US-China Relations: Beyond the ‘Cold War’ Cliché
US-China: The convocation between senior Biden administration officials and Chinese. While it marks the first-to-face opportunity to gauge the dynamics of the relationship between the two most important global powers. On the other side, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan will meet with China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Alaska on Thursday.
Moreover, there are no illusions in the Biden team. Ahead of the meeting, Mr. Blinken noted this was “not a strategic dialogue” and there was no intent at this point for a serious follow-on involvement.
Relations between the US and China are the worst they have been for many years and look set to become worse still. Well before his appointment Mr. Sullivan, co-authored an article in Foreign Affairs magazine with Mr. Biden’s top Asia adviser – Kurt Campbell which bluntly stated that the era of engagement with China has come to an unceremonious close.
Besides, the Biden Administration’s interim foreign policy strategy released earlier this month’s notes. China is the only competitor potentially capable of combining its economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power. To mount a nonstop challenge to a stable and open international system.
However, provocation of China whenever necessary and cooperation where possible is the mantra in the Biden White House. But, China takes a similar stance, signaling its desire for a constructive relationship. While continuing to double-down on its own interests, the anti-democracy clampdown in Hong Kong, and the unashamed treatment of its Muslim Uighur minority.
Beijing hardly wastes an opportunity to point up the ills of the US system. While it has seized upon the catastrophic handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. During Trump’s tenure and the storming of the US Capitol, it cast its social and economic model as superior.
The US-China centered on 5G technology:
While the original Cold War had an important technological dimension, primarily in weaponry and the space race. The new US-China rivalry involves the essential technologies that drive and will drive our societies in the future, such as artificial intelligence and 5G.
However, China is not the Soviet Union. It is significantly more powerful. At its peak, the Soviet GDP was some 40% of the US. China will have the same GDP as the United States within the decade. China is a more powerful competitor than anything the US has faced since the 19th Century. And it is a relationship that is going to have to be managed for perhaps decades to come.
Moreover, President Biden’s China problem is complex. His foreign policy goals prompt conflicting approaches to Beijing. But while the nature of the competition should not be understated, neither should it be overstated. The lazy cliché of a rising China and the declining US-like all clichés have an element of truth. But it does not tell the whole story.
China has many strengths but also many vulnerabilities. The US has great weaknesses but also a remarkable dynamism and capacity to re-invent itself. But as the Covid-19 pandemic has demonstrated in stark terms. What happens in China does not stay. It is a world player that matters to all our lives.
