When Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying was asked on May 11 about a piece written on May 9 by Chas Freeman for the East Asia forum, she said he had laid out “some basic facts” about China which “some in the U.S. deliberately ignore or disregard.” “In short, China is not a threat to the United States. Instead, the threat is within the United States itself,” she said. Freeman writes in his article, entitled, “Washington is playing a losing game with China":
“The principal challenge that China presents is not military but economic and technological. But the United States is geared only to deal with military threats. China has become the antidote to the US post-Cold War-enemy-deprivation syndrome and a gratifying driver of US defence spending. There are US aircraft and ships aggressively patrolling China’s borders, but no Chinese aircraft and ships off America’s coast. US bases ring China. There are no Chinese bases near America. Still, Washington ups its defence budget to make its ability to overwhelm China more credible. Yet, in the long run, the United States cannot outspend China militarily and cannot hope to beat it on its home ground…
“Competitive rivalry can raise the competence of those engaged. But antagonism, seeking to hamstring one other, is not beneficial. It entrenches hostility, justifies hatred, injures, and threatens to weaken both sides.
“Without exception, countries want multilateral backing to cope with the challenge, not unilateral US confrontation. They want to accommodate China on terms that maximise their sovereignties, not make China an enemy. If the United States persists in confrontation, it will find itself increasingly isolated. Given the state of US democracy, if its China policy is defined as a moral effort, most other nations will be alienated, not attracted.”
