Future Wars: Could there ever be a conflict between the US and China?

we have never had a century without great power conflict of some kind
a superpower war would be a type of conflict we haven't seen since the
second world war and it would be dramatically different any nuclease
missal launched from Cuba against any nation in the western hemisphere
as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States direct conflict between
the Soviet Union and the us thankfully never materialized and China is the only
country equipped to challenge the us as a superpower it has the motivation and
the means to do so with a huge economy it can bring to bear absolutely this is
a risk that should be taken very seriously so what would a u's China war look like
and is conflict inevitable centuries ago China built this great war to defend its
borders and in recent decades they've made other moves to protect and expand
their territory and influence leading to an explosive rise in power since 1978 when
China began to open up its economy in the wake of chairman Mao's death
GDP has risen an average of roughly 10 percent every year it's gone from an
estimated 149.5 billion us dollars in 78 to a massive 17.7 trillion in 2021.
800 million people have escaped poverty in the country that's about 10 percent
of the world's population that incredible economic growth essentially tethered
China to global supply chains spanning the world and that created heavy trade
dependencies and with those vulnerabilities this economic rise have stalled slightly
in recent years but China remains on course to become the biggest economy in
the world sometime in the next decade the leadership in Beijing has also been
on a mission to use that economic growth to transform its military power China
thinks that mow it's time for China to make use of its greater power to actually
defend its land claimed territories it's widely thought that China is the world's second
biggest spender on its military behind the United States but a lack of transparency
over that spending makes it difficult to prove the country is thought to be upping its
nuclear weapons stockpile developing highly dangerous hypersonic missiles and
is already a world leader in cyber warfare historically China has been a land power
but over the last decades it's created a modern navy from scratch most of it based
in Hainan it now has more vessels than any other country and those warships have
been built to protect their interests and project power beyond these waters but
they are untested president xi Jinping has made no secret of his military ambitions
he wants China to have a world-class military and one that can be fighting
and winning wars by 2049. China has an increasingly concentrated
power system domestically where the power is mostly concentrated
concentrated under one person China's paramount leaders this sense
of urgency comes directly from the top leadership and now under China's
environment there is no one who is able to stand in his way that makes it
much harder to predict China's decision the us has the biggest military the
biggest economy and is arguably the most influential nation in the world but
China is catching up challenging u's supremacy and some in America do not
like it is putting constant pressure on China we can't continue to allow China
to rape our country and that's what they're doing competition with China is
going to be stiff there have been frictions between the countries for decades
of course, with international incidents breaking out of the 95 to 96 third Taiwan
straight crisis the 1999 bombing of the Chinese embassy by the u's in Belgrade
and the 2001 Heinen's spy plane incident but China's rise means it's now on a
more even footing with the us with both countries vying to lead the world
incidents between them could be more likely to escalate into a major war
neither side us or China is explicitly seeking conflict especially when we're
talking about the two biggest economies in the world throwing down essentially
causing massive collateral damage in the world but the political economic security
technological societal historical forces all of these are converging to reach this point
of intense competition so how could one break out this is the most likely place for any
conflict to break out Taiwan the small island off the southeast coast of China split from
the mainland after the communist revolution in 1949. Taiwan is self-run and democratic but
it's also of key strategic importance to the u's and to China the ruling party
seems to believe that Taiwan is also related to its domestic legitimacy so it's hugely
important to the ruling party the stake is also very high for the United States if Taiwan
is lost there is a concern that China might use Taiwan to launch further into west pacific
and the u's credibility could be undermined if u's doesn't come to Taiwan's defense
recently president joe bidden has reinforced America's commitment to the island are
you willing to get involved militarily to defend Taiwan if it comes to that yes you are
that's the commitment we made but Beijing has long wanted to control Taiwan with
xi going so far as to say that reunification must be fulfilled, and he hasn't ruled out
military force to achieve this please rise ladies and gentlemen the president and
the speaker has arrived in august 2022 a trip by u's house speaker Nancy Pelosi
to Taiwan sparked one of the biggest escalations in tension for years and now
more than ever America's solidarity with Taiwan is crucial and that is the message
we are bringing here today China significantly upped military drills around the
island leading to fears it could develop into full scale foundation foreign the war
games eventually wound down, but it was a clear example of how fragile the
situation over Taiwan is China is more or less secure in its land borders it has
weaker neighbors and a vast army at sea it's different it's surrounded by a
string of democracies with powerful militaries like Japan south Korea and
Australia and further out beyond that in the south China sea there are a host
of countries with their own claims their own interests to defend the south
China sea is vital to China the country is a net importer of energy and food so
control over the waterways could be a matter of survival it needs to keep those
roots open it isn't just about warships though China has pioneered a blurring
of operations with the navy the coast guard and the maritime militia a fleet of fishing
boats some of their mom add all of them up together and you get a lot more capability
especially when it comes to transporting a large number of troops for an invasion
Hainan is where many Chinese missions would begin but their aim would be far beyond
these immediate waters the sprawly islands a small, militarized reef the China says is an
inviolable part of its territory are 1500 kilometers from here and likely to be a flashpoint
China has this long-standing position that it has territorial sovereignty over those islands
so, it is hard for China to make a compromise and china has already taken measures to
strengthen and enhance those military installations on the island's China is a huge country
with plenty of interest to defend so there are a lot of potential areas for conflict like here
in the east China sea where there are contested areas with their old rival
Japan another key us ally or here another flare-up on the China India border and how
developing technologies could make a conflict over the Himalayan border possible China's
rivals know there could be a war on the horizon and they're teaming up there is the
quadrilateral security dialogue known as the quad an alliance between the us Japan
India and Australia that was resurrected in 2017. then the orca's pact signed at the
end of 2021 between the us Uk and Australia to address the issues in the south China
sea it's three very like-minded allies standing shoulder to shoulder China was
particularly annoyed by this one calling it irresponsible and showing an obsolete
cold war mentality they are making some progress they are building stronger
defense ties they are working together to develop high-tech military technologies
there is a long way to go before the alliances like august to develop the necessary
military hardware and soft skills to actually fight China in the future wars if the worst
did happen and one of those flash points escalated into all-out war between Chinas
and the us how all-encompassing would that be i think it's going to start small but a
small war under current circumstances could escalate very quickly if we're talking
about an all-out war it is it can escalate all the way to an all-out nuclear exchange
between the two major powers everything will be destroyed in that scenario both
sides will result to economic sanctions and political coercion they will rally their own
allied countries and friendly countries to support them at the urn and other
international platforms the world will be divided for sure and it's hard to imagine the
boundary of that type of conflict the idea of the facilities trap's states that when a
rising power threatens to overtake a ruling power war always follows Thucydides
was an ancient Greek historian was writing about the rise of Athens and the fear
that instilled in Sparta if he is around today, he may well substitute Athens for China
and Sparta for the United States the us remember hasn't really had to worry about a
challenger to u's primacy in global sea power tech space in a very long time and
the us is profoundly uncomfortable with that reality from China's perspective the
reason there is growing trouble between China United States is because China is
rising and China's rise is gradually challenging the predominance of western
countries in international system throughout history rival powers have often com
e into conflict but none of those have the weapons of mass destruction we have
now the Russian invasion of Ukraine has shown that the type of wars we thought
were left in the past are still possible it's surprising to see a military actually invade
another country um violates its sovereignty in such a brutal manner risk such
economic collateral damage but geopolitical insecurities can lead you to do
um some very extreme things and so i think that's very important then to
apply that lens to how we examine China but when it comes to war between nuclear
states nothing is inevitable we need to discard cold war mentality and seek
peaceful coexistence and win-win outcomes at we can be sure of
is that the rivalry between China and the us will be the defining one of us
time whether it remains a cold war or turns Hoit would be a conflict the likes of
which the world has never seen and hopefully will not but both sides are boring
from an ancient roman phrase if you want peace prepare for war.

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