America as No. 2

Here's a great essay in Asia Sentinel about the seemingly inexorable rise of China as a superpower, equal to or the superior of the United States:

Two important questions for the second decade of the 21st Century are whether China can be satisfied even by becoming a coequal of the United States; and whether the latter would be amenable to accepting China as its coequal? A very important, but a tacit, aspect related to the latter question is that the United States should also be ready for the scenario of China becoming number one among the hierarchy of nations within a decade or so.

The economic superpower is almost certain to become a military superpower as well, though perhaps not following the models we are familiar with: Germany in the 1930s, the Soviet Union in the 1950s, the United States in the 1990s. China will dice and slice, building its space- and electronic-warfare capabilities as a counterweight to the U.S. military; turning the small and eventually the large nations of Asia into pliable states on the model of Finland, whose testicles were owned by the Soviet Union for the duration of the Cold War; and gradually expanding the sphere of its dominance:.

What is interesting to note is that, as China continues its awesome economic rise, it seems to have initiated the process of expanding the list of its core interests. In the past, only Taiwan and Tibet were included in that list. Lately, however, it has also added the South China Sea as a core issue. Considering the fact that the PRC has shown no inclination to negotiate on the "old" core issues, it is expected to do the same regarding the South China Sea. There is a major difference between its old and its new core issues.

On its old core interests (Taiwan and Tibet) no other country is claiming sovereignty over them (even though one can argue that Taiwan claims to be a sovereign nation and its sovereignty is recognized by numerous countries, but their numbers are steadily dwindling). However, in the case of the South China Sea, the interests of other states of East Asia come into conflict with that of China.

Blue skies! -- Dan Ford