In the decades leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. military had a War Plan, code-named Orange for dealing with an aggressive Japan in the Pacific. Admirals and generals of the Joint Army and Navy Board war-gamed the best way to defeat the Empire of Japan all through the 1920s and 1930s.
Imperial Japanese Air Force roundel Credit: Wikipedia
But former Navy Secretary John Lehman worries that history could repeat itself if U.S. war colleges continually plan table top war games with China as the adversary.
Lehman, who ran the Navy Department in the Reagan administration, says military planners developed and constantly upgraded War Plan Orange against Japan to the point, he says, where they “viewed Japan as, inevitably, a major threat.” Japan knew about Orange and planned its own U.S. war strategy.
If you've seen "Tora, Tora, Tora," "In Harm's Way" -- or even "Pearl Harbor" -- you know what eventually happened in late 1941.
Today, China is often cited by analysts as a potential near peer competitor but Lehman says “there is no political or ideological reason why China should be our enemy. None.”
PLA Air Force roundel. Credit: Wikipedia
Speaking recently at a Hudson Institute forum on the future of the Navy, Lehman noted that Chinese officials have told him that if U.S. shifts in deployment leave a vacuum in the Pacific, they intend to fill it.
“I don’t worry about China but it is a relationship that can be mismanaged into a war,” warns Lehman.
I am naturally skeptical of China's military intentions. That we need to engage China, who may very well be a a natural ally is the long run, is on course a given.
Training against a perceived enemy is only natural, but when you start thinking of something as a threat, it's easy to become paranoid and stop considering diplomatic options too soon. China has a more rational, less malevolent government than many give it credit for. They are going to favor a diplomatic solution over Taiwan (they're already getting there) because it's in their best interest, too.
I believe he meant if we onlyy see China as an adversary -- which it isn't right now -- it will shape military thinking for years to come.
He also said that Chinese Navy (I know, I know it's really the People's Liberation Army Navy) officials wondered why the U.S. was pulling back from areas in the Pacific where they had been for decades. That's when they told him "if you leave a vacuum, we'll fill it."
I don't think that was so much an example of expansionist rhetoric as it was a tightly-governed (and tightly wrapped) society saying "Hey we don't like all-skates. Wide open spaces breed uncertainty. Somebody's got to be in control and it might as well be us."
I think Lehmman was saying misinterpreting those words and actions could have dire consequences down thhe road.