Chinese defence forum set to open amid roiling regional tensions

HONG KONG – China’s military leadership is expected to outline its aims for global security as it hosts its annual defence forum this week amid churning tensions in its own neighbourhood over Taiwan, the South China Sea and doubts about US commitments to Asia.

Defence Minister Dong Jun is expected to open the three-day Xiangshan Forum in Beijing on Sept 15 with a fresh pitch for closer international cooperation in a multipolar world, but is likely also to include coded attacks on the US and its allies, diplomats and analysts say.

Hundreds of military officers, diplomats and scholars from dozens of countries are expected to attend the forum, a tightly scripted Chinese rival to the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, which is widely seen as a more freewheeling affair.

Some Asian envoys and analysts say any overt Chinese criticism of the US and its Western allies could be tempered because of President Xi Jinping’s planned visit to Washington later in September to meet President Donald Trump.

Japan, however, could be an easier target given current tensions between Beijing and Tokyo.

“I anticipate the Chinese host will also be using the platform to harp on Japan’s wartime past and criticise Tokyo’s supposed ‘remilitarisation’,” said Singapore-based Chinese security scholar James Char.

Taiwan, whose military conducted military and civil defence drills in August to practise fighting a Chinese invasion, does not attend the forum or most major international events. Neither government recognises the other, and China views the democratically governed island as its own territory.

Dong’s speech on Sept 15 will follow recent statements from Xi calling for greater representation for Global South countries in international affairs.

At the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Kyrgyzstan earlier in September, Xi said: “The domination of international affairs by a few is an injustice left over from history, and global governance dictated by one, a few or a bloc of countries is not true multilateralism.”

Western nations generally send relatively low-level delegations to the forum, while some regional countries will send ministers as they try to juggle relations with China, a modern military power, and the US, the long-dominant East Asian defence ally.

The US delegation is expected to be headed by Cynthia Carras, the Pentagon’s principal director for China, Taiwan and Mongolia, a US official said.

Vietnam, China’s neighbour and rival in the disputed South China Sea, is sending Defence Minister Phan Van Giang, while Deputy Defence Minister Adly Zahari will represent Malaysia.

Doubts about both China and US

Doubts about US security commitments in Asia will create an opening for Beijing to argue that regional defence should be managed by Asian countries, but China’s assertive behaviour sharply limits its ability to capitalise on it, said Patricia Kim, an East Asia politics and security expert at the Washington-based Brookings Institution.

“Many Asian countries remain deeply sceptical of China because of its increasingly assertive behaviour in the region, particularly in the South China Sea,” she said.

As Xi’s corruption purges continue within China’s military, the forum is expected to give foreign delegations a chance to weigh their impact on the leadership.

The forum comes ahead of the ruling Communist Party’s congress in 2027, which will cement the new leadership of the Central Military Commission, the top commanding body of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA).

Currently, the commission has two out of seven seats filled – and one of those is Xi in his role as the ultimate head of the military.

“This will therefore be (a) good opportunity for foreign defence delegates at this year’s forum to meet with potential members of the next generation of PLA leaders,” said Char, of Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. REUTERS