China and US stage a delicate rebalancing act It has almost become a ritual. Every year in early June, a Chinese general sits down on stage at the Shangri-La Hotel in Singapore and tells a ballroom packed with defence ministers and military brass from all over the world that China aspires to peace and will not pose a threat to anyone. When he has finished speaking, one member of the audience after another challenges Beijing's sincerity. It was no different on Sunday, when Lieutenant General Qi Jianguo, deputy chief of general staff of the People's Liberation Army, addressed the Shangri-La Dialogue, an annual high-level defence conference. "China will unswervingly pursue the road of peaceful development, and remain dedicated to promoting development that is peaceful, open, co-operative and win-win," he said, in remarks closely echoing those of his predecessors in years past. And yet, his audience remained unconvinced. "The remarks were completely empty," said Arthur Ding, an expert on Chinese security issues at National Chengchi University in Taiwan. William Choong, a senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, the conference's organiser, noted that China's peaceful development had caused deep concern in the Philippines, pushed Japan to seek closer military co-operation with the US and led Vietnam to start co-operating with its former war adversary as well. Following two decades of nearly unbroken double-digit growth in its defence spending, China has firmly arrived as a regional military power, and is seen by most of its neighbours as aspiring to more. The People's Liberation Army Navy has rapidly expanded the scale and scope of its activities, and its vessels are now operating as far from its coast as the US's exclusive economic zone, a 200-nautical-mile zone off the coast of US territory. The main problem for other countries in the region is that this increased muscle has come in step with increasing friction in territorial disputes. Over the past year, China and the Philippines have been in almost nonstop tussles over uninhabited bits of sand and rock in the resource-rich and strategically located South China Sea, which Beijing claims almost in its entirety and which Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei have partial claims to. China's relations with Japan have also been rocked by an increasingly bitter dispute over a group of islets in the East China Sea. Beijing seized on Tokyo's nationalisation of some of the islands as a provocation and reacted by challenging Japan's administrative control of the islands with frequent patrols by civilian and naval vessels and aircraft. Similarly, Beijing's territorial disputes with India and Vietnam have also been flaring up. In spite of the peace rhetoric, Lt Gen Qi made it clear that Beijing was unlikely to soften its line on this front. Our emphasis on dialogue and consultation for the sake of peace by no means denotes unconditional compromise. Our resolve and commitment to safeguarding core national interests always stands steadfast," he said. In response, China's neighbours have been turning to the US, the incumbent naval and air power in the region and the rest of the world. While Washington is reassuring them through its strategy of "rebalancing" to Asia after years of preoccupation with conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is also struggling to convey to China the message that it does not intend to block its rise. At the weekend, Chuck Hagel, US secretary of defence, called for India to play a growing role as a regional power and held trilateral meetings with allies Japan and South Korea, as well as Japan and Australia. He also consulted with his Philippine counterpart about a "growing rotational presence" of US forces in the Philippines, a plan US officials insist does not stand for establishing a US base but most military experts outside the US government understand to mean just that under a different name. Beijing is concerned. And how can you balance [...] the two different objectives - to assure allies, and to build a positive relationship with China? That remains an open question. Washington hopes that closer military-to-military dialogue can increase transparency and trust. Admiral Samuel Locklear, commander of US forces in the Pacific, said that dialogue was improving as exchanges are becoming both more frequent and more thorough and frank. Chinese military sources agree with his assessment. Beyond that, US military officials think that only growing confidence will help integrate China into a more stable international military community. The first step may be coming, with Beijing revealing that its navy is now sending ships into waters close to US territory - something it has long objected to when practised by the US. "It is difficult for us - China is always a target at such international conferences," said a Chinese military official. But we can only talk more and play along.