Fwd: Peaceful rise’ will meet US containment interview with John Mearsheimer + Tit-for-tat policy toward Japan an unwise strategy Globaltimes China

peaceful rise, my left foot. the hans will attack russia, india, taiwan and japan to 'teach them a lesson'. and oh, incidentally to kill off the 30 million womanless, rowdy, uncontrollable men it will have due to female infanticide. 

but the upside is that it will capture siberia, may well bully india into submission. japan may not be such a pushover. 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: sanjeev nayyar
Date: Thu, Nov 7, 2013 at 10:09 AM
Subject: Peaceful rise' will meet US containment interview with John Mearsheimer + Tit-for-tat policy toward Japan an unwise strategy Globaltimes China
To: esams Nayyar <esamskriti@suryaconsulting.net>

Also read - Tit-for-tat policy toward Japan an unwise strategy http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/823081.shtml 7/11/13

 

Peaceful rise' will meet US containment - Globaltimes China

http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/823045.shtml 6/11/13

 

Editor's Note:

John Mearsheimer (Mearsheimer), professor of political science at the University of Chicago, is best known in China for his book The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (2001), in which he predicts, based on his pessimistic view of the anarchic world order, that China's rise will inevitably be "unpeaceful." Has anything changed this position? What will China's efforts at "peaceful rise" bring to the Asia-Pacific region? Global Times (GT) reporter Chen Chenchen interviewed Mearsheimer exclusively during his recent trip to Beijing.

GT: Tragedy will be issued in a new edition in April 2014, in which the China section will be revised. Is there any change in your long-held conclusion that China cannot rise peacefully?

Mearsheimer: No. I am quite certain that China cannot rise peacefully. I now have a lengthy concluding chapter that makes my argument.

But my argument is based on my theory of international politics, and my theory, like all social science theories, is not always right. So there is some possibility that I will be proved wrong. And I always say let's hope that this is one of those cases where I am proved wrong, because I tell a very depressing story. But I believe, I'm sad to say, that I will not be proved wrong.

GT: Chinese President Xi Jinping recently proposed that China should take the initiative in its neighborhood policy, and achieve a win-win situation. How do you interpret this? Does this mean China's rise will enter a new stage?

Mearsheimer: I think from Xi's perspective, and I think it would be true for any US president as well, the ideal situation would be a win-win situation.

But the fact is there is no win-win situation. International politics among great powers is basically a zero sum game. When one side wins, the other side loses.

 

As China rises and becomes increasingly powerful, it will want to dominate Asia the way the US dominates the Western hemisphere. The US of course will go to great lengths to prevent China from dominating Asia. There will be an intense security competition between them.

GT: There seems to be increasingly louder voices from Chinese experts that China should adjust its low-profile strategy. Do you agree?

Mearsheimer: I believe the smartest strategy for China is to maintain a low-profile approach to international politics and to have a very soft, very light touch when dealing with its neighbors and any crisis that might arise. It's not in China's interest at this point to pursue a hard-nosed foreign policy.

And the reason I say this is that I believe time is on China's side. It becomes more and more powerful with the passage of time. So what China should do is to wait until it is much more powerful than it is now, and then become more assertive, because it is much more likely to get its way in the future when it is more powerful relative to its neighbors as well as the US. So keeping a low profile in the near future is the smartest strategy for China.

China's neighbors, like the Philippines and Vietnam, have a different incentive structure. They understand that time is on China's side, and therefore from their perspective it makes sense to worry about China now and to cause trouble now. If you look at all the crises that have arisen in East Asia over the past 10 years, it is China's neighbors, not China, that have started almost all of them.

China has overreacted in most cases to those provocations, but the provocations were not initiated by China. Of course China cannot afford to ignore them. China has to make it clear what its position is. But China should go to great lengths, in my opinion, not to use bellicose language or force, but instead use firm language.

GT: Many think China's influence only lies in economic field at the moment. Along with economic growth, can China automatically gain discourse power in the international arena?

Mearsheimer: My guess is China will not crash and its economy will continue to grow in impressive ways. And the end result will be that China will become increasingly powerful militarily.

As China grows economically and militarily, it will be able to throw its weight around in international institutions, and in its use of diplomacy.

 

But one should remember that the US and China's neighbors will go to great lengths to contain Chinese power, and that will put a limit on how much influence China has. Nevertheless China is a huge country, and it has tremendous economic potential.

Specifically on the South China Sea issue, China should not be pushing forward negotiations at this point in time. What China should do is wait 20 or 25 years, and then negotiate. It will be much easier for it to get a favorable outcome then.

GT: China's neighbors, especially businesspeople, don't seem to prefer single leadership in this region by either China or the US, but prefer to maximize benefits through balancing the two powers. Is this the case?

Mearsheimer: Businesspeople have only one goal: to make more money. They don't care very much about geopolitics. The geopolitical logic is fundamentally different, it's zero-sum.

GT: So you're saying regional players will need to take sides either with the US or with China?

Mearsheimer: Absolutely. That's what will happen. There will be many countries in Asia that will have a very powerful incentive to side with China for economic reasons, and with the US for security reasons. The question you have to ask yourself is which one will win out. My argument is that security will dominate economics. And the key reason is that survival has to be the principal goal for every state.

Countries like South Korea, Japan, and Australia that have a great deal of economic intercourse with China and would like to continue to trade with China will nevertheless in the end be forced to side with the US in a balancing coalition aimed at containing China.

GT: So China will become an isolated rising power?

Mearsheimer: China will have a few allies. I think that North Korea will be an ally, as will Laos, Cambodia, and Pakistan. As to Myanmar, I think the US will go to great lengths to transform Myanmar from a Chinese ally to a US ally. We've done that with Indonesia and Malaysia. The US will even go to great lengths to win Pakistan over to our side.

 

The problem that China faces is that it is physically located in Asia, and it is a direct threat to its neighbors in ways the US is not. It's purely a function of geography. The US has no territorial goals in Asia, nor do we have territorial goals in Europe. That is why the Europeans never feared us either.

There is little doubt that there will be an intense security competition between the US and China. I think, to choose my language carefully, there is a reasonable chance that the US and China will end up in a shooting war over the next 30 or 40 years. I don't think it will be a war on the scale of either WWI or WWII. A general war between the US and China is not possible, mainly because of nuclear weapons.

Warm Regards
sanjeev nayyar
https://twitter.com/sanjeev1927
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sent from samsung galaxy note, so please excuse brevity