Danger Zone The Coming Conflict With China

A provocative and urgent analysis of the U.S.–China rivalry. It has become conventional wisdom that America and China are running a “superpower marathon” that may last a century. Yet Hal Brands and Michael Beckley pose a counterintuitive question: What if the sharpest phase of that competition is more like a decade-long sprint? The Sino-American contest is driven by clashing geopolitical interests and a stark ideological dispute over whether authoritarianism or democracy will dominate the 21st century. But both history and China’s current trajectory suggest that this rivalry will reach its moment of maximum danger in the 2020s. China is at a perilous moment: strong enough to violently challenge the existing order, yet losing confidence that time is on its side. Numerous examples from antiquity to the present show that rising powers become most aggressive when their fortunes fade, their difficulties multiply, and they realize they must achieve their ambitions now or miss the chance to do so forever. China has already started down this path. Witness its aggression toward Taiwan, its record-breaking military buildup, and its efforts to dominate the critical technologies that will shape the world’s future. Over the long run, the Chinese challenge will most likely prove more manageable than many pessimists currently believe—but during the 2020s, the pace of Sino-American conflict will accelerate, and the prospect of war will be frighteningly real. America, Brands and Beckley argue, will still need a sustainable approach to winning a protracted global competition. But first, it needs a near-term strategy for navigating the danger zone ahead.

One issue could lead to a disastrous war between the United States and China: Taiwan. A growing number of Taiwanese want independence for their island and regard mainland China as an alien nation. Mainland Chinese consider Taiwan a province that was stolen from China more than a century ago, and their patience about getting it back is wearing thin. Washington officially endorses a "one China" policy but also sells arms to Taiwan and maintains an implicit pledge to defend it from attack. That vague, muddled policy invites miscalculation by Taiwan or China or both. The three parties are on a collision course, and unless something dramatic changes, an armed conflict is virtually inevitable within a decade. Although there is still time to avert a calamity, time is running out. In this book, Carpenter tells the reader what the U.S. must do quickly to avoid being dragged into war.

A leading historian's guide to great-power competition, as told through America's successes and failures in the Cold War The United States is entering an era of long-term great-power competition with China and Russia. Such global struggles happen at a geopolitical twilight, between the sunshine of peace and the darkness of war. In this innovative and illuminating book, Hal Brands, a leading historian and former Pentagon adviser, argues that America should look to the history of the Cold War for lessons in how to succeed in great-power rivalry today. Although dangerous authoritarian powers are challenging U.S. influence, America's muscle memory for dealing with powerful foes has atrophied in the thirty years since the Cold War ended. In long-term competitions where the diplomatic jockeying is intense and the threat of violence is omnipresent, the United States will need all the historical insight it can get. Exploring how America won a previous twilight struggle is the starting point for determining how America can master another persistent high-stakes rivalry today.

The United States has been the world's dominant power for more than a century. Now many analysts believe that other countries are rising and the United States is in decline. Is the unipolar moment over? Is America finished as a superpower? In this book, Michael Beckley argues that the United States has unique advantages over other nations that, if used wisely, will allow it to remain the world's sole superpower throughout this century. We are not living in a transitional, post-Cold War era. Instead, we are in the midst of what he calls the unipolar era—a period as singular and important as any epoch in modern history. This era, Beckley contends, will endure because the US has a much larger economic and military lead over its closest rival, China, than most people think and the best prospects of any nation to amass wealth and power in the decades ahead. Deeply researched and brilliantly argued, this book covers hundreds of years of great power politics and develops new methods for measuring power and predicting the rise and fall of nations. By documenting long-term trends in the global balance of power and explaining their implications for world politics, the book provides guidance for policymakers, businesspeople, and scholars alike.

From two former Beijing bureau chiefs with long experience in Asian affairs comes a clear-eyed and uncompromising look at the potentially disastrous collision course now taking shape in U.S.-China relations. Aggressively anti-American, China has nuclear weapons deliberately targeted at the United States. Recent confrontations between Chinese and American military forces indicate that China may try to take Taiwan by force. While our trade deficit rises to unprecedented heights, the powerful new china lobby shapes U.S. policy with the support of American businesses eager for a share of its booming markets. The Coming Conflict with China is required reading for those who wish to understand the tense global rivalry that is already shaping the course of the 21st century. "Plunges harpoons into the tenderest interstices of the Chinese-American relationship."--New York Times "Disturbing and provocative...There is plenty to worry about."--Wall Street Journal

Under Xi Jinping, China has embarked into more aggressive gray zone tactics and operations, especially in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. While this new assertiveness has intensified the likelihood of military crises, especially with the United States, Xi has been keen to remain under the threshold of war. Can this strategy succeed?

Hegemony with Chinese Characteristics compares the historical relationship of China with its neighbours to the developing trajectory of the Belt and Road Initiative, and asks what this tells us about the kind of hegemon China is likely to become. China is going to play a more active and decisive role in the international community and there is much uncertainty about how China will handle its responsibilities and interests. The ambiguous and assertive Belt and Road Initiative is a matter of special concern in this aspect. The Tributary System, which provides concrete evidence of how Chinese dynasties handled relations with foreigners, is a useful reference point in trying to understand its twenty-first century developments. This is particularly true, because after the turbulence of the "Century of Humiliation" and the Maoist Era, China seems to be explicitly re-embracing its history and its pre-revolutionary identity. Confucius, one of the biggest targets of the Cultural Revolution, is being rehabilitated alongside Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism and other ideologies and philosophies suppressed in the Mao era. Doğan analyzes the extent to which China’s current approach to foreign relations resembles its earlier models. Grounded in "hegemony" as an analytic lens, this book provides an innovative study of the power generated by the global rise in China. It will be a valuable resource for scholars and students of Chinese foreign policy and international relations and serve as a benchmark for further studies.

“You almost feel like you are flying when you are already falling.” - RJM. Why are we building a tower? The answer comes from the depths of human curiosity and our thirst for new discoveries. More than ever before in human history, the development of technology has skyrocketed and continues to do so today. The 21st century will witness the return of the human race to the Moon, as well as the first steps humans will take on Mars. This fast-paced development and innovation in the technological sense must be met with caution. In The New Babel, we will have the chance to deeply reflect and rethink what we need to do in the future. We must understand our limitations, so we can not just survive, but also thrive. Modern thinking that there are no boundaries or ends to the world runs the risk of colliding with this obstinate truth. Humanity has the task of learning how to create a sustainable future in the face of challenges to its long-term survival and reconnect to the divine purpose it once had. Is it true that “humans have that potential to destroy themselves?” Or is there a way for us to avoid it from happening? This book will be a guide to the present and even for those future humans on how they could live their life to the fullest without affecting the complex and intricate life on Earth, and enable them to preserve it for their descendants.