U.S.-China relations have deteriorated to a level unforeseen since the early 1960s. China’s rapid military modernization, maritime posturing, and diplomatic withdrawals signal a persistent security-focused approach from Beijing. What is to be done in an era of great power competition, where policies promoting careful coexistence and reduction of tensions are deprioritized?

In a new article for The Washington Quarterly titled “China’s America Policy: Back to the Future,” co-authors Thomas Fingar, Shorenstein APARC fellow, and David M. Lampton, a senior research fellow at the Johns Hopkins—SAIS Foreign Policy Institute and a former Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow at FSI, explain the current tensions through a comprehensive analysis of the historical drivers of Chinese policy. The article enhances the understanding of Chinese grand strategy and proposes a series of policy prescriptions to help reduce the dangerous externalities of the diplomatic feud between Beijing and Washington.

March 2024 update: Thomas Fingar and David M. Lampton joined Kaiser Kuo, host of the Sinica Podcast, to discuss their Washington Quarterly article. Listen:

The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Center for Global Security Research (CGSR) sponsored the talk entitled "China's America Policy: Origins and Implications" by Dr. Tom Fingar on February 15, 2024. Watch:

Unhelpful Caricatures of China

Fingar and Lampton begin the article by acknowledging that U.S. policy is an important driver of Chinese behavior. They argue that U.S. policy has often been based on inaccurate and oft-counterproductive characterizations of China.

The authors challenge reductivist portrayals of Chinese strategy as purely ideological are misleading, asserting that “describing the PRC as an autocracy means interpreting its behavior as part of an ideological crusade to preserve the regime and thwart U.S. ambitions” and that  “Beijing’s Communist Party leaders, like leaders in all countries, seek to preserve their political system, but that is not their only objective.”

Fingar and Lampton also dispute the prevailing view in Washington of China as an “unstoppable juggernaut determined — and/or destined — to displace the United States and remake the international system,” emphasizing instead that current PRC behavior is better understood as the product of perceived weakness and fragility.

To manage the current impasse, the authors suggest that Washington must avoid exacerbating the situation and must shape Chinese perceptions in a way that might facilitate a transition to a more cooperative coexistence.

The True Drivers of China’s Strategy

The authors purport that, over the centuries, China’s policy options have coalesced into one of two comprehensive approaches: one that prioritizes national and regime security, and another prioritizing economic and social development.

The first approach assumes a hostile international environment and promotes “economic autarky, tighter domestic social control, ideological conformity, a leader-in-charge approach to governance, and deep suspicion of foreigners.” The second “emphasizes the gains to be made through interdependence and openness, places less emphasis on ideology, and instead underscores the importance of experts, pragmatism, initiative and innovation.”

These two drivers, in the authors’ view, neatly explain the last century of Chinese grand strategy and frame the current administration’s emphasis on security and coercive Wolf Warrior Diplomacy.

Theories of Encirclement

The authors add that, both historically and currently, an important category of factors shaping Chinese policy is assumed subversion, that is, “persistent attitudes […] centered on suspicion and fear of outsiders (foreign countries and groups) and social forces swirling in China itself [...] Almost any action that could be negative for China is perceived as taken to weaken the regime.”

Chinese commentators often cite U.S. foreign policy activities — including Secretary of State Clinton’s statements about maritime claims at the 2010 ASEAN Regional Forum, the Obama Administration’s 2011 “Pivot to Asia,” NATO’s and other security groupings’ involvement in Asia, and alleged U.S. efforts to foment regime change through “peaceful evolution” — as a rationale for Beijing’s increased assertiveness.

However, Fingar and Lampton see these as excuses and contributing factors to decisions primarily motivated by concerns about a perceived growing danger of domestic instability that would impede economic growth and erode regime legitimacy.

What can be done?

In the final section of the article, the authors reflect on the poor state of U.S.-China ties, arguing that “relations will spiral unless domestic factors persuade Beijing to reprioritize growth and development.” Indeed, Xi Jinping’s return to the security-minded policy package signifies a departure from the cooperative approach prevalent in the latter half of the 20th century. The authors emphasize that an escape from the current downward trajectory in U.S.-China bilateral relations “will not occur without joint efforts and a change in the domestic politics of both societies.”

For this to happen, Beijing must first perceive less hostile intent from Washington. According to the authors, this will be no easy feat. Despite common expressions of intent to improve relations and to put a “floor” under the relationship voiced at ministerial-level meetings and recent meetings between Biden and Xi, little has improved in real terms. “Even limited and tangible efforts to pick low-hanging fruit such as mutual reduction of tariffs, restoration of academic exchanges, and reopening closed consulates remain dormant or ineffective.”

For Fingar and Lampton, Washington needs an approach that does not depend on prior or simultaneous moves by Beijing. The authors provide three concrete areas that may help bolster U.S.-China ties. The first is to avoid behaviors that push “PRC hot buttons” and trigger predictable reactions that stymie meaningful dialogue. The U.S. must continue to conduct necessary and appropriate military exercises in international waters and airspace and should call out dangerous or unprofessional actions by the PLA Navy or Air Force.

To this end, the U.S. should also avoid making statements and take actions that make it difficult for Beijing to respond positively, as “many third country observers are spring-loaded to criticize US inaction to reduce tensions [...] Conversely, PRC initiatives should be treated seriously, examined carefully, and addressed appropriately.”

The second area of improvement is to avoid declaring preconditions for discussions or taking actions that may not be in U.S. interests. Such preconditions rarely, if ever, have eased or accelerated desirable outcomes, and imposing conditions further complicates the resolution of issues and indicates to third countries that the United States is solely responsible for tensions.

To start the process, the authors suggest that “both sides ought to pick some low-hanging policy fruit like reopening consulates in Houston and Chengdu and increasing mutual media access [...] Both sides should see the benefit of having more than 350 American students studying in China.”

The third and most complicated issue is Taiwan. “Taiwan-related issues are the elephant in the room that cannot be ignored, but there is nothing to be gained by abandoning the policy of strategic ambiguity or further muddying the US position,” write Fingar and Lampton.

The authors suggest that the correct response to speculation on this issue should be “restatement of the USG position that the use of force in the Taiwan Strait is unacceptable, that there will be absolutely no support for Taiwan independence unless Taipei and Beijing peacefully reach agreement, and that relations between the people of Taiwan and the United States will remain unofficial [...] Washington needs to stop nibbling around the edges of the One China Policy.”

Only when progress is made on these three areas will perceived threats to Beijing begin to diminish. In the meantime, the current U.S. and Chinese framework of great power competition that “justifies efforts to hobble the other, is harmful to both countries and impedes international efforts to address global challenges.”

The authors deploy the “first law of holes” as a good place to start: “When you are in a hole as we are now in the relationship with China, stop digging. Making things worse is a poor way to seek improvement.” A reduction in tensions will not be easy, but tangible and modest measures to avoid hostility and work toward bounded competition and even cooperation on transnational challenge areas like pandemic disease and climate change mitigation should remain a possibility. 

This Q&A originally appeared in Al Jazeera. 

Southeast Asian nations are stuck in “troubling divisions” over Myanmar’s coup crisis and China’s expansionism in the South China Sea, according to Scot Marciel, a veteran United States diplomat.

And the former US ambassador to Indonesia and Myanmar, who has just published the book Imperfect Partners: The United States and Southeast Asia, argues the US should use this time not to focus on countering Chinese influence in the region, but instead to prioritise its own engagement efforts.

Washington should focus “more on showing itself to be a consistent, reliable, trusted, and good partner across the board”, Marciel told Al Jazeera.

Imperfect Partners is a hybrid of personal memoir and foreign policy analysis of relations between the US and Southeast Asia, based on Marciel’s decades-long diplomatic career.

Joining the State Department in 1985, he was the first US diplomat to be posted to Hanoi since the Vietnam War. His career took him across the region, from witnessing the People Power revolt in the Philippines to responding to coups in Thailand and the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar.

Marciel retired from the foreign service in 2022 and is currently an Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow at Stanford University’s Walter H Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.

Al Jazeera spoke to Marciel about his book and regional politics.

The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Al Jazeera: Imperfect Partners covers different countries in Southeast Asia over an extended period. The Philippines and Vietnam are strengthening their relations with the US, while Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos appear to be firmly in China’s orbit. Are divisions in Southeast Asia deepening amid big power rivalry?

Scot Marciel: There are certainly some troubling divisions within Southeast Asia, but I wouldn’t necessarily attribute them primarily to the US-China rivalry, and I don’t see a division within ASEAN [Association of Southeast Asian Nations] between a pro-China and a pro-American group.

What we’re seeing is all the countries of Southeast Asia wanting to have good relations with China and the US. Some will lean more one way than the other, depending on the issue and the time, but they’re also working very hard to bolster their relations with other countries such as Japan, Australia and India.

The divisions are concerning when it comes to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the situation in Myanmar, and the South China Sea, which may have some relationship to the US-China rivalry. But that rivalry isn’t the cause of the South China Sea tension.

Al Jazeera: The US and Vietnam upgraded their relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership recently. This represents a massive change from several decades ago when Ho Chi Minh’s regime and the US were fighting each other in the Vietnam War. You were the first US diplomat to work in Hanoi since the end of the Vietnam War. Could you tell us more about what it was like back then?

Scot Marciel: I arrived in Hanoi in August of 1993. We still didn’t have diplomatic relations. But we, over the previous handful of years, had begun talking. The Vietnamese, after the fall of the Soviet Union, which they had depended on, were looking to diversify their relationships but also build economic partnerships because they had begun their economic reform efforts.

For the US, it was more about healing the divisions from the war. At the end of the Cold War, the US wasn’t looking at it so strategically, but we were very interested in getting Vietnam support for a Cambodian peace process.

When I first arrived, Vietnam’s reforms had been under way for only a few years. It was still quite poor but you could feel the energy in the country. You could see lots of little shops opening up. During those early days, we were trying to build basic trust after the war by working on issues that were in effect legacies of the war, such as accounting for missing Americans.

The economic relationship began to develop rapidly after those early years, and that in my view has driven the relationship ever since. Very quickly it became a trade and investment relationship and broadened to include health, climate change, a little bit of security and so on. The upgrade to a comprehensive strategic partnership has a significant economic component, with both countries seeing an opportunity for Vietnam to play a bigger role in global supply chains.

Al Jazeera:  You were ambassador to Indonesia. Indonesia’s presidential election will take place soon, in February next year. What’s at stake in the upcoming election in terms of geopolitics and what the US is watching?

Scot Marciel: Indonesia’s transition to democracy is one of the more underappreciated stories of Southeast Asia. It’s truly a remarkable achievement.

If you look back at the Soeharto years, and then in 1998, and the next several years, they marked a very turbulent transition to democracy, but the transition has held up and deserves a lot of admiration.

The elections next year will hopefully reinforce that democracy. The Indonesians have run good elections, very transparent and fair, with high voter turnout.

In terms of geopolitics, one never knows for sure. But there appears to be a consensus in favour of what Indonesians call a free and active foreign policy. They’re not going to suddenly align with any major powers. I think Indonesia will continue to play a very strong, independent role within ASEAN and within the broader world, and will still speak with their very own Indonesian voice on regional and global issues.

Al Jazeera: Laos is taking over the ASEAN chairmanship in 2024. What do you expect to change regarding the South China Sea and Myanmar under the leadership of Laos?

Scot Marciel:  ASEAN member states agree on a lot of issues but also disagree on some important ones, including the South China Sea, where the disagreement is mostly between those who have claims and those who don’t and therefore don’t want to pick a fight with Beijing.

I’d be surprised if Laos would lead a major change regarding the crisis in Myanmar. ASEAN doesn’t really know what to do. Even under Indonesia’s chairmanship, with all due respect, the bloc didn’t do all that much. There’ll unlikely be anything dramatic under Laos.

Laos may be more inclined to engage with the State Administration Council than Indonesia. I assume bringing the Burmese junta back to ASEAN’s top political meetings is a decision of the whole ASEAN, instead of the chair. Laos could certainly take a trip to Naypyidaw and talk to the generals, but that – while unfortunate – wouldn’t change much on the ground.

Al Jazeera: How have China’s diplomacy and behaviour changed during your decades-long diplomatic career? The US appears keen to counter China’s influence in Southeast Asia.

Scot Marciel: When I started in the mid-80s, China wasn’t a big factor in Southeast Asia. It was in the early days of Deng Xiao Ping’s reforms and kept a relatively low profile. It was also coming out of that era when Beijing backed communist insurgencies in Southeast Asia. For more than 20 years beginning in the late 1980s, China increased its engagement and economic ties with all the Southeast Asian countries.

From around 2008 onwards, we started seeing China shifting from a charm offensive to being a little bit more muscular in its diplomacy, particularly in the South China Sea. In recent years, Chinese diplomacy could be quite assertive and even aggressive – throwing its weight around.

China’s influence has increased significantly. That’s a fact. I think there’s an unfortunate tendency to worry about China because it has influence, as opposed to worrying about specific Chinese behaviour that is problematic, such as in the South China Sea.

The US should focus less on countering China, because China’s going to be there and countries are going to want to have the relationship, and more on showing itself to be a consistent, reliable, trusted and good partner across the board.

I think the US in general has done that, but not always with the consistency that the region would like to see. It’s been lagging on the economic side, most notably by pulling out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. So Washington should focus on improving its own efforts in the region, rather than countering China.

Al Jazeera: Thai journalist Kavi Chongkittavorn brought up the US Burma Act in a column and warned of a ‘mini proxy war’ in Myanmar. Is this based on a misunderstanding about the Burma Act?

Scot Marciel: With all due respect to my good friend Kavi, I don’t see the Burma Act or anything else that the US is doing is in any way stoking a proxy war. Between the US and China, only one of the two countries is providing weapons to one party in this conflict, and it’s not the US.

America has offered rhetorical and diplomatic support, as well as humanitarian aid to the people of Myanmar. After all, we have to remember the people of Myanmar overwhelmingly don’t want the military to be in power. This is a horrific junta that has no popular support. The US very much sympathises with and supports the people of Myanmar, but it’s not providing weapons.

The Myanmar crisis is not at all about the US and China. It’s about what’s going on inside Myanmar and the Myanmar people saying, ‘We’ve had it with the military. We need to get them out once and for all.’ I think they’re right about it. It’s unfortunate that so many countries are not supporting them, with some neighbours even supporting the junta.

I do fear that the Burma Act may have led some in China to worry excessively that the resistance was some US-backed group, and that misunderstanding led Beijing to be more supportive of the junta.

China enjoyed perfectly good relations with a democratically elected government under Aung San Suu Kyi. If and when democratic forces return to power in Myanmar, they will want to have good relations with China, too. That makes sense. So Beijing doesn’t need to worry about the resistance being a US proxy and should not see the crisis there as a US-China matter.

The Burma Act expresses support for the restoration of democracy and offers the possibility of nonlethal assistance but not weapons. This is about people who have been brutalised by a horrific military for decades saying, ‘Enough. We want to restore our own power’. They’re not doing this at anyone’s behest.

Al Jazeera: Russia has kept a very high profile and gone further than China in backing the Burmese junta, such as recent talks about supporting the regime’s ambition to develop nuclear energy. Is Moscow’s behaviour in Myanmar and other parts of the region troubling?

Scot Marciel: We can see every day in the news what kind of destructive power Russia is and its support for the Burmese junta reflects that attitude: It is an absolutely, completely amoral and unprincipled foreign policy, and an opportunity to sell weapons.

Moscow is also seeking to expand its influence, although I don’t think it’s ever going to be very influential in Myanmar. It’s creating chaos and suffering. Myanmar is the most extreme case. Russia still has some influence in Vietnam and Laos due to a historic legacy of past support.

Compare this with China. Beijing could play a more helpful role in Myanmar’s crisis because the instability isn’t in China’s interest and any democratic government that takes power will likely want to be on good terms with Beijing. But there’s no hope for Russia as long as Putin is in power.

Today’s geopolitical climate has created new and dangerous challenges for America’s defense and the support of democracy and freedom worldwide. These challenges demand a reexamination of the U.S. defense budget to ensure that America’s forces retain the capabilities to defend the nation and deter aggression abroad. The expert authors of the new volume Defense Budgeting for a Safer World (Hoover Institution Press) review the significant areas of debate in the U.S. defense budget and provide recommendations for aligning it with new global realities. Chief among these new realities are China’s modernized military and the nation’s objectives in the South China Sea and for reunification with Taiwan, testing U.S. dominance in the world order and raising questions about allies’ security and the U.S. ability to counter threats from the People’s Liberation Army.

In her contribution to the new volume, in a chapter titled “The Military Challenge of the People’s Republic of China,” Center Fellow Oriana Skylar Mastro reviews the last quarter-century of developments in China’s strategy for reunification with Taiwan. Mastro explains that the original shape of that strategy, strengthening ties with Taiwan to persuade the population, “has failed” and now takes the form of belligerent air and sea incursions, increasingly sophisticated military exercises, and official Chinese rhetoric about the inevitability of reunification and the impossibility of Taiwan’s independence has intensified.

Mastro notes that “China’s military modernization has focused on the ability to prevent a decisive U.S. response, referred to as its anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) strategy." The United States, as a non-resident power in the Asia-Pacific, depends on its aircraft carriers to project power in the South China Sea, but these carriers are vulnerable to Chinese ballistic systems. Because it will likely have to operate outside the first island chain — that is, the “barrier” extending from Japan, past Taiwan and the Philippines, to maritime and peninsular Southeast Asia — the U.S. military depends on “enablers” to accomplish its missions, like aerial refueling and satellites for cyber capabilities. These assets are likewise vulnerable to Chinese disruption/attack, as are U.S. forward bases in Asia, such as Okinawa.

Mastro’s recommendations to mitigate current U.S. weaknesses to a Chinese invasion of Taiwan include "more access, basing, and overflight," "more mass on targets," and "leveraging partners." While Chinese military power has not surpassed that of the United States, Mastro warns that if U.S. deterrence is not maintained and improved, Chinese leadership may become confident enough to move against Taiwan, resulting in a war with the United States. On the other hand, she assesses that the needed deterrence is possible if the proper steps are taken now.