Gates Considers Roots of Terrorism

U.S. Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates listens to the opening address of the IISS Asia Security Summit, Friday, June 1, 2007, in Singapore. The U.S. role in Asia-Pacific security and ties between regional superpowers China and India will dominate the annual security conference of defense ministers and top officials this weekend. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara) (Dita Alangkara - AP)

Although Gates spoke only briefly about China, Zhang delivered a detailed refutation of U.S. assertions that Beijing has been overly vague about the level and purposes of its defense spending and military modernization.

He said, for example, that of the $45 billion in this year's defense budget -- which the Pentagon last week said might actually be as high as $120 billion -- $20 billion is consumed by pay raises and other improvements in living conditions for Chinese troops. Millions more are being spent on new uniforms, he said.

The published Chinese defense budget is "true and authentic," he said, according to an English translation.

Zhang said Beijing remains committed to peaceful cooperation with other Asian and Pacific nations.

"China shall never fire the first shot," he said.

In his exchange with members of the audience _ primarily government officials and security experts _ Gates was asked how long U.S. intelligence agencies think it will take Iran to build a nuclear weapon.

"The general view of American intelligence is that they would be in a position to develop a nuclear device probably sometime in the period 2010-2011 or 2014 or 15," he said, adding that some think it could be as early as late next year.

"The reality is that because of the way Iran has conducted its affairs we really don't know, and it puts a higher premium, it seems to me, on the international community coming together in terms of strengthening sanctions on Iran so that they begin to face some serious trade-offs in terms of their economic well being and their economic future, for having nuclear weapons."

On Iraq, Gates spoke positively of the Bush administration's new troop buildup and counterinsurgency effort.

"The immediate goal is to create the breathing room necessary to allow reform and reconciliation to go forward _ steps that will give all of Iraq's communities, majority and minorities alike, a stake in that nation's future," he said.

"Whatever your views on how we got to this point in Iraq, it is clear that a failed state in that part of the world would destabilize the region and embolden violent extremists everywhere."