The U.S. China rivalry will shape the next two decades
John Pomfret's article in the Washington Post about a Chinese general's "outburst" during the recently concluded bilateral talks serves as pretty good reminder of why the next decade or two are going to require some deft diplomacy:
On May 24 in a vast meeting room inside the grounds of the state guesthouse at Diaoyutai in Beijing, Rear Adm. Guan Youfei of the People's Liberation Army rose to speak.Known among U.S. officials as a senior "barbarian handler," which means that his job is to deal with foreigners, not lead troops, Guan faced about 65 American officials, part of the biggest delegation the U.S. government has ever sent to China.
Everything, Guan said, that is going right in U.S. relations with China is because of China. Everything, he continued, that is going wrong is the fault of the United States. Guan accused the United States of being a "hegemon" and of plotting to encircle China with strategic alliances. The official saved the bulk of his bile for U.S. arms sales to China's nemesis, Taiwan -- Guan said these prove that the United States views China as an enemy.
U.S. officials have since depicted Guan's three-minute jeremiad as an anomaly. A senior U.S. official traveling on Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's plane back to the United States dismissed it, saying it was "out of step" with the rest of the two-day Strategic and Economic Dialogue. And last week in Singapore, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates sought to portray not just Guan, but the whole of the People's Liberation Army, as an outlier intent on blocking better ties with Washington while the rest of China's government moves ahead.
The funny thing is that Guan is not wrong - at least, not about American strategy. While the Bush and Obama administrations have talked about (and often honestly worked toward) a constructive partnership with China, there is also a clear policy of hedging against China's rise. The U.S. fought hard to keep a military base in Japan and the Pentagon routinely invokes the People's Liberation Army as a threat (or "challenge") to which we must prepare for. Indeed, open any recent issue of a major foreign policy journal and you'll read about how China's military modernization is a threat to the U.S. Visit any conservative think tank and you'll hear how it is incumbent upon the U.S. to bolster our military in Asia to prevent Chinese military superiority from threatening our hegemony in the region.
In other words, Guan knows exactly what's going on. There is a natural and increasingly inevitable rivalry that is going to occur in Asia between two powers that insist that hegemony in the region is their right. It's a struggle that will almost certainly define the next two decades and, I'd argue, is significantly more important to American security and international peace than Iran's nuclear program.
(AP Photo)
