From a review of the historical and cultural context of both U.S. and China’s perspectives on the world (as explored more fully in the Appendix), we can summarize the following observations:

Differences in Historical Practices — For at least two thousand years, China has been engaged in trade with its neighbors, primarily through its tributary system. While expecting tributary obeisance from all its neighbors, at the same time the Chinese Emperors also recognized the rights of their own local rulers. This system first began with the Silk Road when the Han Dynasty opened trade with the west in 130 BCE. Following the spectacular expeditions of Admiral Zheng, He in the early 1400s, the tributary system began to decline, and many intrepid Chinese merchants accordingly increased their private trade in the Southern China Seas. They traded peacefully with countries throughout the area, including Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand. But following the long-practiced tributary system they never set out to conquer those countries and did not even claim uninhabited islands for their Emperor when they were the first ones to settle on them.

In contrast, the European countries, their appetite whetted by fine Chinese goods such as silk, porcelain, tea, and Asian spices that had come to them via the Silk Road, wanted more – preferably without having to pay for them. The 1457 Papal Doctrine of Discovery gave Spain and Portugal the moral right to sail far and wide, claiming sovereignty over all land and islands they found along the way. Soon Protestant countries began to adopt this Doctrine as well and set out on their own to colonize land all over the world: Africa, the Americas, the Indian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia, confident that they had the God-given right to take and govern any land they came across and to subjugate all native peoples. Today, this practice is so ingrained and internalized that hardly anyone in the West is even aware of its origin.

World Economy — Through the 1700s and early 1800s, China was the largest economy in the world. The subsequent economic decline, coupled with an inept government, left the country vulnerable. The British East India Company, the de facto British government, exploited the opportunity and started two successful Opium Wars against China in the name of free trade. Thus began China’s Century of Humiliation, which in fact lasted close to two centuries.

The U.S.-led victory in WWII, dubbed “the moral war” by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, gave the U.S. the status of the moral premier country in the world. Its Marshall Plan, created and implemented in 1948 to aid in the economic recovery of European countries, including its WWII enemies Germany and Italy as well as Japan, solidified its standing. When the program ended in 1952, the economy of every participating country had surpassed its pre-WWII level.

During this same period, the Communist takeover of China in 1949 sealed the country off from outside contact or influences. Widespread famine ensued, and millions died. In the following decades no country would even contemplate that China would one day again attain a formidable economic presence on the world stage.

However, the opening up of China in the 1970s by Premier Deng Xiaoping unleashed the huge latent entrepreneurial energy among its citizens. Fifty years later China has taken 800 million of its citizens out of poverty to become the second largest economy of the world in the process and is now poised to surpass the U.S. in 2030 to become, once again, the largest economy in the world.

International Diplomacy — In 2013 Chinese President Xi Jinping announced the    One Belt, One Road Initiative that advocates for international peace and cooperation. This Initiative also recognizes that every nation has the right to determine its own form of self-government. In rapid succession, China has signed the Samarkand Declaration with countries that represent two thirds of the world’s population. The Declaration also promises China’s assistance in infrastructure building, as well as access to the Chinese market. There is no mention of military dominance.

Alarmed by the rapid rise of China’s economy and its international diplomatic influence, and concerned about its seemingly aggressive military demonstrations in Southeast Asia, the U.S.    in 2017 began a policy to ‘contain’ China. Turning its back on the 2016 agreement that President Obama had reached with China President Xi on curbing worldwide carbon emissions, and rebuffing Xi’s overture to collaborate on China’s One Belt, One Road Initiative, the U.S. set out to raise the tariffs on Chinese goods, emphasize investing in the U.S., align its allies against China, and compete with China on multiple fronts in a zero-sum game. Realization that the U.S. has become severely challenged by China in key technologies such as building electric car batteries, semiconductors, renewable energy solar panels and quantum computers has heightened the urgency of this policy.

In response to China’s Samarkand Declaration Initiative, the U.S. last year launched its own Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity and received the support of several prominent countries such as India and Indonesia. However, unlike the Chinese Samarkand Declaration, the United States did not offer its partners access to the U.S. market.  

A recent polling of eleven European countries found that the majorities of respondents in all those countries would be unwilling to support the U.S. against China if there were to be a military escalation between these two powers. They would wish to remain neutral. A concurrent poll in Southeast Asia found that in all ten resident countries polled, China’s influence has risen in the last five years while that of the U.S. has ebbed.

While recent meetings between high-level officials of the U.S. and China indicate a possible shift, most U.S. policy makers continue to view competition with China as a zero-sum game. For the U.S. to win, China must lose.

China has repeatedly claimed that it does not want war with the United States. An increasing number of China specialists and institutions in the U.S. have urged restraint and proposed instead to seek common ground and mutual respect.