PREAMBLE
There are basically two types of scholars in China: those who emphasise the growing risk of war between their country and the US and those who prefer to stress how unlikely this remains. Shi Yinhong (时殷弘) belongs to those whose dictum is that no one likes war, but war eventually happens — especially when not enough is done to prevent it.
Shi, at 73, is of the same generation as Xi Jinping, who is 71. Both men experienced the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution, the Sino-Soviet split during the Cold War and both were already young adults when the US-China rapprochement began in the early 1970s.
Today’s excerpts come from an academic article that he wrote earlier this year on the growing competition between China and the US and the risks that it entails. Paragraphs have been re-arranged so as to convey his views as succinctly as possible where the essay was initially written as:
US-CHINA RIVALRY: RECENT PAST AND PRESENT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR CHINA'S STRATEGY (EXCERPTS)
Shi Yinhong (时殷弘 )
Asia-Pacific Security and Maritime Affairs, No.3, May 2024
I. The Growing US-China Rivalry
“US-China relations today are more complex and even riskier than at any time in the past half-century. Although the two countries may still be some distance from a potentially severe conflict, it is certainly not as distant as it once was. ‘Bottom-line thinking [底线思维]’ is essential and should help in averting the worst-case scenario by fostering strategic clarity and an awareness of the risks.”
“Reflecting on the recent and present US-China rivalry, it can be concluded that the United States initiated strategic military competition with China during Obama's second term. Trump [then] not only launched a trade and high-tech war against China, but also promoted an ‘Indo-Pacific Strategy’ alliance [network] and a full range of technical upgrading of the US’s strategic forces, thereby posing a significant challenge to China's strategic ambitions. However, Trump's international behaviour inevitably created a ‘power vacuum’, which encouraged China to advance its [geopolitical goals]. [Finally,] the Biden administration has been relentless in its strengthening and upgrading of its precautions, containment, isolation and pushback against China in strategic military areas such as Taiwan, the Korean Peninsula, the US-Japan military alliance, the East China Sea or the ‘Indo-Pacific’ Quad alliance. It has intensified its efforts to decouple technologically from China, striving continuously to make it more difficult for China to innovate independently. It has also been framing the increasingly intense competition between the US and China as part of a broader global ideological contest.”
“Over the past 15 years, China has emerged as a rapidly rising power on the international stage, with its economic and military strength growing steadily. American scholars believe that China's behaviour both partially aligns with and partially contradicts its long-held public statements regarding its goals in the Asia-Pacific and the world. The significant enhancement of China's power has altered its intentions and ambition, [they note], with the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China [i.e. when Xi Jinping came to power in Nov. 2012] playing a decisive factor in this transformation.”
“One could say that since the 18th National Congress, China has worked consistently, both domestically and internationally, to achieve three main objectives:
To expand and deepen its engagement in global governance and the global political economy, striving to have an impact or even to lead alone in certain areas of its choosing.
To achieve economic and diplomatic advantages in the Asia-Pacific region and, with the flexibility to pull back when need be, in the developing world. This is not aimed at gaining an advantage over [developing] countries and societies, but rather at gaining an advantage over other external powers led by the United States.
To secure sooner or later a strategic and military advantage over the United States in the Western Pacific (extending from the Chinese coast to the first island chain), with an increasing belief in the need for [China] to be able to control militarily the strategic space between the first and second island chains.”
“The pattern of confrontation and rivalry between two major alliances has already begun to take shape. Within just two weeks of the high-level diplomatic meeting between the US and China in Anchorage [Alaska] in mid-March 2021:
China and Russia formed what appeared to be a quasi-military alliance [中俄两国看似形成准军事同盟].
China and North Korea resumed their rhetoric on being allies and having common ideologies. China largely stopped mentioning one of its basic stances since 2003, namely the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.
Major strategic advances were made in China-Iran relations and China refrained from intervening in Myanmar's domestic affairs [after the 2021 coup d'état].
“China-focused diplomacy with allies is a major, if not the primary, focus of the Biden administration's foreign policy. It strives to gain as much sympathy, endorsement, support and cooperation from as many developed allied countries and the European Union as possible on all the big issues of the US-China rivalry.”
An important potential area of cooperation between China and the US is addressing climate change. But this potential cooperation coexists with fundamental policy differences between the two countries. This is intertwined with their competition over global prestige, leadership in global governance, ideological influence and economic/technological dominance.”
The balance of Shi Yinhong's presentation is summarised:
Facing with economic headwinds, Beijing is now having to readjust some of its priorities.
Since the 2008 financial crisis and the West’s relative decline, Chinese elites have been afflicted by a growing sense of triumphalism and overconfidence.
This has led China’s leadership to becoming more assertive and ambitious abroad, as well as more determined to achieve cross-Strait unification and the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation in the foreseeable future.
Its approach to Taiwan may also be changing, with increasing military posturing around the island occurring for no apparent reason other than to prepare for a potential military conflict.
On the other hand, Beijing has occasionally avoided tit-for-tat responses to perceived provocations by Washington and Taipei.
Neither China nor the US wants a war to erupt, but the risk of its happening is increasing.
The recent reopening of communication channels between the two countries will only go so far in helping avert such a disaster. US-China rivalry will continue to rise. New safeguards must be established.
The Author
