It's now commonly thought that the "Thucydides Trap" confronting rivalling Great Powers has now well and truly sprung. A "New Cold War" is happening in all but name between the United States as world hegemon and China its existential challenger. To understand America's perspective, the above White House report released on 20 May, 2020 is as timely as it is instructive.
The Report outlines a robust, realist, results-based pushback on all fronts against China as the greatest threat to American national interests including the free, open, and rule-based world order led by the United States.
Its apparently-benign Conclusion reads as follows -
"The Administration’s approach to the PRC reflects a fundamental reevaluation of how the United States understands and responds to the leaders of the world’s most populous country and second largest national economy. The United States recognizes the long-term strategic competition between our two systems. Through a whole-of-government approach and guided by a return to principled realism, as articulated by the NSS, the United States Government will continue to protect American interests and advance American influence. At the same time, we remain open to constructive, results-oriented engagement and cooperation from China where our interests align. We continue to engage with PRC leaders in a respectful yet clear-eyed manner, challenging Beijing to uphold its commitments."
Concrete pushback against China across the board is already in full swing. This includes a massive tariff war, tightening chokehold on Huawei (the lodestar of China's 5-G advance), restricted academic access to US technological research, measures to decouple from China's supply chains, increase in "Freedom of Navigation Operations" in the South China Sea, stepped-up development of hypersonic weaponry, ratcheted-up criticisms of China's perceived human rights violations (Xinjiang), questioning China's Belt and Road Initiative, its green energy credentials, its rhetoric in building a global "Community of Common Destiny", and most recently, refusing to recognize Hong Kong's "One Country Two Systems"
The Report denies any sinister motive of regime change or China containment -
"Our approach is not premised on determining a particular end state for China. Rather, our goal is to protect United States vital national interests, as articulated in the four pillars of the 2017 National Security Strategy of the United States of America (NSS). We aim to: (1) protect the American people, homeland, and way of life; (2) promote American prosperity; (3) preserve peace through strength; and (4) advance American influence."
"Even as we compete with the PRC, we welcome cooperation where our interests align. Competition need not lead to confrontation or conflict. The United States has a deep and abiding respect for the Chinese people and enjoys longstanding ties to the country. We do not seek to contain China’s development, nor do we wish to disengage from the Chinese people. The United States expects to engage in fair competition with the PRC, whereby both of our nations, businesses, and individuals can enjoy security and prosperity."
To Beijing, however, the Report's rhetoric masks a blatant attempt to interfere with and discredit China's chosen development path. Warts and all, China's own model has proved remarkably successful for the Chinese nation and its people. Fear of China's increasing economic clout and influence sustains the rhetoric of a global "China Scare". It ignores China's lack of willingness and capacity to take over America's global leadership. It is tone-deaf to China's repeated warnings that its model doesn't suit every nation. It flips China's national defensive strategy to an offensive military posture. It underplays China's leading contribution to solar, wind and hydroelectric energies under the Paris Agreement (which the United States has torn up). As for the Belt and Road Initiative, it is meeting a glaring global deficit in infrastructural connectivity. It is being embraced by a host of countries including Western nations such as Italy and Greece, while China has acknowledged important room for improvement such as debt-sustainability, transparency and corporate governance.
Beijing is now widely condemned for trying to enact for Hong Kong's national security bypassing Hong Kong's legislature. This ignores a gaping national security loophole in Hong Kong's mini-constitution (Basic Law). This loophole has been created by decades of fierce opposition to enacting Hong Kong's national security safeguards (Article 23) under the Basic Law. The same anti-Beijing legislators now stand on the high horse that such law should be enacted locally.
The absence of sufficient national security safeguards became all too evident in Hong Kong's recent violent protests. Symbols of Beijing's sovereignty have been ransacked, police stations fire-bombed, and ordinary citizens with opposite views publicly lynched. Flags, slogans, and demands calling for Hong Kong's "independence" became a common sight. Prominent activists were lauded and given high-level meetings with very senior officials of hostile foreign powers. A generation of Hong Kong people have been brainwashed into total loss of a sense of nationhood. Many have been turned into radical subversives, aided and abetted behind the scenes by opportunist hostile foreign forces.
In the eyes of many Chinese people, China's many failings notwithstanding, America's double-standards about democracy and human rights are glaring. Apart from friendly relations with Arabian autocracies, the White House's attitude towards current "George Floyd" protests against deep-seated American racism and social inequalities stands in ironic contrast to America's support and encouragement given to Hong Kong's remarkably similar fiery unrests.
While the Report rightly flags up legitimate alarm and fears of a rising "authoritarian" China, it begs the question if China's real intentions are misread. Taken to conclusions, such misreading may turn out to be the fuse igniting a catastrophic powder keg that may engulf the whole world.
