. MORRELL: What is it with multiple questions along the -- in the front row today? I'll be here for as long as you like. Let's take them one at a time.

What is it more with General Xu's visit? Listen, it's been two years since the secretary visited China, and we have yet to have a reciprocal visit from what would essentially be his Chinese counterpart.

We are finally getting that with the arrival of General Xu later this month, and we are very much looking forward to that.

Because the secretary, as he stated then on that trip, really believes there is huge value in fostering better military-to-military relations between our two countries, in working towards better transparency and a more open dialogue between our military leaders so that we both understand what we are doing with the billions and billions and billions of dollars that we spend on defense. So the better -- the more transparency there is, the more dialogue that goes on, the less chance there is for a misunderstanding between two very formidable powers on the world stage.

And so General Xu's visit is significant in that we are finally getting a very high-level reciprocal visit from the military establishment, and we will show him a great deal of how our military operates in this country. He's going to visit installations representing all four of the services, be they academic or operational. And I think this is done with the hope that he will come away with a better understanding of how we operate and how this kind of transparency can ultimately help our relations in the long term.

I mean, I think you heard from President Obama earlier this year, when he spoke of the U.S.-China relationship, express that the one area in which we particularly need to improve is on the military-to- military relationship. The secretary couldn't agree with him more and has been pushing for quite some time to have this kind of visit and to continue the kind of dialogue that he first suggested back in our visit to Beijing a couple of years ago.

I mean, he noted -- for those of you on the trip then, you'll recall he noted that, in his experience in dealing with the Soviets during the Cold War, that the strategic dialogue that took place between those two countries went a -- you know, it can be debated about whether or not they ultimately impacted the level of strategic weapons that we had, but they certainly did enable us to better understand each other and avoid any misunderstandings that could have been problematic.

Okay? Yeah, Barbara.

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