An American perception of China as intransigent and belligerent needs some
scrutiny. China is inflexible when it is asked to abide by rules it has no part
in writing. Its perceived belligerency stems from the only war it fought against
the US: the Korean War. This was because China felt threatened by the presence
of US soldiers close to its border, more so because, before that, the US sided
with Chiang Kai-shek against the communists in China's civil war.
It must come to terms the day when China will edge out its influence in Asia.
In Nathan Gardels' "The Changing Global Order," Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew
said:
'But now, for America to be displaced, not in the world, but only in the
Western Pacific, by an Asian people long despised and dismissed with contempt as
decadent, feeble, corrupt and inept is emotionally very difficult to accept.'
Yet, if the US accords respect and recognition to China, it will play a
constructive role vis-à-vis American interest.
For example, from 1971 the two nations worked closely when they perceived the
USSR their common threat. It was the cooperation of China that hastened the
break-up of Soviet Russia in 1989.
The rapprochement in 1972 saw China contributing significantly in the UN. In
the 1990 Gulf War, it cooperated with the US by not using its veto. It signed
the MTCR (Missile Technology Control Regime) in February 1992, and the NPT
(Non-Proliferation Treaty) in March 1992, and the Chemical Weapons Convention in
January 1993.
Gary Klintworth and Murray McLean, in their paper "China and the United
States: Neither Friends nor Enemies," cited four questionable assumptions on the
prognosis of US-China relations as prospectively a clash of the giants:
(1) a superpower China not only challenges the US for global supremacy, but
will not share the latter's interest in global stability or find common cause
such as containing a rising Japan or Russia in ten to fifteen years' time,
(2) China can become a superpower and able to maintain its present rates of
rapid economic growth despite many profound difficulties,
(3) China's economic, financial and legal reforms may not follow the
Taiwanese or South Korean model of soft authoritarianism and eventually a
democratising society, and
(4) the US and China's neighbours rather see an impoverished China beset by
warlordism and unable to control mass emigration than one that is stable and
prosperous.
To confront China is a self-fulfilling prophecy that she will be the eventual
enemy of America.
Therefore it makes sense for US to engage China. The high level military
contacts between the two countries are highly desirable, as they promote
transparency that can bring about better understanding and prevention of an
accidental nuclear war that may be disastrous for the rest of the world.
[End]
