GOOD MORNING FROM LONDON
The old USSR failed + withdrew in the 1980s. Now Biden follows UK colonial forces, the Moghuls, Genghis Khan + the USSR and withdraws after a 20-year military involvement in Afghanistan. Will China fall into the same trap?
US “experts” – Mearsheimer + Prof Allison, Defence Dept and Council of Foreign Relations thinks so, says David Dodwell in a penetrating article in SCMP. China, they say, is an aggressive power with an offensive agenda. But there is an alternative – that China is a defensive power, determined to protect its economic progress + play its part in world affairs.
The US points to PRC defence spending but look at the figures – PRC military budget is up by 1.9% of GDP whereas the US figure is up by 4.4%. China has one military base in Djibouti whereas the US has 800+ bases worldwide. China has fought one war in the past 50 years whereas the US has fought approx. 14 wars since 1980. Defence priorities has motivated China’s modernisation of its military not the hegemonic international acquisition of power + influence. Only Taliban military action in Pakistan re Gawdar and the Belt + Road Initiative could provoke China.
In 1945 the US used the alleged threat of a Stalin invasion of W Europe to consolidate its power. Today all experts agree that USSR had no such capacity or intent. The same today – China has no capacity or intent to dominate the world. But it does know how to defend. The world remains quite unstable.
