Breaking with tradition, President Trump chose to personally launch a 55-page National Security Strategy on 18 December. He named China and Russia “revisionist powers” “attempting to erode American security and prosperity”. While conceding the need to cooperate with China, he vowed to make the United States more competitive and much stronger, including its military, always putting America first.
This was shortly echoed by an 11-page summary of a 2018 National Defence Strategy. This asserts that henceforth, “great-power competition,” not terrorism, must be the primary focus of national security. A broad roadmap is unveiled, aiming at sharpening integrated military lethality, including nuclear weaponry, and expanding America’s military alliances.
Some American opinion-formers have regretted that the United States supported China’s entry into the World Trade Organization, which has helped China’s economic rise. There is bipartisan consensus that attempts to mold China into a “responsible stakeholder” of the US-led world order have been largely unsuccessful. A more robust anti-China mindset seems to have moved centre-stage, reminiscent of the “Offensive Realism” school of great-power rivalry.
Under a new “Indo-Pacific Strategy”, President Trump has re-energized a quadralateral strategic alliance of the United States, Japan, Australia and India, all not-so-friendly towards China. Various Chinese investments in the United States have recently been blocked. A 30% tariff has been imposed on Chinese solar panels, an ominous first salvo of what could escalate into a full-blown trade war. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson recently warned Latin America against dependency created by China’s Belt and Road Initiative Click here. A storm seems to be gathering in US-China relations. Click here
Amid growing sinophobia and Trumpist smoke and mirrors, it is easy to lose sight of the reality and paradox of China’s rise.
As China grows into a ten-thousand-ton panda, it can no longer follow Deng Xiaoping’s dictum of “hiding strength and biding time”. Even its own avowed benign behavior has not been sufficient to prevent smaller neighbors from hedging strategically.
Paradoxically, however, a stronger and more developed China may well offer greater opportunities to keep America safer and even more prosperous. President Trump once said the United States should have kept the oil in what turned out to be an unproductive War on Iraq (*). Nevertheless, even with geopolitical rivalry with China, there are ways for America to gain.
Examples abound.
First coming to mind is China’s capacity for stabilizing the dynamics of the Korean peninsula. With supreme leader Kim Jong-un’s new-found friendly Winter-Olympics overtures towards South Korea, China could be encouraged to broker a verifiable non-aggression deal between North Korea and the United States, perhaps backed by security guarantees by China along with other members of the six-party talks, including Russia.
Second, the South China Sea is China’s artery of trade and resources. China is therefore unlikely to disrupt the normal flow of civilian and commercial navigation. But China’s “island building” with military installations diminishes America’s military flexibility. Nevertheless, apart from symbolic yet provocative “freedom of navigation operations”, the United States may select suitable sea routes for regular joint patrols with the Chinese navy. This would send a strong signal for regional peace and stability.
The United States could also explore the possibility of jointly developing with China and other countries the vast energy reserve in the South China Sea, subject to suitable environmental safeguards. Likewise, with depleting fishery resources, a US-China joint initiative for sustainable fisheries management would do wonders in minimizing regional conflict, while adding to the soft-power of both countries.
Third, a strong and prosperous China presents many opportunities for American investments and expertise. As an energy surplus nation, America can sell vast quantities of natural gas to China, the world’s biggest energy customer, to help reduce coal-fired pollution. China has recently removed foreign investment restrictions in a host of industries and services. These include rail transport equipment, automotive electronics, new energy batteries, electric vehicles, bio fuels, motor cycles, satellites, edible agricultural products and marine engineering.Click here According to a McKinsey report, China investment opportunities in 2018 include the middle-class consumer market, the digital economy, electric vehicles, the green economy, pharmaceuticals, wealth and asset management, and other financial services.
Last but not least, America’s strongest card of managing China’s rise is its robust institutions and unmatched legacy of moral and ethical values, what makes for America as “a shining city on a hill”. Although much of this has been temporarily squandered by “America First” Trumpism, the reservoir of American soft power largely remains.
For example, instead of resisting China’s Belt and Road Initiative, the United States could participate in some much-needed regional infrastructural projects. This will enable it to set an example in good corporate governance including transparency, accountability and sustainability. An analogy is the China-initiated Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Its diverse membership includes a host of American allies. Its more transparent and inclusive organization structure and its development of good governance along with the Word Bank are instructive.
However, all of the above opportunities would be compromised if US-China relations becomes strained.
China’s Ambassador to the US Cui Tiankai recently alluded to strategic misjudgment of China in some United States quarters Click here. Still beset with a mountain of economic, financial, social and environment obstacles, China has neither the global military capacity nor the geopolitical willingness to displace the United States’ role in world leadership any time soon.
In an ever-closely knit “global village” facing a host of common challenges including climate change, energy security and terrorism, China’s fate cannot be unbundled from the rest of the world, least of all the United States. Hence, President Xi Jinping’s clarion call for abandoning a binary cold-war mindset and forging a “new era for international politics” with a view to building a global “community of common destiny”.
With major historical, cultural, socio-economic and political differences, China’s choice of development path and its security and other core interests must be respected. As the country becomes much larger, its natural desire for more regional elbow room and international influence projection must be accommodated.
Fixating on confronting and thwarting China’s inevitable rise will not enrich the United States. On the contrary, engaging China more constructively would capture the “oil”, figuratively speaking, in China’s rapid development. It would keep America safer and more prosperous. It would also be a smart way of leveraging China’s rise to make America great again.
(*) Fire and Fury, Inside the Trump White House, Michael Wolff, Henry Holt & Co., New York, 2018, p.49.
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An edited version of the above article appeared as an Op-ed in the South China Morniong Post of 15 February, 2018 with a different title "How a Sino-US relationship reset would help make America great again".
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