PERHAPS THE MOST SERIOUS ARGUMENT the Clinton administration makes in favor of its “engagement” policy towards China is a strategic one: Beijing’s military capability requires it. We want to get China to stop selling strategic-weapons technology, and so we must offer Beijing some carrots — economic relationships with certain Chinese firms — to ensure a safer world. The policy sounds sensible. But it turns out that the carrots we offer are actually feeding firms that are responsible for the proliferation we want to end.
Indeed, the White House has not only held off penalizing these firms, as American law authorizes; it has actually rewarded them with U.S.-subsidized nuclear cooperation and sweetheart U.S. satellite transfers. The administration’s hope is that this will get China to buy American and behave. But if the last few years of such “engagement” are any guide, it’s not working. A brief look at just three of the Chinese firms benefiting from U.S. largesse tells the tale.
