America’s Coronavirus Blame Game Must End
Washington seems to want an adversarial China that poses an existential ideological and national security threat because such a China validates Americans’ sense of vulnerability and uncertainty. Plus, it provides an enemy against which to mobilize. Similarly, the Chinese appear to be rationalizing and girding for an increasingly hostile posture toward the United States.
Paul Heer is a Distinguished Fellow at the Center for the National Interest dealing with Chinese and East Asian issues. He served as National Intelligence Officer for East Asia from 2007 to 2015. He has also served as Robert E. Wilhelm Research Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for International Studies and as Adjunct Professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. He is the author of Mr. X and the Pacific: George F. Kennan and American Policy in East Asia (Cornell University Press, 2018).
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