The silent LLP between the PRC and the USA
Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 12:03AM 
WAPO story on a long-favorite theme of mine here and in the brief: the limited liability partnership between China and the US--as in, we do the Leviathan and pay for virtually all of the up-front SysAdmin work, but China cashes in nicely on the backside economic integration.
China didn't take part in the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq or the bloody military battles that followed. It hasn't invested in reconstruction projects or efforts by the West to fortify the struggling democracy in the heart of the Middle East.
But as the U.S. military draws down and Iraq opens up to foreign investment, China and a handful of other countries that weren't part of the "coalition of the willing" are poised to cash in. These countries are expanding their foothold beyond Iraq's oil reserves -- the world's third largest -- to areas such as construction, government services and even tourism, while American companies show little interest in investing here.
The Chinese are risk-tolerant on economics, just not on the pol-mil. And they cannot become a superpower until they get such risk-tolerance in the kinetic realm. And that can't come until they go multiparty, because the CCP cannot afford even a single loss of face. And if you can't afford to lose, then you can't afford to wage war.
So oddly enough, the longer we put up with this LLP, the longer we keep China in its pol-mil place.
China, Iraq, US foreign policy | in Citation Post | Email Article | Permalink | Print Article 
Reader Comments (1)
Your comment title, "The silent LLP between the PRC and the USA" reminded me of an angry Chinese student who stormed into my humble abode at WuYi University in Jiangmen (1994) and, with fury in his eyes and his best broken English, yelled, "Why JFK of USA follow KMT of ROC and not Mao of PRC?!!!" In addition to learning some new acronyms I also learned that, whether I liked it or not, in the eyes of this student (and many others) I represented all of America. Scary ... especially for someone like me who is only now ~ in my "mature" years ~ entering the field of international relations. Thanks for your most helpful insights in this arena, Mr. Barnett.