World Geostratetegic Insights interview with Alfredo Toro Hardy on the evolution of United States -China relations, the current challenges, including Joe Biden’s ideological approach, the Taiwan issue, and the predictable outcome of the current US -China confrontation.
ALFREDO TORO HARDY is a retired Venezuelan diplomat, scholar and author. He has served as ambassador to the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, Brazil, Singapore, Chile and Ireland. He has directed the Diplomatic Academy of the Venezuelan Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other academic institutions. He is the author of twenty-one books and co-author of fifteen others on international affairs and history. His latest book “America’s Two Cold Wars: From Hegemony to Decline?” was published in March 2022.
– In your new book “America’s Two Cold Wars: From Hegemony to Decline?” you thoroughly investigate the US-China competition. “Chimerica” the name given to the partnership confluence of economic interests between China and the United States, has been replaced in recent years by a visceral antagonism between the two countries. What went wrong? What are the main factors that have produced this changed state of affairs?
The economic complementarity between China and the United States was such that in 2007, the term “Chimerica” was coined by Niall Ferguson and Moritz Schularick. The term alluded to a symbiotic relation in which East-Chimericans were savers and West-Chimericans spenders, where East- Chimericans did manufactures and West-Chimericans services, where East-Chimericans exported and West-Chimericans imported, and where East-Chimericans piled up reserves and bought bonds that allowed West-Chimericans to run deficits. Indeed, notwithstanding the several difficulties encountered along the way, both the United States and China had made a deliberate effort to overcome problems and remain within the road opened by Nixon and Mao in 1972. However, of the two countries one acted strategically while the other based its actions in wishful thinking. Following Deng Xiaoping’ advise, China laid low while winning time which allowed it for the geopolitical miracle of emerging without alarming the Americans. Meanwhile, supremely confident in the superiority of its model and its strength, the United States assumed that a more prosperous China would naturally evolve towards a freer society and economy in accordance with its own.
The year 2008, though, would mark an inflexion point in this relationship. From that moment onwards, everything began to unravel. What made this year such a momentous point in time? What propelled the reversal of what had been thirty-six years of constructive relations and willingness to overcome differences? The answer can be found in a notion familiar to the Chinese mentality but entirely remote to the Western world – the shi. This notion can be understood as an alignment of forces able to shape a new situation. More loosely, it encompasses notions such as momentum, strategic configuration of power, strategic advantage, or propensity for things to happen. The shi, as a concept, took form during the so-called Warring States Period and became common to the different Chinese philosophical schools of thought. The shi, according to Chinese strategic thinking, becomes the window of opportunity when the skilled strategist can mould a favourable environment.
Seen through the lens of the shi, what alignment of forces redrew the situation in 2008? The answer is clear, and manifold: The American financial excesses that produced the world’s worst financial crisis since 1929; China’s sweeping efficacy in overcoming the risk of contagion from this crisis; China’s ability to maintain its economic growth, which prevented a major global economic downturn; and finally, the boost to its self-esteem that the highly successful Beijing Olympic games had given the country. Concomitant to those events was the erosion of America’s hegemonic standing because of its inability to prevail in two peripheral Middle Eastern wars.
In sum, the United States had proven not to be ten feet tall, while China appeared much taller than expected. This could only mean that the U.S. had passed its peak as a superpower and that the curves of Chinese ascension and America’s decline were about to cross. Deng’s guidance of preserving a low profile while waiting for the attainment of a position of strength had reached its fulfilment. The events of 2008 seemed to prove that China was strong enough to start acting more boldly. The shi was in motion and the strategic advantage therein derived had to be exploited. Xi Jinping’s arrival to power in 2013 only accelerated this trend. China’s strategic thinking and America’s wishful thinking could only collide amid increasing acrimony.
– US President Biden’s biggest promise on foreign policy during the campaign trail was to revive the liberal international order. Consequently, Biden seems to want to re-edit the liberal confrontation democracy versus communism that characterised the Cold War with a new version: democracy versus authoritarianism, with China included among the authoritarian states. But a confrontation based on ideology is still possible in the current system of international relations? Moreover, do the differences in political systems between China and the United States really play a role in the clash between the two countries?
Ideology was the core underpinning element in the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, which gave the former a crucial advantage. As the birthplace of liberal democracy and its most fervent preacher, America was particularly well suited for a contest of ideologies. It was not only easy for Washington to claim the mantle of leader of the “Free World”, but freedom itself represented an arrow directed to the Achilles heel of a totalitarian system such as communism. Nothing would be more useful for Washington, in its fresh confrontation with China, than a new ideological rivalry. As in the case of its Cold War with the URSS, this could provide focus, a sense of purpose and coherence in its actions. It is not a surprise, then, that President Biden has become an ardent proponent of an ideological contest between democracy and authoritarianism as a sort of re-edition of the contest between democracy and communism.
However, as America’s liberal order has been invaded by the cancer of populism and its basic norms are under threat at home itself, ideology has become a nonstarter. Several polls around the world depict an acute lack of trust in America’s democracy. Conversely, for the Chinese an ideological contest is a road to nowhere. Since Deng Xiaoping’s days, delivering is all that matters – the cat has to catch mice. A straightforward social contract exists between the Communist Party and the country’s population: We’ll make you better off and you will follow our orders. That bargain can endure as long as the regime keeps providing results and the Chinese accomplishments during these last four decades, which have no precedent in history, are testament to the strength of this bargain. Moreover, the authoritarian nature of the Chinese regime is not tantamount to ideology but to culture. As such, the Communist Party exists on a continuum with the nation’s long dynastic history. Behind it lies a Confucian political culture, in which the ruler is compared to an authoritarian parent presiding over an extended family.
Although war in Ukraine has provided a temporary lift to Biden’s democracy versus autocracy proposal, the fact remains that populism has profoundly eroded America’s liberal credentials. The convictions of a frail old man seem insufficient to alter this fact. Especially so as in three years’ time Washington could be inaugurating a new Trump administration and NATO’s unity could be entering in disarray again. Moreover, events in Ukraine don’t alter the fact that for the Chinese the cat has to keep catching mice irrespective of ideologies.
On top, the ideologically oriented dichotomy of democracy versus autocracy fails to capture the complexities involved within the great powers’ competition. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, by instance, cannot be solely attributed to Putin’s autocratic impulses. Other elements are also in line: Moscow’s historical obsession with borders, imperial nostalgia, Ivan Ilyn’s fashionable ideas on Russia’s exceptionalism. And so on.
– President Biden said that the United States would intervene militarily if China attempts to take Taiwan by force. But rhetoric aside, what could the US really do in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan?
Following the successful outcome of its containment strategy to the Soviet Union, the United States aims to geopolitically contain China as well. But, things are different in both cases. Is it viable to indefinitely constrain China to a secondary role in an area which is of geostrategic priority to it? Is it possible to do so given its layered defence-in-depth control of the area? How to contain a force whose main objective is precisely to deter penetration by others?
The case of Taiwan is particularly forbidden in relation to an American containment policy of the Popular Republic of China. This, essentially for three reasons. First, the distances involved. Distance from California to Taiwan is 7,000 miles and from Hawaii close to 5,300 miles. Conversely, the distance between mainland China and Taiwan is only 90 miles. John Mearsheimer’s notion of the stopping power of water fully applies here. Second, the asymmetric interests involved. For Beijing, reuniting Taiwan with the mainland represents a historical restitution not a territorial expansion. Meaning, it sees Taiwan as an integral part of the country’s territory and has immanent incentives in seeking reunification. For the U.S., on the contrary, only reputational interests are involved. What it’s at stake for both lies at completely different levels. Third, the principles involved. Since the 1972 joint communique between Washington and Beijing, the former has never contested the One China policy. A good example of this was Clinton’s “Three No’s” policy – the United States doesn’t support independence for Taiwan, nor does it support “two Chinas”, nor does it believe that Taiwan should have membership in any organisation for which statehood is required. Under those bases, what would be the legal justification to go to war with Beijing in support of Taipei?
The United States had so far maintained a policy of strategic ambiguity in relation to Taiwan. This implies remaining deliberately vague about whether it would defend the island in case of a Chinese invasion. Biden seems to be promoting a shift in America’s position. If this shift materialises, America’s possibilities of getting involved in a war for Taiwan would undoubtedly increase. Especially so as the flames of Chinese nationalism have also produced a hardening in the opposite direction as well, with 70 percent of mainlanders strongly propping up the use of force to attain unification if necessary. America’s abandonment of its ambiguity policy could only generate a dangerous spiral – it would push Taiwan’s authorities towards becoming bolder in their pro-independence stand, thus hardening Beijing’s aggressiveness towards the island, which in turn would force an American strong stance in Taiwan’s defence. For the U.S., though, a war for Taiwan would be a highly undesirable option as recent war games conducted by the Pentagon and the RAND Corporation showed that a military clash over Taiwan would result in an American defeat, with China completing an all-invasion in just days or weeks. As John Mearsheimer has argued, China’s rise to great power status makes the United States security commitment to Taiwan increasingly unsustainable.
– Considering that, as you pointed out in your book “China vs. the United States: Who Will Prevail?”, neither China nor the United States are powers that will easily accept the number two position, what is the predictable outcome of such a confrontation?
What makes the rivalry between the United States and China so utterly complex is that both perceive themselves as pinnacles within human history. Finding themselves at cross purposes, the Middle Kingdom and the Exceptional Nation have not an easy way out. Three elements make such an impasse a particularly difficult situation. In the first place, because both China and the United States are prisoners of their history and of their national myths. Neither of them can objectively look at the future, without distorting their analyses by the subjective lenses of their perceived sense of superiority and mission. In the second place, because China’s “restoration” comes hand in hand with the impulse to revise the regional status quo and the international order, both of which were defined while the country was weak. Conversely, as the sole superpower of the last three decades, the United States holds to being the main custodian of both East Asia’s status quo and the international order. Moreover, having emerged victorious from its competition with the Soviet Union, the United States feels validated in its own vision of the world and in its commanding role within it. In the third place, because while China sees itself as the epitome of human civilization, with no lessons to be given, the United States’ “we know best” attitude led Americans to believe that by helping China’s economic success they were promoting at the same time a freer society and economy in tune with their own values. As a result, while the Chinese feel belittled, the Americans feel betrayed, thus generating mutual resentment.
Five resulting options could emerge from this rivalry: Containment, power sharing, war, withdrawal, and collapse.
The first possibility would be a long-term containment policy of China by the United States. This follows the main lines that this country put in motion in relation to the Soviet Union between 1947 and 1989. However, during their Cold War neither Americans nor Soviets challenged each other’s main spheres of influence, essentially limiting their confrontation to client states in peripheral zones. This is certainly not the case in the current situation, as seen before.
The second option would be a power sharing agreement. Figures like Henry Kissinger and Paul Kennedy have been advocating for a compromise between the two countries. However, would China be willing to accept a power-sharing structure in its historical sphere of influence? Would it be willing to do so when it perceives that time and momentum are on its side? Would the United States be ready to accept China as an equal?
The third option is war. Incapable of reconciling their differences an armed conflict might ensue. But what kind of war might this be? A Thucydides Trap type of conflict where a still stronger but declining power is the aggressor or a Power Transition Theory type of conflict, where the emerging power begins hostilities? Would these two powers’ allies be pulled into the conflict as well? Would this be a single episode war, or a long belligerence able to trigger periodical armed conflicts?
A fourth option would be America’s withdrawal. It must not be forgotten that the United States’ foreign policy has shown to possess its very particular yin and yang qualities – seemingly opposing forces that actually belong to the same Oneness. The latter being America’s self-perceived moral superiority and the yin and yang representing the shifting periods of international missionary impulses and isolationism. America’s populism may well push towards the latter.
The fifth option would be the collapse of the Chinese Communist Party regime. According to several analysts the CCP is approaching the historical longevity frontier for one-party regimes. Can indeed the regime overcome the serious domestic challenges that it currently confronts, while sailing against strong international winds? Can it do it while simultaneously riding the nationalism tiger at home?
ALFREDO TORO HARDY is a Venezuelan retired diplomat, scholar and author. He has a PhD on International Relations by the Geneva School of Diplomacy and International Affairs, two master degrees on international law and international economics by the University of Pennsylvania and the Central University of Venezuela, a post-graduate diploma in diplomatic studies by the Ecole Nationale D’Administration (ENA) and a Bachelor of Law degree by the Central University of Venezuela. Before resigning from the Venezuelan Foreign Service in protest for events taking place in his country, he was one of its most senior career diplomats. As such, he served as Ambassador to the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, Brazil, Singapore, Chile and Ireland. He directed the Diplomatic Academy of the Venezuelan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as well as other Venezuelan academic institutions in the field of international affairs. He is an Honorary Research Fellow of the Geneva School of Diplomacy and International Relations and has been a Visiting Professor at the universities of Princeton and Brasilia and an on-line Professor at the University of Barcelona. He has also been a Fulbright Scholar, a two-time Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center Resident Scholar and an academic advisor on diplomatic studies to the University of Westminster. He has authored twenty-one books and co-authored fifteen more on international affairs and history, while publishing thirty peer reviewed papers on the same subjects. His latest book America’s Two Cold Wars: From Hegemony to Decline? was published by Palgrave Macmillan in March 2022 (https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-16-9503-2)