By Scott A. Snyder
Skepticism within China about the US rebalancing is strong.
I spent a week in China early this month on the heels of the Shangri-La Dialogue and amidst rising tensions in the South China Sea following China’s placement of an oil rig in disputed waters near Vietnam. Instead of spending time “inside the ring roads” of Beijing with America-handlers practiced at making careful judgments about the China-U.S. relationship, I visited a few regional cities where the Chinese views of the U.S. rebalancing policy that I heard were harsh and unvarnished. This mood parallels Liz Economy’s assessment last month of the growing misconnect in U.S.-China relations.
At an academic workshop, I listened to a presentation by a Chinese colleague on how the U.S. grand strategy of the rebalance, and especially American efforts to reassure allies, were really about the “construction of threats,” designed to make China into the enemy. In this scholar’s narrative, the Obama administration’s “Return to Asia (PDF)” was responsible for promoting regional instability, especially by backing allies, thereby creating instability and a demand among allies for greater security measures. President Obama’s promise in April to defend the Senkakus was a primary case in point. The economic component of the U.S. rebalancing strategy through establishment of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) drew an equally skeptical analysis from this scholar, who concluded that the U.S. design is to create an unstable atmosphere in Asia so that Asian countries continue to accept a U.S. presence in the region.
Read the full story at The Diplomat