Still, it does not for a moment suggest that we are satisfied with the progress we have made on a range of key issues, about which we care deeply. Let me turn now to the topic at hand, namely how we see China and the People's Liberation Army as factors in the security environment of East Asia and how this affects our policy judgments. First, a few well-known but important facts. China is not only the most populous country in the world, with 1.2 billion people, but it has the largest standing army. China is a nuclear power, and along with France the only country in the world still testing nuclear weapons, to our regret.
China possesses ballistic missiles, including ones capable of reaching the United States.
It is a permanent member of the UN Security Council, with the rights and responsibilities that go with membership in that exclusive club. It has major influence in regional conflicts. Such facts, plus others I will cite later, make China an extremely important and potentially difficult neighbor. How to integrate China into the rest of East Asia, not to mention the rest of the world, is a challenge that has preoccupied China's neighbors not just recently, but for generations. As recently as 25 years ago, China was a revolutionary power bent on the subversion of its neighbors.