The dangerous one is the United States

The implication of AUKUS is that China constitutes a danger to Australian security. It borders on official Australian policy that China is an aggressive power bent on domination. But the history of the People’s Republic suggests its military is for defense, not aggression and that the cases where it has used external military force are very few. Under President Xi Jinping it may be assertive and keen to extend influence, especially economic, but it shows no signs of political/military aggression. On the contrary, it is the United States that constantly uses external military force and is bent on maintaining domination at all costs.

It was less than a year after the birth of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on October 1, 1949 that the Korean War broke out. Korean history of the first years after World War II is too complex to pursue here. But essentially no sooner was Korea independent of a defeated Japan in 1945 than a divided country emerged, with the US setting up the Republic of Korea (South Korea) on August 15, 1948 and the Democratic People’s Republic (North Korea) following on September 9. Under US dominance, it was the south that moved first formally to divide the country.

When the north attacked the south in June 1950, the US got the United Nations to intervene under its own American leadership. China became involved only in October 1950, after the US actively threatened to move north to invade the fledgling PRC. Yet, at US behest, China was condemned for aggression.

Let’s be very clear: the US was the first foreign power to be involved in this war, not China. After a truce reached in 1953, Chinese troops withdrew fully from the north by 1958, while American troops remain in the south to this day. The dangerous one is the US, which assumes its God-given right to control the world, not China. There is no peace treaty covering Korea to this day.

Following the Korean War, China has only rarely been involved in wars outside its own borders. In 1962, it fought a brief border war with India, but it is important to note that the rights and wrongs of this are extremely controversial. Although the Western media reported almost entirely India’s version of events, scholars such as the late Neville Maxwell (1926-2019) and Gregory Clark have shown convincingly that China had a perfectly respectable case.

ALSO READ: Chinese embassy: AUKUS deal jeopardizes peace in Asia-Pacific 

The most recent time China sent troops to attack another country was in Vietnam in February and March 1979 in response to Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia. During this very brief war, China made no attempt to take the capital or to change the Vietnamese government. It withdrew unilaterally.

In short, the longest war since 1949 to see Chinese troops fight outside their borders is still the Korean war. It was unfairly condemned of aggression by the first foreign power to participate in the war, with the US version of events sticking for decades because of its world power.

Since the Korean War, the US continues to be involved in numerous wars, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, among others, with Australia simply taking part to follow the boss. What’s striking is that the US has lost these wars and ended up withdrawing humiliated. The US has attempted to invent an ideological justification but frequently been attacked by protests from within its own borders. It has also been involved in proxy wars, some such as the present Ukraine conflict large in scale.

In contrast to China, the US has hundreds of military bases outside its own borders and has installed numerous governments in foreign countries replacing those that don’t conform to its ideology it calls “democracy”

In contrast to China, the US has hundreds of military bases outside its own borders and has installed numerous governments in foreign countries replacing those that don’t conform to its ideology it calls “democracy”.

Many in the West assume that under Xi Jinping China has become an aggressive nation, even if it was not before. It is true China is much more assertive in world affairs. But I see no sign that China has become aggressive. It shows no sign of wanting to use its armed forces outside its own territory.

ALSO READ: Envoy: AUKUS nuke submarine cooperation jeopardizes security

As for Taiwan, let’s remember that the international community recognizes Taiwan as part of China and Taiwan has no seat by itself in the United Nations. The US may be goading Beijing to retake Taiwan with violence, but has not succeeded up to now. China’s policy is now, and has always been, that it wants to reunify the country by retaking Taiwan, but it wants peaceful reunification, using force only as a last resort.

China extends its influence through trade and investment. We know that its Belt and Road Initiative has expanded China’s economic and to some extent political influence throughout Central Asia, Africa and Latin America, and even the South Pacific. We even hear increasing reports of China’s replacing the US dollar as the reserve currency by trading in the Chinese yuan and other currencies.

Western countries, especially the US, express alarm at the increase of Chinese influence and have taken increasingly severe measures to thwart it. However, what the Chinese have not done is establish military bases, overthrow local regimes or even try to spread their ideology to those countries with which they trade. In this sense they are far less dangerous than the US.

Xi Jinping talks of a common shared future of humanity, not of dominance. Western commentators tend to assume that’s just words, and really he hides deception and conquest in his heart. I don’t see the evidence for that.

What China wants, and what seems to me in China’s interests, are two things. One is to protect China against external attack. The other is a multipolar world, in which China is one of the important poles. It does not want or aim for a Chinese-dominated unipolar world. True, it is becoming involved in the Middle East and in peace processes to an unprecedented extent, at the same time as the US is in decline relative to China (and other countries). Personally, I can’t see why it should not. As a great civilization, it has a right to extensive influence. Influence is quite different from dominance.

READ MORE: US has disrupted Asia-Pacific tranquility by inventing 'China threat'

The US currently assumes it is number 1. Its main aim is to retain that position. Its policies are geared to that end, to keep China down. What alarms the US is China’s success. How can a country so recently impoverished and backward actually be prosperous enough to enjoy a life expectancy at birth longer than the US? (World Bank data for 2020 have China at 78, and the US at 77).

The way Australia has submitted itself to this dangerous and untrustworthy country, the US, is shameful. Our track-record of blindly following allies into wars that don’t concern us is unworthy of the independent country we should be and aspire to be.

 

COLIN MACKERRAS, AO, FAHA is Professor Emeritus at Griffith University, Queensland. He has visited and worked in China many times. He is a specialist on Chinese history, theatre, minority nationalities, Western images of China and Australia-China relations and has written widely on all topics. His many books include Western Perspectives on the People's Republic of China, Politics, Economy and Society, World Scientific Publishing, Singapore, 2015.

The article first appeared in 

The article first appears at PEARLS & IRRITATIONS website: https://johnmenadue.com/the-dangerous-one-is-the-u-s/

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.