China-US relations show signs of strain
Photo: L-R, news.boisestate.edu and corporateforeignpolicy
The bilateral relationship between the US and China is complicated and multi-faceted. The relationship touches on a wide range of areas, such as security, economic policy and bilateral and multilateral issues. Economically the US and China have become intertwined. China is the second largest US trading partner. It also has the second largest holder of US securities and largest holder of Treasury bonds. The Obama administration was definitely very China friendly in the first year. A major reason is America's need for China to continue to buy US Treasury bond in the midst of the economic meltdown in America. Barack Obama, keen to avoid displeasing the Chinese, declined to meet the Dalai Lama shortly before the US president's own debut in Beijing, where he too extolled the range of common interests shared by the two powers. There is a view in America's Republican Party that Obama gave in too much to China in some of the early negotiations like his visit to China during the first year of his office. He spent four days and three nights in Beijing and Shanghai. Washington insiders cannot expect America to negotiate from a position of strength like during President Clinton years, because China is just so much stronger now economically and politically. China's recent success comes from its status as the world's leading creditor nation. As history as shown, power flows to where money is and that is playing out again in China today. Now that Washington has perceived China to be the other super power of the world in future, it would be hard for the US to put pressure on China. America has a problem now where the Chinese leadership also has to satisfy and listen to the growing middle class that is more nationalistic and confident than ever. So, as Washington is pressing President Obama to get more out of China, the Chinese population is also pressuring the Politburo to not give any concession to the US. Mr Obama approved a $6 billion arms sale to Taiwan. The divergence of opinion on the military sale to Taiwan stems from how the West and China sees Taiwan. Most Westerners believe that Taiwan is a separate sovereign entity that should only rejoin China if it wishes to do so. Therefore, Americans see these military sales as fulfilling the Taiwan Relation Act by providing Taiwan with additional defensive deterrent. The weapons themselves are very advanced, but they are defensive in nature and are not going to change the military balance across the straits. The best hope for Taiwan is still to make peace with China and maintaining strong relationship with America. Most Chinese people believe that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China that no other country should interfere with. Therefore, any sale to Taiwan is looked as containing Chinese power, violating its sovereignty and interfering with its internal affairs. To the Chinese, the US president appears to have reneged on promises in 2009 November's joint statement of the two countries during President Obama's visit to China to concentrate on mutual interest and ignore intractable differences. Mrs Clinton has berated China for creating a new "information curtain" on the internet to rival the Iron Curtain of the Cold War era, and stoutly supporting Google in its dispute with the Chinese authorities over hacking and censorship. China's leaders detect deliberate provocations from the Obama administration. They believe the Google row early this year could have been limited to a trade issue but the White House chose to maximise its political impact. In private and public, China bitterly accuses US of engineering the award in October of the Nobel Peace Prize to a Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, in an effort to undermine its government. Washington's options from here are limited. China holds most of America's $12.4 trillion debt and American consumers are hooked on cheap Chinese products. Beijing's growing strength seems to reflect a belief that the US needs China more right now than the other way around. Observers say Washington has little leverage over Chinese policies. A lot of America has not caught up with the fact that China now can say no more often. They argue that Chinese leaders are considering how to balance its interest in supporting North Korea with the interest in preventing more accidents or another nuclear test in the Korean Peninsula.
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