Most of our beliefs about China being a “new superpower” that is capable of challenging the world order and about the new stand-off between the US and China were thrown in by US experts in 1989-1995.

       I would like to debunk the myth that China has almost become another superpower. Indeed, China is the world's second largest economy by several measures. Primarily, I’m referring to gross domestic product and absolute output, nothing else. However, by other indicators, such as per capita GDP or the level of innovation in the economy, China is still lagging behind other developed countries. Most importantly, the economic success does not automatically lead it to plans to create a powerful military capability. To do so, a political decision must be made. Between the two world wars, Germany had a weak economic potential, but managed to create powerful military forces in a short time. Contrary to the expectations of US experts, China hasn’t demonstrated a focus on military power over the past 25 years.

       Most of our beliefs about China being a “new superpower” that is capable of challenging the world order and about the new stand-off between the US and China were thrown in by US experts in 1989-1995. Back then, the International Security magazine published major debates on this subject, and precisely this magazine created stereotypes with regard to China's foreign policy strategies. As we debate the new bipolarity, we are essentially repeating the theses developed by US political scientist Richard Betts in 1993 (1). One can understand the motives of the Americans: following the collapse of the Soviet Union, they were faced with an urgent need to create an image of a new enemy in order to justify the expansion of the US military-industrial complex. However, the fact that in 2014 we are still arguing about the same things with regard to China as in 1989 is reason enough to question the validity of their predictions.

       Military constraints

       In terms of military capability, China is inferior to the United States and Russia. China still lacks a strategic potential that would be comparable to that of those countries. It doesn’t have the capability for independently developing and manufacturing the whole gamut of weapons. China relies on foreign military equipment purchases and foreign (primarily, Russian) military technology licenses. China lacks such a strong potential as fundamental science, which both Russia, and the United States have. In this sense, if you look at the power potential, the modern world is reminiscent of the Cold War world much more than we think. There’s still a qualitative and quantitative gap between Russia and the United States and the rest of the world, including China, in their ability to manufacture the full range of weapons.

       China has no global power projection tools, such as an ocean-going fleet, strategic aviation, global satellite navigation and communication systems, or global reach rapid deployment force. Without them, China is doomed to remain a regional power from a military perspective.

       China has significantly expanded its military budget, but this alone doesn’t guarantee a surefire way to obtain powerful armed forces. In order to strengthen military capacity, one needs to have developed national defense industry. China has one, but it is heavily dependent on imported technology. It turns out that the intellectual head of the Chinese military and industrial complex is located in Russia. The second aspect is that China hasn’t yet demonstrated its ability to create a single qualitatively new generation of weapons. China was unable to accomplish this over the past two centuries due to the lack of fundamental research.

       At this stage, China is trying to achieve the military and technology level that the United States and the Soviet Union enjoyed in the early 1960s. However, these isolated successes cannot drastically change the balance of power in China's relations with Washington. For example, Beijing announced its plan to build three to four nuclear submarines. But how do three nuclear submarine stack up against the US Navy, or how will the creation of one aircraft carrier affect the alignment of forces when the US has squadrons of aircraft carriers?

       Theoretically, China can build up its military capacity by going into a mobilization mode. However, Beijing is constrained by two things here. First, the Chinese economy is too intertwined with the global economy, and the capital outflow will severely limit the success of the Chinese economic model. Second, it is the traditions of Chinese politics. The Chinese strategic culture is devoid of the cult of militarism, such as European or Japanese. In Chinese history, there was no cult of aristocracy as a military class, such as Western European knights or Japanese samurai. China rarely started wars, preferring non-military methods of expansion.

       In Chinese culture, war has never been part of its regular policy. China's strategy is steeped in Sun Tzu’s idea of “winning by design.” This is quite unlike the European-American strategy of Clausewitz, where the war is only the continuation of politics by other means.

       Political constraints

       Beijing seems to have a strong political clout. China remains one of the permanent members of the UN Security Council, and aspires to be a non-formal G20 co-leader together with Russia. However, all of this is part of the system policy within the existing world order. Officially, Beijing states the need to promote “multipolarity” by peaceful rather than military means. Currently, the Chinese diplomacy prefers to act in conjunction with Russia, emphasizing shared positions on all key global issues.

       In today's world order, the Chinese global hegemony is impossible. There are several reasons for that. First, as I mentioned earlier, China’s military potential is still inferior to that of Russia and the United States. China is unable to technically destroy neither Russian, nor American strategic potential.

       Second, there’s a vast cultural difference between China and the Euro-Atlantic world. Here’s what Secretary of State James Baker said in May 1991: “If the European countries are faced with a choice of a global leader, they will, of course, choose the United States, not China, not Japan, and not the Soviet Union." China is an alien culture to them, and the Euro-Atlantic attitude toward it is dominantly negative.

       Third, the financial aspect. Financially, the modern world order is a modification of the Bretton Woods system created in 1944. It identified the dollar as the world's reserve currency and laid the foundations for key international institutions, such as the IMF and World Bank followed by GATT and WTO. All these institutions were based on the prevailing status of the dollar as the world reserve currency. The second reserve currency is the British pound sterling. For yuan to acquire such a status, some major global upheaval must happen. The entire structure of the global economic, political and cultural order must radically change for this to happen, which is unlikely to occur today.

       China will achieve some progress and success, but not much. China does not have the resources that would allow it to globally change the world order in the short term.

       China and the United States

       However, even a limited growth in China's military power will be put to use by the United States and its regional allies, such as Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia and New Zealand and, most recently, Vietnam. These countries, of course, will clamor that China is modernizing its army, which means that they, too, must boost their military spending and expand their military contacts with the United States.

       If China continues to increase its defense budget, it will stoke another arms race and serve as a great justification for Congress to increase US military spending and modernize its weapons under the guise of the Chinese threat. The Republicans will step up and say, “We warned everyone about that, and Obama has slept through the rise of China; we must respond immediately.” The Americans will have an excellent rationale for implementing their concept of China containment, whose foundations they developed back in 1994.

       The White House received good mileage out of playing the “China card.” Beginning in 2010, the US has revived ANZUS, strengthened its ties with Indochina, especially Vietnam, and expanded its presence in Singapore and the Straits of Malacca. In parallel, the United States is rearming the Philippines and looking away as Japan is building powerful armed forces. In July, the Japanese parliament made appropriate amendments to the constitution. The three pillars of the American presence in the Pacific are revived: Japan and South Korea in the north, the Philippines and Singapore in the center, and the ANZUS in the south. The American strategy has changed little since the time of the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty with Japan in 1951.

       China pursues the following objectives: first, it is trying to level out the US military superiority in the region. Second, it wants Taiwan back, but without a large sea fleet China cannot conduct a landing operation because the Americans enjoy military superiority on sea and in the air. Third, the problem-ridden South China Sea. There was a milestone military conflict here in April 2012 when the Americans supplied a state-of-the-art frigate to the Philippines, and it came into conflict with the Chinese Navy. Back then, China was considering the possibility of a conflict not only theoretically, but as an important practical step in the implementation of the Chinese military doctrine as well. However, China does not want a military conflict in the South China Sea, which will be bad for its cooperation with ASEAN.

       China and Russia

       Currently, Russia does not consider China a potential threat. Russia’s superiority in terms of nuclear capabilities and conventional armed forces is too great. Russia and China have few unresolved issues. In Central Asia, Russia supports China’s broad participation in regional affairs and even facilitates its involvement in them. Speaking about border conflicts, they were settled in general in 2004. It's hard to imagine that China, which can’t resolve the Taiwan issue, will decide to start a conflict with a power such as Russia. Both China and Russia are realistic about their respective capabilities.

       Rather, Russia and China share a common goal to create a center of influence aimed at limiting the influence of the United States. Both countries now see the main threat to their national security in Washington's policies.

       China does not want a military conflict with Russia, because we are, in fact, the only country that is friendly to it in the Asia-Pacific Region. Others, including Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand and the United States, share hostility, concerns and fears in relation to China. India can be put on this list as well. As a result, China is left with the only option which is to expand cooperation with Russia.

       Over the past 20 years, both Russia and the United States had strong expectations that China would follow in the steps of either the Soviet Union or the German Empire. However, China stays away from both. Not least because the Chinese notion of a “great power” is different from the European concept.

       1. Betts R. K. Welth, Power and Instability: East Asia and the United States after the Cold War // International Security. Vol. 18. (Winter 1993 / 94). No 3. P. 34–77.

       Views expressed are of individual Members and Contributors, rather than the Club's, unless explicitly stated otherwise.