Regardless, such imaginative gaming in Sino-American relations is worthwhile because there is an increasingly widespread belief in Washington, DC that China really doesn’t have any good options. If America can help China’s neighbors to “stand up” to China, then the Chinese will be forced to back down and magnanimously change their behavior. The trouble with this belief is that it assumes away any other Chinese response.

To the contrary, in the short term China is far from helpless. As we’ve shown, by linking issues to other parts of its foreign policy—such as cybersecurity cooperation or arms sales to Iran—China can respond in a creative manner that hurts American interests without causing economic self-destruction or immediate conflict escalation. Nonetheless, there is a pernicious logic to such responses: each moves the two countries further down the “realist road to war.” After agreeing to “impose costs” on the United States for its transgression, Xi’s advisors in our imagined scenario outline the potential American responses, some of which are quite serious. This is how a rivalry gradually escalates. Xi can’t just roll over. He responds to America, and America then responds to him. What began with the sale of F-35s now could end with trade restrictions and an increasingly fierce arms race.

In the long run, it is true, selling F-35s to Taiwan will not dramatically alter U.S.-China relations. Nor will it fundamentally change Chinese foreign policy. But history and more general empirical studies suggest that it will confirm the common Chinese sense of American containment, reinforce the “peace through strength” position of hawks on both sides and accelerate Sino-American rivalry. Outspoken PLAN Rear Admiral Luo Yuan suggested in 2010 in the Chinese weekly Liaowang that China should respond to U.S. arm sales to Taiwan with a “strategic combined fist.” Considering history, this is not an outlandish recommendation. After the Belgrade embassy bombing in 1999, the Chinese Central Military Commission convened an emergency meeting to “accelerate the development of ‘Shashoujian’ [杀手锏] armaments.” The bombing acted as a catalytic event, strengthening China’s resolve to challenge U.S. military primacy. Similarly, after the 1995–96 Taiwan Straits Crisis, China doubled down in its pursuit of aircraft carriers. The sale of F-35s to Taiwan would be another such event: something that wounds China’s pride, even as it reminds Chinese leaders of the nation’s military and economic weaknesses. The resulting dynamic would make what Christopher Coker has called the “improbable war” more probable.

That being said, the future, of course, is uncertain: if you imagine it differently than we do, make your case!

Nicholas Butts is a double degree candidate in International Affairs at the London School of Economics and Political Science and Peking University, where he was awarded the National Southwest Associated University Guocai Scholarship Prize (西南联大国采). Follow him on Twitter at: @Nicholas_Butts.

Jared McKinney is a Non-Resident Junior Fellow at the Center for the National Interest and a dual-degree Msc. student at Peking University (School of International Studies) and the London School of Economics and Political Science (Department of International History).

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