What China thinks of Trump's war with Iran

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0:23Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Frankly, the Chinese, I think, see the war serving a lot of their diplomatic interests, not the least of which is that China is just as happy to see the United States alienated from as many of its traditional allies as possible.

0:41Professor David Lampton:With the U.S. waging war against Iran, Chinese leaders might be taking advice from Napoleon, Never interrupt your enemy when he's making a mistake.

1:00Professor David Lampton:It's Wednesday, March 18th, and this is Here and Now, Anytime from NPR and WBUR. I'm Chris Bentley. Today on the show, a retired Army general says the U.S. is on the edge of a strategic disaster as it tries to force Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Also, can the mail survive losing its biggest customer? Amazon reportedly plans to cut packages sent by the U.S. Postal Service by at least two-thirds later this year. Before we get to that story, though, the decision by the U.S. and Israel to start bombing Iran more than two weeks ago has had ripple effects far beyond the Middle East. though it's hard to overstate just how much havoc it's wreaked in the region, with Israel simultaneously invading and bombarding Lebanon, and Iran retaliating with missile and drone strikes in at least nine countries.

1:56Professor David Lampton:American presidents have been promising to pivot to the Pacific, or otherwise avoid getting mired in the Middle East for decades, and yet here they go again. While war has not come to China directly, President Trump did ask to postpone his summit in Beijing with Chinese President Xi Jinping that had been scheduled for later this month. So we wanted to talk with someone who would know about what this war means for U.S.-China relations. And that person is David Lampton, former director of China Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. David Lampton told Scott Tong that China is watching this war closely.

2:37Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Yes, I think it's got the Chinese thinking about the coherence of American foreign policy. First and foremost, China has important interests with Iran, which it wants to safeguard. Certainly, the first thing is that Iran is China's number two source of imported oil. Saudi Arabia, incidentally, is number one. And then less thought of often is the fact that China is a major builder of infrastructure. There's a lot of rebuilding of infrastructure going on in Iran already, and there'll be a lot of infrastructure to be replaced, and China wants to be one of the builders of that infrastructure. Also, frankly, the Chinese, I think, see the war serving a lot of their diplomatic interests, not the least of which is that China is just as happy to see the United States alienated from as many of its traditional allies as possible.

3:42Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Also, they see fissures in the United States in its own domestic political system. So China has a lot of interests, economic, but strategic and diplomatic as well. Yeah.

3:55Professor David Lampton:Well, on the table right now is President Trump's request, perhaps demand that China and other countries step in to help the U.S. open the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has closed to most anchorships. Beijing has not said yes. Instead, it's been urging de-escalation. How big a standoff is this between these two superpowers?

4:17Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Actually, I don't think it's that much of a standoff in the sense that I don't think there's the slightest chance, basically, that China is going to transform itself from its hopeful role of being a mediator, which may not be too realistic. But it certainly wants to avoid becoming a combatant or caught in sort of the crossfire in the Strait of Hormuz. So this may not be the right moment for the two leaders to get together. Certainly, President Trump's putting a lot of emphasis on cooperation, as he calls it, for various countries to help secure the Hormuz Strait. And I think, were they to meet in the president's current frame of mind, emphasizing what he calls cooperation, with the Chinese not being, I would guess, willing to become any more involved, this may not be the best time to get together.

5:11Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Maybe the better part of wisdom is not to force things. I'd also say is even before the current, we'll call it flare up in the Persian Gulf, the Chinese were a little worried that the United States seemed preoccupied and unable to kind of fix on an agenda for the meeting. Frankly, the Chinese are probably gobsmacked that the U.S. is asking them to play a role in the Straits, particularly just for one thing that would occur to the Chinese is the U.S. is making their life difficult in terms of using the Panama Canal and port facilities there. And the United States is impeding their role in the Panama Canal at the same time we're asking for their help.

6:00Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:So I think that would create some dissonance in China. Yeah.

6:04Professor David Lampton:Well, as far as this scheduled trip by President Trump to Beijing. The U.S. is pushing to delay it. It would be the first visit by an American president to China in almost a decade. Whenever it does happen, how important is this meeting to China, to the U.S.?

6:22Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Well, in fact, my statement that I think I at this moment would recommend them postponing it is precisely because I think it's so important that this be successful. You mentioned the first meeting in many years. That's important. But the fact of the matter is the United States and China are involved in an arms race, a technological race, and we've got to work, whether we like it or not, and that the we is both of us, to develop some common rules of the road. Proliferation in Asia is going to become an increasing problem. China's increasing its nuclear warheads and its delivery vehicles. And as China does that, Japan's going to respond.

7:08Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:And as Japan responds, then Korea will respond. And then, of course, there's India and China. Then there's India, China, and Pakistan. So we have such a rich and important agenda on arms control and trying to get a handle on arms limitation that we really need to focus on that and not be distracted by a lot of other things. Also, the whole tariff mess needs to be straightened out.

7:37Professor David Lampton:And stepping back just for a moment, you've been observing these two countries for a long time, writing about them, analyzing them. How do you think about where the U.S.-China relationship is right now?

7:49Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Well, I think a good example, if you look back about two plus decades, We had 9-11. You may remember George W. Bush said, you are either with us or against us. Practically, the first major power call President Bush got after 9-11 was from Jiang Zemin, the then president of China. And he basically said to Bush, our answer is, we are with you. We have gone from this we are with you to we are each other's biggest strategic competitor. We had a policy of reassuring each other, China, that it would be respectful of our security interests and to some extent economic interests. And we tried to reassure China that we wouldn't move too far away from a one China policy and tried to reassure China we stood for the development and prosperity of China.

8:51Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:And now we are in a policy of deterrence. That is to say, we each see each other as the biggest threat. You could hardly define a more different situation that's evolved over the last two decades.

9:06Professor David Lampton:David Lampton is Professor Emeritus, former head of China Studies, at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Professor, thanks so much. Good to be with you.

9:19Professor David Lampton:Coming up next, Scott gets another point of view on the war from a retired Army general. Stick around.

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10:06Professor David Lampton:Today, the Trump administration faces more questions on why it attacked Iran and the intelligence behind it. Senators today are questioning Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence. Just one day after a top official under Gabbard resigned, that official Joe Kent said Iran posed, quote, no imminent threat to the United States. Retired General Barry McCaffrey joins us now. General, welcome back.

10:29Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Good evening.

10:30Professor David Lampton:Let me ask you about Joe Kent. He ran the National Counterterrorism Center until he resigned. That's inside the intelligence community. The White House spokesperson cites strong and compelling evidence that Iran was going to attack the United States. Yet Kent, in his resignation letter, said Iran posed no imminent threat to the U.S. What does this tell you about the intelligence justification for this war?

10:53Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:It's non-existent. It's farceal. It's obvious that the Iranians would have been mad to attack the United States from a position of tremendous weakness following the 12-day war 10 months ago. They were involved in negotiations. They thought they were possibly going to get through this without an attack. So it's made up after the fact. And by the way, there is an argument for using military power to degrade or eliminate Iran's nuclear capability. But the only way you actually get at that is to return arms control inspectors to the ground, not through air warfare.

11:37Professor David Lampton:Well, at this point in the war, Iran has responded by blocking the Strait of Hormuz, critical waterway, of course, for crude oil and natural gas. Let me play a clip from today's hearing. This is Democratic Senator Mark Warner questioning Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence.

11:53Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:The president continues to say as well that, you know, he had no idea, was shocked that the Iranians had moved to take over the Strait of Hormuz.

12:02Professor David Lampton:Did you provide any intelligence that would say that it would be that it was not likely that the Iranians would try to move on the Strait?

12:10Joe Kent:I'm not aware of those remarks, and I think those of us here at the table can point to the fact that historically the Iranians have always threatened to leverage their control. Why would the president say he was amazed? I'm not aware of those remarks. What about the—

12:26Professor David Lampton:What are—Barry McCarthy, what are you hearing there?

12:31Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:The thing, again, there is no national security process. We need to understand that. The National Security Council, under all preceding presidents, essentially takes 30, 60, 90 days debate, argument, policy options. What we're dealing with in Trump is policy by whim, actions by decree. So, I mean, the whole notion of attacking Iran without coalition allies in the Gulf or in Europe, never mind Japan and South Korea and Australia, who are influenced by this action, without taking into account the likely option that they would close the straits is simply astonishing. And there's going to be a strategic advantage to the Iranians, who have suffered a tactical disaster through these Israeli and U.S.

13:26Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:airstrikes.

13:27Professor David Lampton:Well, in general, we read all the time that the U.S. military, the career professionals, they do these war games, they do these tabletop exercises to play out scenarios. Is it conceivable the Trump administration did not anticipate this?

13:43Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:I think they didn't anticipate anything. They had a series of, apparently the chairman of JCS, who I remind our listeners, has no command authority, no uniformed service chiefs. It's in the hands of the Secretary of Defense, Hegseth, and the President of the United States. But they proceed on these things basically without any analysis on how they're going to deal with it. And you could, you know, try and control a Straits of Hormuz by putting ashore one, two, three U.S. Army divisions, get a sanitary zone of 100 kilometers deep and stay there for the rest of your life, none of which sounds like a very good military option.

14:25Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:So he just ignored this as a problem. By the way, I think both sides now are in desperation, both Trump and the Iranians. It's possible we'll see serious talks. The Iranians are a basket case on the economy, despised by their own people. They may have murdered 30 ,000 plus during the uprisings. And Trump's in a strategic disaster.

14:54Professor David Lampton:Yeah, well, finally, General, you have said Iran has other tools at its disposal, including terrorism and cyber warfare. What do you worry about?

15:05Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Well, I think the cyber warfare can't bring down the industrial might of America, but it's going to be a huge problem. It'll be continuing. They've used it in the past quite successfully. They're very clever, capable people. I think that terrorism is less likely to be sleeper cells being activated in a major U.S. city then at some point if they're in such trouble now they'll start lashing out at u.s presence in embassies military bases globally we've already seen some domestic self-radicalized attacks but it's a concern and a concern even more so because federal law enforcement has been bullied in the submission they've fired some of their most experienced people and many of the rest of them have been chasing immigrants rather than protecting the United States from terror attacks.

16:01Professor David Lampton:All right, retired General Barry McCaffrey, thank you once again.

16:04Retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey:Good ability.

16:14Professor David Lampton:One more story for you on today's show. Coming up, we give the war a rest for a few minutes to find out why the Postal Service might run out of money later this year. Indira Lakshmanan has that in just a minute.

16:55Professor David Lampton:Send off your Babbel subscription right now at babbel.com slash NPR, spelled B-A-B-B-E-L dot com slash NPR. Rules and restrictions may apply. The U.S.