Sino-US tensions do not have to culminate in another Cold War
Wed, Jul
27, 2022
NOT a day passes in Washington of late without a US official, member of Congress, or some pundit warning of the coming “new Cold War” between China and the United States, and that a military confrontation between the 2 global powers is almost inevitable.
One does not have to be a geostrategic thinker to conclude that these 2 superpowers are engaged in an accelerating economic competition involving trade, finance and technological development.
Similarly, it is clear that China and the US are trying to exert their diplomatic influence and maintain their military presence in East Asia and other parts of the world. But the acceptance of the above assertions should not lead one to assume that this global rivalry needs to end with a cold or hot war.
Moreover, against the backdrop of the war of Ukraine, and the “democracies vs authoritarians” narrative advanced by US President Joe Biden, US officials have been raising concerns about the so-called “alignment” between Beijing and Moscow, as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken put it after the recent meeting with his Chinese counterpart in Indonesia.
That American diplomatic spinning has created the impression that the Chinese are, for all practical matters, supporting the Russian aggression against its neighbour and in its confrontation with the US-led Western alliance.
It is true that China has refused to join the US and its allies in imposing economic sanctions on Russia and continues to import oil from it. But then so does India, which is also a major importer of Russian arms, and which the Americans regard as a major strategic ally in the competition with China. Yet no one in Washington raises the spectre of an evolving “alignment” between New Delhi and Moscow.
While there is no doubt that nationalist and anti-American rhetoric emanating in Beijing has helped raise the tensions between China and the US, it does seem that these days it is the Americans who have been challenging the mostly peaceful status quo between the 2 nations.
In addition to the American harping about Chinese human-rights conduct, there has been a steady effort on the part of US officials as well as Democratic and Republican lawmakers to start eroding the foundations of the so-called “One China” policy that has served as the basis for normalising Sino-American relations since 1979.
As part of that agreement, Washington “de-recognised” Taiwan as an independent state with the provision that it could provide Taipei with defensive material while respecting Beijing’s goal of peaceful resolution of the island’s sovereignty.
More recently, Biden said on 3 occasions that the US would come to Taiwan’s aid in the event of a war with China, a clear departure from Washington’s “strategic ambiguity” on the issue.
It was also announced that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the second-in-line of succession to the US presidency, is planning an official trip to Taiwan, to express solidarity with the island’s separatist groups, a decision that former president Donald Trump described as “not a good idea right now”.
Indeed, Pelosi should reconsider this decision, and together with other American politicians recognise that by continuing to focus on China as a global threat, they only help to turn it into one.