658 { China’s Quest
on terrorism” that took US military forces first into Afghanistan (in October
2001) to overthrow the Taliban government that had sheltered al-Qaeda, and
then into Iraq (in March 2003) to oust Saddam Hussein’s government, which
Washington believed had colluded with terrorism. From Beijing’s perspec-
tive, US energy and attention were being directed away from China. With
luck, the Americans might not be able to extricate themselves from these new
West Asian quagmires for many years. In fact, US forces left Iraq in December
2011, and US combat forces are scheduled to leave Afghanistan by the end of- The shift in US strategic attention resulting from 9-11 eased American
pressure on China for perhaps a decade.^34
Jiang Zemin phoned President Bush before the end of the day on September
11 to convey China’s condolences and condemnation of that morning’s attacks.
Washington’s newly proclaimed “global war on terrorism” required Chinese
assistance in various ways. The United States sought UN authorization for
establishment of new international counterterrorism norms regarding move-
ment of airplanes, freight containers, ships, materials, significant people, and
money around the world. China, with its position on the Security Council and
its prominent role in international commerce, transportation, and finance,
could facilitate or obstruct those US efforts. Beijing opted to cooperate with
Washington. In the Security Council, for instance, on September 12 and 28,
China supported resolutions giving Washington UN authority for its response
to the 9-11 attacks. At a long-scheduled APEC summit meeting in Shanghai
in October, Washington wanted to set aside the originally scheduled agenda
and focus instead on building a consensus on antiterrorism. China, chair
of the summit, cooperated fully. President Bush reached a “consensus” with
Jiang Zemin on opposing terrorism and referred to “China and other Pacific
nations” as “important partners” in the antiterrorism effort.^35
One of China’s most important early forms of support for Washington’s
“global war on terrorism” was encouragement of Pakistan to cooperate with
the United States. Having decided on military intervention to oust the al-
Qaeda-harboring Taliban regime in Afghanistan, the United States needed
a forward territorial operational base to support that intervention. Pakistan
was geographically ideal for such a purpose; it had seaports and abutted
Afghanistan. But Pakistan-US relations were very poor. In 1990, virtually as
soon as the Soviets had withdrawn from Afghanistan, the United States had
broken with Pakistan over its nuclear weapons programs. From the Pakistani
perspective, the United States used Pakistan to support the anti-Soviet Afghan
jihad, and then abandoned it as soon as it was no longer needed. Indeed, the
United States began building a new cooperative relation with India in late - India was, of course, Pakistan’s nemesis. The Taliban in Afghanistan
also had close links to Pakistan; Islamabad had supported the Taliban take-
over of Afghanistan in 1994–1996 as a way of stabilizing its borders, becoming
a corridor for Central Asia oil and gas to reach global markets, and gaining