Why Washington’s Eagerness to Amend Fences won’t Diminish its Pushback against China

By Andrew KP Leung (International and Independent China Strategist. Chairman and CEO, Andrew Leung International Consultants and Investments Limited).

On 21 May, President Joe Biden said that US-China relations would “thaw” very shortly.  Despite repeated attempts, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin failed to secure a meeting with his Chinese counterpart at the Shangri-La security summit in Singapore from 2-4 June.  Now, Secretary of State Antony Blinken expects to resume on 18 June  his scheduled Beijing visit derailed by the Chinese balloon incident.  

Does this eagerness to mend fences suggest that the United States is willing to compromise on China’s “core interests”, including Taiwan, for the sake of harmonious coexistence?   

Not so fast. Here are the reasons why not. 

There remains robust bipartisan support for an all-out American ‘grand strategy’ to triumph over a perceived China threat to the US-led “liberal world order” consolidated since World War II. Jonathan Ward’s 2023 book The Decisive Decade explains why this existential battle is now or never, including an anti-China “arsenal of democracy” in four related arenas: economic, diplomatic, military, and ideological. 

Disregarding China’s warning, moves are continuing afoot to create a NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) presence in the Asia Pacific, partnering with Japan, South Korea and the so-called QUAD military alliance of United States, Australia, Japan and India. 

China has proven its economic resilience as the largest manufacturer deeply embedded in the world’s supply and value chains including critical rare earths. Anti-China rhetoric has now shifted from “decoupling” to “de-risking”, focusing on “strategic” technologies like high-end semiconductor chips and 5G. There is no let-up in treating a rising China as a threat. 

Weaponizing the dollar to impose sanctions across the globe has now boomeranged, as expounded in Agathe Demarais’ Backfire: How Sanctions Reshape the World Against U.S. Interests. There is now a strong “de-dollarization” undercurrent among various developing country groupings such as BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) and SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization), not to mention China’s rapidly-developing digital  yuan as alternative sovereign currency for international trade.  

While the dollar’s deep-seated dominance remains secure for now, continuing erosion of its global trustworthiness bodes ill for America’s financial and economic stability. It seems high time to recalibrate America’s hard power, but dollar-based sanctions are unlikely to be ditched anytime soon.  

 By 2035, the developing world is set to account for around 60 per cent of the global economy, based on purchasing power parity, according to the Conference Board Global Economic Outlook. Most developing nations have China as the largest trading partner. Many are now moving in China’s orbit. As a counter-weight, we’re seeing a foray of American diplomatic overtures to cement strategic ties, both economic and military, with hitherto-neglected states in the South Pacific, the Middle East, South America and Africa.  

As  “Defender of the Free World”, America is unlikely to let up on calling out China for perceived transgressions on human rights and trade norms, deemed aggressiveness in the South China Sea, and alleged coercion over Taiwan. Nor is it likely to give up corralling Western allies to confront China. 

Although the U.S says publicly it doesn’t want to suppress China or separate its economy from China , the language seems reminiscent of the Hollywood film The Godfather: “It’s not personal, just business.”  

In his seminal work The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, John Mearsheimer explains that historically, Great Powers seek dominance at each other’s expense, leading to inevitable conflict. 

In The Great Delusion, Mearsheimer calls out the folly of liberal hegemony as a grand strategy to spread democracy, defend human rights and promote peace, only to turn into a recipe for endless wars with violated human rights abroad and diminished civil rights at home. The catastrophes of the wars over Iraq and Afghanistan resulting in millions of deaths and untold human suffering speak volumes, against the backdrop of a deeply divided America with poisoned domestic politics, broken infrastructure, unaffordable healthcare, widespread urban homelessness, drug abuse and high rate of incarceration.  

Washington is unlikely to acknowledge that contrary to demonizing rhetoric, the Chinese Communist Party has a successful governance system miraculously improving people’s lives over decades. According to separate independent research studies conducted by the Harvard Kennedy School , the NewYork-based Edelman Trust Barometer and the Paris-based Ipsos public relations consultancy , Chinese people are enjoying the highest level of happiness, including longer life expectancy, while its government is much better supported and trusted, multiple ranks above many Western democracies including the United States.

Beijing is under no illusion about Washington’s olive branch. Meeting newly-appointed US Ambassador Nicholas Burns in Beijing, China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang called out America’s double standards, saying one thing but acting the opposite, damaging China’s sovereignty, security, and development interests. He called for genuine dialogue and cooperation on the basis of mutual respect and reciprocity, building harmony despite differences.  

Dominated by powerful vested interests, America’s national psyche is such that it may take years, if not decades, to be willing to accept the legitimacy of a non-Caucasian, ancient civilization with a different political ideology in sharing global power alongside U.S.-led Western democracies. 

For the time being, Antony Blinken’s Beijing visit, if materialized, may serve to break some ice, build some guardrails including quiet diplomacy, and even score brownie points on some selected mutually-beneficial projects such as food security and renewable energies, as proposed by Ryan Haas, Senior Fellow of Washington-based Brookings Institution . However, it is unlikely to reverse the course of intensifying Great Power rivalry pushing back against China.

 Andrew KP Leung – Independent international strategist of China; he previously served as director general of social welfare and Hong Kong’s official representative for the United Kingdom, Eastern Europe, Russia, Norway, and Switzerland.

(The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of World Geostrategic Insights)

The article was  first published in SCMP