This week's column

Why prioritizing China over India in military cooperation makes sense

I've argued for years that America should seek military alliance with China, believing that such a strategic partnership in spreading and protecting globalization would serve each country's supreme national interest. Here's why:

For America to win a long war against radical extremism, we need to make globalization truly global by effectively integrating the one-third of humanity whose noses remain pressed to the glass, wondering when they'll be connected to the global economy. That's labor-intensive, whether it's post-conflict stabilization and reconstruction in failed states or infrastructure development and market creation in developing economies.

Read on at KnoxNews.
Read on at Scripps Howard.

Tom's comment:

I wanted to simultaneously repurpose the USN&WR column's main thrust and spin it off a question I fielded last week from a reader.

Comments

[Bill C.]

I am concerned that Beijing may perceive:

(a) That it can continue to be extremely successful at securing its interests via globalization without the use of military force and,

(b) That the use of military force (especially in conjunction with the United States) is an extremely counterproductive strategy -- one that seems to grow rather than decrease the number of radical extremists and jeapordize rather than protect globalization assets.

Accordingly, China's strategy may be to continue to distinguish itself from the United States in this regard (use of military) and to continue to build on its cooperative -- rather than confrontational -- "special relationship" with the Gap.

India may come to look at these things in the same light as China.

Thus, the only place we may be able to find bodies to fight on our side may be within the Gap itself. Herein may prove to be the ultimate significance of the Africom model.

[Lexington Green]

I don't see why this is cast as China v. India.

We should be working both sides, just as the Indians and Chinese are.

The idea of downplaying China as Cold War II does not require us to downplay a stronger relationship with India.

We should keep the whole board in play, which sounds like something Tom would say.

[Tom Barnett]

Lex,

Did you read the entire column?

[stuart abrams]

This is Barnett at his most brilliant. IMO, the greatest danger to globalization comes from "national interest"/hegemonist approaches to US policy, such as the Kagan piece that Barnett posted a few weeks ago, which could very well lead to confrontation between US and China. At best, this approach would lead to Cold War II, along with attendant economic sanctions, trade restrictions, etc., all of which would present a huge set-back to globalization. Thus, solidifying a strong strategic partnership between the US and China now is the best way of keeping globalization on track. By contrast, it is difficult to see any scenario that could bring about a US vs. India confrontation, so strategic partnership with India is far less important to the continued progress of globalization.

We're at a cross-roads vis a vis China that is similar to where the UK was in 1861 when it was confronted with the decision of whether or not to intervene in the American Civil War. Short-term "national interest" analysis would have counseled the UK to support the Confederacy in order to counteract the "rise" of the US. That undoubtedly would have resulted in a negotiated peace and the partition of the US, which in the short-run, would have served the UK's interests. Instead, after flirting with an alliance with the Confederacy, the UK instead took the long-term approach that guaranteed Union victory, and ultimately, forged the most powerful and long-lasting alliance in recent history (the US/UK "special relationship"). We can do the same thing with China as long as we put aside hegemonist fantasies about needing to "contain" "Rising China".

[stuart abrams]

To Bill C.:The problem is that conflict and the The Gap go together like ham and cheese (best insight in Collier's "Bottom Billion"). China's dependency upon Gap-derived resources will inevitably put it in a position where it will have to deal with Gap-derived conflicts. That's why China needs the US, or at least, it needs a US that isn't being run by hegemonist neo-con ideologues.

[Tom Barnett]

Suffice it to say, whenever I make any China-India comparison, I get a lot of very condescending and acidly sarcastic emails from clearly pissed-off Indians now living in the U.S. (they have a certain brilliance for this sort of delivery).

Actually, I get them whenever I say anything negative about India.

Touchy, touchy . . .

[Tom Barnett]

Stuart,

That decision point, when book-ended in the early years of WWI by our slight wavering over the question of whether we'd support Britain or Germany in the conflict (when the first German submarine made it's cross-Atlantic run through the British blockade, it's crew was feted in NYC and its captain received in the White House), reminds us how iffy the whole "special relationship" was in the making, especially when you consider how big a percentage of the U.S. population in 1910 was made up of German and Irish immigrants.

It's all so obvious to us now, in hindsight. But nothing was so clear back then. It was the result of decisions on both sides to make it so.