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Feb 4, 2021 Joseph S. Nye, Jr.

كمبريدج ــ من الواضح أن الطريقة التي يتعامل بها جو بايدن مع الصين ستكون واحدة من القضايا الـمُـمَـيِّـزة لرئاسته. يرث بايدن العلاقة بين الصين وأميركا وقد بلغت أدنى مستوياتها في خمسين عاما. يلقي بعض الناس باللائمة عن هذا على الرئيس السابق دونالد ترمب. بيد أن ترمب يستحق اللوم لأنه صب الزيت على النار. لكن قادة الصين هم الذين أشعلوا النيران وأضرموها.

على مدار العقد الماضي، تخلى قادة الصين عن سياسة دنج شياو بينج المعتدلة: "أخف قوتك، وانتظر الوقت المناسب". لقد أصبحوا أكثر عدوانية على أكثر من نحو؛ فقد شرعوا في بناء وعسكرة جزر اصطناعية في بحر الصين الجنوبي، وتغلغلوا في المياه القريبة من اليابان وتايوان، وشنوا الغارات على الهند على طول حدود البلاد عند منطقة الهيمالايا، وقهروا أستراليا اقتصاديا عندما تجرأت على انتقاد الصين.

على الصعيد التجاري، أمالت الصين ساحة اللعب لصالحها من خلال تقديم إعانات الدعم للشركات المملوكة للدولة وإجبار الشركات الأجنبية على نقل الملكية الفكرية إلى شركائها الصينيين. وجاء رد ترمب أخرق كالمعتاد، ففرض الرسوم الجمركية على الحلفاء إلى جانب الصين، لكنه حظي بدعم قوي من الحزبين عندما استبعد شركات مثل هواوي، التي شكلت خططها لبناء شبكات الجيل الخامس من الاتصالات تهديدا أمنيا.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 5 Comments on this article

Yoshimichi Moriyama Feb 8, 2021

John Lee wrote an online article "Australis can't afford to bite its tongue on China" at the onlineopinion. com.au. He is a senior fellow at the US Studies Centre and the Hudson Institute.

https://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=21233.

I (Michi) made thirty-six comments on it and said or quoted like: Why do we have to engage in free trade with China when it wishes to impose its authoritarianism on the world; Edwin. O. Reischauer, a Harvard Professor, wrote an Foreign Affairs article and said that the pivot for US foreign policy was Japan, the President-elect Kennedy read it and talked with him and appointed him ambassador to Tokyo, the US-Japanese relations were strengthened and Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea rose but Nixon and Kissinger thought that China was the pivot and so we are here where we stand in East Asia; Kissinger was a firm believer in power politics but as he is tricky like Nixon there is a variety of power politics and Stanley Hoffman said that Kissinger's diplomatic style resembled not Metternich's but Bismarck's ; the first fifty years in the US-Japanese relations were cordial but a big change came in 1898 with the Spanish-American War, and the relations began to sour not from the Japanese side but from the American side; "One of our best informed diplomats, Mr. John V. A. MacMurray, retired since several years, wrote in 1935 an extremely thoughtful and prophetic memorandum, in which, pointing to the likelihood of a war with Japan if we continued the course we were following...If we were to 'save' China from Japan...[it] is no reproach to the Chinese to acknowledge that we should have established no claim upon their gratitude...They would thank us for nothing, and give us no credit for unselfishness, but set themselves to formulating resistance to us in the exercise of responsibilities we would have assumed...Today we have fallen heir to the problems and responsibilities the Japanese had faced and borne in the Korean-Manchurian area for nearly half a century, and there is a certain perverse justice in the pain we are suffering from a burden which, when it was borne by others, we held in such low esteem (George F. Kennan, American Diplomacy, the University of Chicago Press, first printed in 1951, reprinted in 1984, pp.51-52.)"
I shall appreciate if some readers here read them.

China has not changed its characteristic Weltanschauung or world view and would not be able to change it even if it decided to; to expect of it to change it is tantamount to expecting it to stop being Chinese and morph into another being. But it has got to survive in a totally changed situation, and the greatest source of its power comes from its unencumbered and free participation in the so-called free trade system. The Chinese leaders are very scared, in spite of their unchanged bombast, of being denied it. To deny it would be of course to deny ourselves some economic benefit. So, the ultimate question is not in China but in ourselves.

Kurt Campbell, How America Can Shore Up Asian Order, Foreign Affairs, is available on online.
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j. von Hettlingen Feb 6, 2021

Joseph S. Nye, Jr. highlights the significance of strengthening the Japan-US alliance, which had frayed under Trump due to his abraisive “America First” approach. The alliance remains “popular” in both countries. Now the two decades-old allies “need each other more than ever” to counter China’s far-from peaceful rise. Together, they “can balance China’s power and cooperate with China in areas like climate change, biodiversity, and pandemics, as well as on working toward a rules-based international economic order.”
The author says, Joe Biden’s handling of “China will be one of the defining issues of his presidency. He inherits a Sino-American relationship that is at its lowest point in 50 years.” Trump’s move was counterproductive - imposing “tariffs on allies as well as on China, but he had strong bipartisan support when he excluded companies like Huawei, whose plans to build 5G networks posed a security threat.” As the new administration “develops its strategy to cope with China’s continued rise, the alliance with Japan will remain a top priority.”
Biden needs to walk a fine line between competition and cooperation. The US and China “remain interdependent, both economically and on ecological issues that transcend the bilateral relationship. The US cannot decouple its economy completely from China without enormous costs.” During the Cold War, there was “almost no economic or other interdependence” between the US and the Soviet Union. Yet “China has learned to harness the power of markets to authoritarian control in ways the Soviets never mastered, and China is more countries’ trading partner than the US is.”
The author believes, despite China’s “population size and rapid economic growth,” the combined GDP of “the developed democracies - the US, Japan, and Europe - far exceeds that of China.” This should help bolster “the importance of the Japan-US alliance for the stability and prosperity of East Asia and the world economy.” But it requires sustainable effort from the US to convince the Japanese that the principle of “pacta sunt servanda” will be upheld, and that the next Republican administration would not walk away from any agreement reached by the previous one.
In this regard, the newly appointed Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin reached out to his Japanese counterpart Nobuo Kishi. In their first phone call on January 23, they both underscored their willingness to bolster their mutual alliance. They also agreed that Article 5 of the US-Japan security treaty, which obliges the US to respond to an attack on Japanese-administered territory, also applies to the uninhabited Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea controlled by Japan but also claimed by China.
In recent years Beijing has been accused of undermining Japanese control there, aggravating tensions by increasing the presence of China Coast Guard (CCG) vessels in the contiguous zone known for its natural resources. Last year the Japan Coast Guard (JCG) cited the alarming number of Chinese official ships inside the zone since April 2019. While foreign ships sailing within the contiguous zone is not a violation of international law, the near constant Chinese presence there is no doubt irritating and appears threatening to Japan.
Threatended by China’s expansionist appetite in the South China Sea, many other Asian countries do not “want to be dominated by China.” Japan is now taking a leading role in its alliance with the US: “setting the regional agenda, championing free-trade agreements and multilateral cooperation, and implementing new strategies to shape a regional order.” More importantly it will continue contributing generously to hosting the 50,000 US troops in the country.
The author praises former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who had “spearheaded a reinterpretation of Article 9 of Japan’s post-war constitution, to strengthen the country’s defense capabilities under the United Nations Charter, and, after Trump withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, he preserved the regional trade pact as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for TPP. Abe also led quadrilateral consultations with India and Australia regarding stability in the Indo-Pacific.” His successor Yoshihide Suga, one of the foreign leaders Biden called after election, will continue Abe’s policy.
Austin has also spoken to his South Korean counterpart, Suh Wook by phone, calling the US-South Korean alliance a “linchpin” for “peace and stability” in Northeast Asia, vowing to further develop the bilateral alliance. Since both Japan and South Korea are eager to contain the nuclear threat posed by North Korea, Biden might as well reconcile the two US allies, which have been at loggerheads over issues rooted in Japan’s brutal 1910-1945 occupation of the Korean peninsula.
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vivek iyer Feb 5, 2021

Utterly foolish. What matters now is Duterte in the Philippines. Japan can protect itself. Why should it do more? South Korea always had twice the population of North Korea and, by playing nice with China, has nothing to fear. Why should it stick its neck out for America?

China may abandon 'wolf warrior' diplomacy now its people feel the US is a chaotic country which can't even protect itself from COVID or crazy guys in animal skins who invade the Capitol. But, if China is nice to its neighbors- as it has been to Myanmar- then hostility to it melts away. Why be friends with the US where woke nutters will always try to Maginstky those who love enough to store their kids and money there?

Why does China have the monopoly on big infrastructure projects? The World Bank can't do anything because of vocal NGOs and assorted nutters. So China is the only place to go for Development.

The mirage of 'soft power' based on lecturing everybody on Human Rights and so on has completely evaporated. Recently the Guardian Newspaper quoted a Chinese millionaire as saying 'I'd rather buy a condo in Wuhan than 'Nine Elms'. But then Trump himself said the US Embassy moving there was a terrible idea.

Biden may not be a terrible President. But if he listens to the usual and very old suspects then America will simply be disintermediated. It can sanction anyone it likes but not even Europe will pay any attention.
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Leo Arouet Feb 5, 2021

One strengthened tie with Japan is wise policy. While China rise their militar power, United States should will be more alliances.
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Jaro Potucek Feb 4, 2021

It seems that deep strategic partnership among US, EU, Japan is necessary to persuade China to cooperate in the major present issues - preservation of environment and mitigating population explosion. But what about India? India started its development later than China, but the progress is increasing. And as for the population issue it seems India has achieved major progress without drastic measures.
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