As the West faces a possible confrontation with Russia over Ukraine, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the United States can’t afford an open conflict with Vladimir Putin—and it’s not because the Russian autocrat is too strong, or the United States too disinterested.
America must keep its eyes on the real challenge, an ascendant China, and a new Cold War that Washington appears to be losing. That shouldn’t be.
The United States won the Cold War before by boosting its defensive capabilities and leveraging its economic prowess in foreign policy by investing in cutting-edge technologies and shoring up the economies of its allies. Over the past two decades, America seems to have forgotten its own winning strategy, while China clearly learned its lessons.
The gradual and seemingly voluntary renunciation of the United States’ global primacy is lately fashionably interpreted as the decline of a hegemon. Another way to see it, however, is the United States neglecting its allies, leaving them with neither financial nor security support—and giving them no choice but to side, however reluctantly, with whoever offers it. Famous for its political long game, China readily steps into the void that America leaves behind.
Beijing has grown increasingly assertive in global politics, from the Middle East to Eastern Europe and Latin America. Traditionally pro-U.S. nations aren’t struggling anymore to choose between Beijing and Washington—the United States essentially has forced their hand. They have found a new patron in China that’s using its growing economic strength as the United States used to against the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
“In the new world order, a triangle consisting of three powers—Iran, Russia, and China—has formed.”
America needs to remember that countries are by and large motivated by their national interest, not by ideology, and that a declining hegemon that makes cultural and ideological demands with less and less to offer in return has limited appeal. Meanwhile, China offers supposedly lucrative deals without requiring any political or ideological adjustments from the countries seeking its investment or protection—not until it’s strong enough to demand everything, that is. For now, however, it’s all business, and seemingly reciprocal at that.
The United States should relearn its own Cold War playbook and use it against the Chinese Communist Party instead of letting China wield it against the West. America must act fast to provide credible, practical, unified alternatives to China’s sprawling economic footprint, and to collaborate with its democratic allies while respecting their cultural and national identity.
Until the United States proposes an alternative, the national interest of smaller and larger players friendly to the United States will push them into China’s snare disguised as investment opportunities.
The template to win this new Cold War already exists. It only needs to be revived, adapted to the new adversary, and executed. The U.S. allies will welcome America’s return.
