America and China: Nonviolent enemies

The Philippines has changed its foreign policy direction from being an ally of China to being an ally of the United States. The relationship between the United States and China has become critical as it will have a direct effect on our policies.

Recently, there have been talks that US-China relationship should be mended and the two countries should find ways to live harmoniously. The fact is that the relationship between the two countries has deteriorated since the assumption of the presidency by Xi Jinping.

There is a state of thinking that the extreme tension between the United States and China comes from the supposedly inevitable conflict between an existing superpower and a rising superpower. This is the well-known Thucydides principle of the inevitability of conflict between the existing dominant nation and a rising power out to challenge it.

It would be beneficial to the world if the tensions between the two nations could be defused. But in the history of great power struggles, a peaceful settlement has not been historically possible.

Prominent political scientists like Michael Colaresi, Karen Rasler and William Thompson have written that there have been 27 great power rivalries since 1816.  These rivalries have each lasted for an average of 50 years. Nineteen out of the 50 ended in a war with one side beating the other into submission.

Another six of the rivalries ended with an alliance against a third common foe. The rest ended with a tense standoff between the two conflicting countries.  Perhaps this is the best that can be hoped for because this at least avoids full scale fighting.

The United States and China are highly unlikely to be able to find a harmonious way of cooperating in the present world. Firstly, their vital interests are in conflict.  They are competitors in the worlds of technology and trade. Secondly, their respective political systems are completely opposite. Ideologically, China believes in authoritarianism and the United States practices capitalism and liberal democracy.

After the fall of Mao Zedong, there was an attempt for the two superpowers to work closely together. But this was the time of Deng Xiaoping when China introduced