Trump and China

There are certain reasons why the Trump administration continues to attack China. The Trump administration’s attitude has become aggressive as the November presidential elections are approaching. Tensions are rising between the two largest economies of the world.

President Trump is trailing against Democratic candidate Joe Biden. He thinks that the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic in America is the main reason of his falling popularity, and he is blaming China for this situation.

In fact, he is blaming China for his administration’s failures. The market-driven American healthcare system simply collapsed, and Trump’s policies allowed the virus to spread.

One thing is clear: the Trump administration and the right-wing Republican Party want to whip up the anti-communist and anti-China sentiments that exist in sections of the American population. They want to rally right-wing voters around the presumed fear of Communist China.

The trade war, mounting tension in the South China Sea and deteriorating diplomatic relations indicate that the US and China have already entered into an era of hostility, mistrust and suspicions. The struggle to gain maximum influence, economic clout and strategic advantage between US and China is going to sharpen in the coming period. A new cold war is on the cards.

There are many reasons behind the rising tensions between the two countries. The main one seems to be the increased suspicion within the American administration towards the role of the Chinese Communist Party and the hybrid economic system.

American officials now believe that the Chinese Communist Party and state have an increased role in China’s economy and society. They have drawn the conclusion that the CCP has tightened its control and is not moving towards the full restoration of capitalism in China.

Recent statements by US Secretary of State Pompeo are clear indication that the Trump administration has changed its decades-old China policy. The old American policy was to engage with Communist China to encourage it to integrate with world markets and global capitalist institutions. In this policy, China was seen as a partner. But in the new policy, China is considered a threat and thus needs to be contained.

In the last few months, Pompeo made one speech after the other to demonise China. He has called for an international alliance of countries to take it from here, framing it as a choice between freedom and tyranny. This sounds like typical cold-war era American rhetoric.

Before Pompeo’s speech, three other top officials of the Trump administration made hard hitting speeches on China. National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien had focused on the ideological underpinnings of the Chinese Communist Party; Attorney General William Barr had addressed business and trade ties; and FBI director Christopher Wray spoke on intelligence and hacking. All these speeches clearly indicate the change in American policy towards China.

Secretary Pompeo, without mincing any words, admitted the failure of the old China policy and that it had failed to bring desired results. “The old paradigm of blind engagement with China has failed. If the free world doesn’t change Communist China, (it) will surely change us.”

The top US diplomat said, citing Nixon, that the purpose of engaging with China was to “induce change”. The thinking among policymakers then was that as China became more prosperous it would become “freer at home” and “friendlier abroad”. He said that it did not quite happen that way.

“The kind of engagement we have been pursuing has not brought the kind of change in China that President Nixon hoped to induce,” Pompeo said, adding, “Whatever the reason, China today is increasingly authoritarian at home, and more aggressive in its hostility to freedom abroad.

“Nations must change the way they deal with China. We cannot treat this incarnation of China as a normal country,” Pompeo said, adding that the US cannot do it alone because the Chinese have spread far too wide and deep into the world, unlike the Soviet Union, which had remained closed.

There is a need for “a new grouping of like-minded nations — a new alliance of democracies”. When asked if he was urging nations to pick between the US and China, in line with a choice the US presented to the world in the 1940s between itself and the USSR, Pompeo said the choice for them was between ‘freedom and tyranny’.

“If we bend the knee now, our children’s children may be at the mercy of the CCP (the Chinese Communist Party), whose actions are the primary challenge to the free world,” he had said in his speech, as he was laying out the threat the world faced form China.

“We must also engage and empower the Chinese people...a dynamic, freedom-loving people who are completely distinct from the Chinese Communist Party.” he said.

Pompeo has been meeting Chinese dissidents from Xinjiang and Hong Kong and some of them were present in the audience at the invitation-only event.

Pompeo has summed up the mood of the Trump administration and some sections of the American ruling classes towards China. It shows the frustration of the American administration regarding the state-dominated economic model of China. The American ruling class thought that the market reforms that begun in 1978 would abolish communist rule in China like happened in the Soviet Union.

The thought was that reforms would finally restore capitalism and China would become a capitalist democracy like Russia. But that never happened. China has survived with its unique hybrid system without full restoration of the capitalist system. China has introduced some elements of capitalism under the Chinese New Economic Policy. Market economy has been introduced in China under state domination and control. China attracted foreign direct investment and modern technology through that policy. And it worked well for the country. But socialist elements remained dominant.

Through market reforms and increased trade, China integrated its economy with the world market and economy. China ended its economic isolation through this process. China has public ownership, planning and investment. The state still dominates the economy. The Chinese system lacks the direct participation of the people in the running of both the economy and society. The Democratic aspect needs to be increased.

This Chinese economic model is the real threat for the neoliberal economic model of the West. The Chinese economic model with the inclusion of democratic and political rights can be an alternate model for many Asian and African developing countries. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the Chinese model has proved that it is a far more efficient system than capitalist neoliberal models like America. So the Chinese system is the real target.

The writer is a freelance journalist.