HONG KONG -- Former U.S. defense secretary William Perry warned Monday that growing anti-China rhetoric in Washington posed one of the greatest risks to security in the Asia Pacific.
Perry said during a visit to Hong Kong that the Sino-U.S. relationship was at its most worrisome point in many years."I cannot point to a time in recent history when I was more concerned about the U.S.-China relationship based on what is going on in Washington today," Perry told the Asia Society.
"Above all I would like to see a moderation of the rhetoric that persists in referring to China as an enemy," he added.
"If we treat China as an enemy, it will surely become one."
Opposition to the U.S. policy of China engagement seems to be growing and could yet gain ascendancy, destroying a pillar of Asian stability and security over the past two decades, he said.
"One consequence of this stabilizing influence is that the region has not yet had a major arms race that allows a larger share of the resources in the region to be used for economic development," Perry added.
If the other U.S. pillars of stability fell -- heavy troop deployment in the region and security pacts with Japan, South Korea and Australia -- an arms race would overtake Asia, he said.
Taiwan, the most volatile flashpoint in Asia, has become more dangerous after U.S. allegations of Chinese nuclear espionage and signs of a Chinese buildup of missiles aimed at Taiwan, he added.
"All this acrimonious debate is complicated by the fact our engagement policy is an inextricable mixture of economic policy and security policy," Perry said.
Defending engagement as the best long-term approach to China, he said a robust trading relationship should not encompass the export of U.S. military technology or so-called "dual use" technology with the potential for military application.
He also stressed that a missile-defense system being developed by the United States -- another strain on Sino-U.S. ties -- had a relatively small "footprint."
"It is misleading to think of a theaterwide defense system in a theater as large as this one (Asia)," he said.