Contents:

How Obama is Transforming America's Military from Superpower to Paper Tiger

Furthermore, if a potential hegemon emerges among them, the other great powers in that region might be able to contain it by themselves, allowing the distant hegemon to remain safely on the sidelines. The bottom line is that for sound strategic reasons the United States labored for more than a century to gain regional hegemony, and after achieving that goal, it has made sure that no other great power dominated either Asia or Europe the way it dominates the Western Hemisphere.

In particular, how should we expect China to conduct itself, as it grows more powerful? I expect China to act the way the United States has acted over its long history. For good strategic reasons, China will seek to maximize the power gap between itself and potentially dangerous neighbors like India, Japan, and Russia. China will want to make sure that it is so powerful that no state in Asia has the wherewithal to threaten it. It is unlikely that China will pursue military superiority so that it can go on the warpath and conquer other countries in the region, although that is always a possibility.

Instead, it is more likely that Beijing will want to dictate the boundaries of acceptable behavior to neighboring countries, much the way the United States makes it clear to other states in the Americas that it is the boss. Gaining regional hegemony, I might add, is probably the only way that China will get Taiwan back. A much more powerful China can also be expected to try to push the United States out of the Asia-Pacific region, much the way the United States pushed the European great powers out of the Western Hemisphere in the 19th century. We should expect China to come up with its own version of the Monroe Doctrine, as Imperial Japan did in the s.

In fact, we are already seeing inklings of that policy. Those naval maneuvers were originally planned to take place in the Yellow Sea, which is adjacent to the Chinese coastline, but vigorous protests from China forced the Obama administration to move them further east into the Sea of Japan. These ambitious goals make good strategic sense for China.

Beijing should want a militarily weak Japan and Russia as its neighbors, just as the United States prefers a militarily weak Canada and Mexico on its borders. No state in its right mind should want other powerful states located in its region. All Chinese surely remember what happened in the last century when Japan was powerful and China was weak. Furthermore, why would a powerful China accept US military forces operating in its backyard? American policymakers, after all, express outrage whenever distant great powers send military forces into the Western Hemisphere.

China: The Next 'Gun' Superpower?

Those foreign forces are invariably seen as a potential threat to American security. The same logic should apply to China. Why would China feel safe with US forces deployed on its doorstep? Why should we expect China to act any differently than the United States over the course of its history?

JSTOR: Access Check

Are they more principled than the Americans? Are they less nationalistic than the Americans? Less concerned about their survival? They are none of these things, of course, which is why China is likely to imitate the United States and attempt to become a regional hegemon.

And what is the likely American response if China attempts to dominate Asia? It is crystal clear from the historical record that the United States does not tolerate peer competitors. Therefore, the United States can be expected to go to great lengths to contain China and ultimately weaken it to the point where it is no longer a threat to rule the roost in Asia. Toward that end, it built a deep-water pier at its new Changi Naval Base so that the US Navy could operate an aircraft carrier out of Singapore if the need arose.

There will be important differences, however, between the superpower competition during the Cold War and a future rivalry between China and the United States.

How Obama is Transforming America's Military from Superpower to Paper Tiger

For starters, the Soviet Union was physically located in both Asia and Europe, and it threatened to dominate both of those regions. Therefore, the United States was compelled to put together balancing coalitions in Asia as well as Europe.

China, on the other hand, is strictly an Asian power and is not likely to threaten Europe in any meaningful way. As a result, the major European states are unlikely to play an active role in containing China, but will probably be content to remain on the sidelines. Both superpowers had allies in the region that sometimes fought wars with each other, and the United States was seriously worried about a Soviet invasion of Iran following the ouster of the Shah in But a Chinese invasion of the Middle East is not likely, in part because it is too far away, but also because the United States would surely try to thwart the attack.

China is more likely to station troops in the region if a close ally there asked for help. For example, one could imagine China and Iran establishing close ties, and Tehran then asking Beijing to station Chinese troops on its territory. In short, while the Americans and the Soviets competed actively in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, China and the United States are likely to compete in only the latter two regions.

Other Books in This Series

Although the Soviet—American rivalry spanned most of the globe, the main battleground was in the center of Europe, where there was the danger of a large-scale conventional war for control of the European continent. That scenario was especially important to both sides not only because there was considerable potential for nuclear escalation in the event of a war, but also because a decisive Soviet victory would have fundamentally altered the global balance of power.

Korea is probably the only place where those two countries could get dragged into a conventional land war; in fact, that is precisely what happened between and , and it could happen again if conflict broke out between North and South Korea. But the stakes and the magnitude of that conflict would be nowhere near as great as a war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact for control of Europe would have been.

As with Korea, the outcome of all of these scenarios would be nowhere near as consequential as a superpower war in the heart of Europe during the Cold War. Because the stakes are smaller and a number of the possible conflict scenarios involve fighting at sea—where the risks of escalation are more easily contained—it is somewhat easier to imagine war breaking out between the China and the United States than between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. It is also worth noting that there was no territorial dispute between the superpowers—Berlin included—that was as laden with intense nationalistic feelings as Taiwan is for China.

Thus, it is not hard to imagine a war breaking out over Taiwan, which is not to say that the odds of such a war are high. Another important difference between the Cold War and a future Sino—American rivalry concerns ideology. The superpower competition was especially intense because it was driven by sharp ideological differences between the two sides as well as by geopolitical considerations.

Communism and liberal capitalism were potent ideological foes not only because they offered fundamentally different views about how society should be ordered, but also because both American and Soviet leaders thought that communism was an exportable political model that would eventually take root all over the globe.

The Case for China’s Peaceful Rise

Over the course of the next years, American policymakers worked unrelentingly in pursuit of regional hegemony. Therefore, the United States was compelled to put together balancing coalitions in Asia as well as Europe. Indeed, there was little direct contact between the elites, much less the broader publics, on the two sides. Communism and liberal capitalism were potent ideological foes not only because they offered fundamentally different views about how society should be ordered, but also because both American and Soviet leaders thought that communism was an exportable political model that would eventually take root all over the globe. Nor is there a consensus on whether Imperial Germany was a highly aggressive state that was principally responsible for causing the First World War. Second, although Imperial Japan did not launch an amphibious assault against Australia in , it seriously contemplated that option, and decided against it not only because of the difficulty of the operation, but also because Japan thought that it had an alternative strategy for dealing with Australia.

Soviet leaders had real concerns, as the spread of liberal capitalism posed a serious threat to the legitimacy of Marxist rule. The incompatibility of these rival ideological visions thus reinforced the zero-sum nature of the rivalry, and encouraged leaders on both sides to wage it with unusual intensity. There are certainly some ideological differences between China and the United States, but they do not affect the relationship between the two countries in profound ways, and there is no good reason to think that they will in the foreseeable future.

In particular, China has embraced a market-based economy, and does not see its current version of state capitalism as an exportable model for the rest of the world. If anything, it is the United States that shows a greater tendency to want to export its system to others, but that ambition is likely to be tempered by setbacks in Afghanistan and Iraq as well as the impact of the recession. This situation should work to make a future rivalry between Beijing and Washington less intense than the ideological-laden competition between the superpowers.

Finally, the Soviet Union and its close allies had remarkably little economic intercourse with the West during the Cold War.

High Risk Civilian Contracting - Working in a War Torn World.
?
Get Into Running: Teach Yourself?

Indeed, there was little direct contact between the elites, much less the broader publics, on the two sides. The opposite is the case with China, which is not only deeply integrated into the world economy, but is also actively engaged with Western elites of all kinds. For those who believe that economic interdependence produces peace, this is good news. After all, the major European powers were all highly interdependent and prospering in when First World War broke out. Australia, of course, faced a similar situation with regard to Imperial Japan, which helps explain why the Japanese military did not invade Australia when it went on a rampage across the Asia—Pacific region in December I would like to make three points to support this claim.

We are talking about how Australians will think about China after it has undergone two more decades of impressive economic growth and has used its abundant wealth to build a military that is filled with highly sophisticated weaponry. We are talking about a Chinese military that comes close to rivaling the US military in terms of the quality of its weaponry. That Chinese military, however, should have two important advantages over its American counterpart.

A Matchmakers Match;
Anansi Island;
iTunes is the world's easiest way to organize and add to your digital media collection..
.
Balcony Girls 2.

In short, China is likely to have far more offensive military power in than it has in You can download Apple Books from the App Store. Overview Music Video Charts. Opening the iTunes Store. If Apple Books doesn't open, click the Books app in your Dock. Do you already have iTunes? Click I Have iTunes to open it now. View More by This Author. Description Barack Obama has made it clear that he thinks the world would be a better and more peaceful place if the United States were too weak to affect the course of events.

Other Books in This Series. Contemporary Conflict Resolution Tom Woodhouse. Empire's Workshop Greg Grandin.

Bestselling Series

How Obama is Transforming America's Military from Superpower to Paper Tiger: The Truth about China in the Twenty-First Century (Encounter Broadsides) [Jed. How Obama is Transforming America s Military from Superpower to Paper Tiger: The Truth about. China in the Twenty-First Century (Paperback). By Jed Babbin.

Oxford IB Diploma Programme: Queen of the Desert Georgina Howell. Who Rules the World? Strategy Sir Lawrence Freedman. Global Politics Andrew Heywood. Warning to the West Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Asia's Reckoning Richard McGregor. Bible and Sword Barbara Tuchmann. The Long Hangover Shaun Walker. Anti-Israel Agenda Alex Ryvchin. Rise and Kill First Ronen Bergman.

Top Authors

Silent Invasion Clive Hamilton. Optimism Over Despair C. The Quest Daniel Yergin. Turkey and the West Kemal Kirisci. Dead Aid Dambisa F Moyo. Start-Up Nation Saul Singer. Politics in the Republic of Ireland John Coakley.