He must be smoking a funny kind of substance, the
one who suggested that China –– whose rendez-vous with greatness has finally
arrived –– can be contained by the President of the United States of America
doing nothing more than securing “buy-in” from his cabinet secretaries, from
members of his legislature and from the public. This is like suggesting an
octopus, which feeds on crabs, can be contained by one very determined crab.
You'll be surprised to know that Peter Harris
ventured that suggestion in an article he wrote by making an “if only” kind of
argument. Here is the title of that article: “Why Containing China Is Easier
Said Than Done,” and here is the subtitle: “Trump must get buy-in from his
cabinet, both houses of Congress, and from everyday Americans.” It was
published on October 14, 2018 in the National Interest.
Nothing in the Harris article suggests that the
success or failure to contain China depends on China and what it will do in
response to America's actions. In fact, the writer is treating China like an
inert object; one that's sitting there, waiting to be kicked or ignored by the
President of the United States, depending on his whim and the effort he puts
into convincing his folks about the course of action he'll be taking when the
time comes.
Peter Harris bases his argument on the image he
has in his head about the Cold War era. He simply removed the Soviet Union and
put China in its place, having noted that: “The Chinese threat to US national
security pales in comparison to that posed by the Soviet Union.” But what this
situation reveals is that the rivalry between the two superpowers at the time,
was mainly a military rivalry.
The reality on the ground was such that to contain
the Soviet Union meant to go to the countries surrounding it and building bases
that were then manned jointly by local and American troops. In reality, the
strategy was simple and easy to implement for America and its NATO allies who
were by far wealthier than the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact satellites.
In contrast, a rivalry with China today would be
so complex an undertaking, altering it on the ground will prove impossible to
implement. Whereas containing the Soviet Union was like trapping a whale in an
estuary that had a couple of narrow channels open to the ocean, containing
China will be like trying to prevent the tentacles of an octopus from extending
in all directions.
In the Cold War, America was comparatively big and
had NATO with it. Today, America is comparatively small and has no one with it.
It stands like a lonely crab trying to prevent an octopus that's spreading its
economic and financial tentacles into Asia, Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe
and even Western Europe where it is warmly welcomed in all the places. When
you're a crab that's intelligent enough to know octopuses eat crabs, you don't
want to challenge the octopus that's dominating his surroundings. Do you hear
that, America?
Still, America calls itself a liberal democracy.
As such its political players are addicted to the game of politics the way that
gamblers are addicted to gambling. No matter how much they are told, and how
much they learn from experience that gambling with politics is bad for them,
they cannot stop the habit. They engage in the vice continually till they ruin
themselves and the nation as if they had no alternative. They suffer
consequences they could have avoided, and seek reelection without doing as much
as promise to change their ways.
Look what Peter Harris admits is happening in
America:
“While the politics of opposing China will be
around for some time –– nobody can dispute there are votes to be gained in
stoking animus against China –– it is unlikely to produce much more than the
sort of harsh rhetoric and unconnected foreign policies that are already on
offer … The effect of rising anti-China sentiment will be real: a potentially
dangerous to the bilateral relationship between the world's two most important
powers. But they will be muted. It would take a massive shift in domestic
opinion or a dramatic international crisis to jolt America into accepting
anything more dramatic than this”.
That's wishful thinking on the part of Peter
Harris. But Murphy's Law says that under normal circumstances, if something can
go wrong, it will go wrong at some point. Now imagine what it must be like in a
so-called liberal democracy where all things are prone to go wrong the way they
have since the American culture was invaded and contaminated by the
Judeo-Yiddish subculture.