A Declining China Is a Dangerous China
Even if the United States has fallen into decline in absolute economic and military terms, China may have crested early and plunged into yet steeper decline. In that case, the margin between the contestants would widen even if both countries were on the wane. If that’s how Xi Jinping & Co. size things up, they might order the People’s Liberation Army into action while China stands its best chance of success. There is ample precedent.
Back to Admiral Aquilino’s diagnosis of what ails China and could spur aggression. It could be that China has started its descent without ever overtaking U.S. power. Even if the United States has fallen into decline in absolute economic and military terms, China may have crested early and plunged into yet steeper decline. In that case, the margin between the contestants would widen even if both countries were on the wane. If that’s how Xi Jinping & Co. size things up, they might order the People’s Liberation Army into action while China stands its best chance of success. There is ample precedent.
With apologies to Thucydides, maybe we should rejigger his dictum to fit the U.S.-China competition: “The withering of the power of China, and the alarm which this inspired in Beijing, made war inevitable.”
Ponder.
About the Author: Dr. James Holmes, U.S. Naval War College
Dr. James Holmes is J. C. Wylie Chair of Maritime Strategy at the Naval War College and a Distinguished Fellow at the Brute Krulak Center for Innovation & Future Warfare, Marine Corps University. The views voiced here are his alone.
