What will China be like tomorrow?

What will China be like tomorrow?

December 30, 2020

[I first posted this one article at the very height of the tensions between the US and China, about 2 years ago, just before Covid-19]

For this, people have mockingly said to me “Hey, China troll, how much did you get for this essay? My question to them would be, "Could you feel disgust more towards Russia in a higher degree than some Eastern Europeans?” Yes, we South East Asians have historically little love lost between us and 'The Big Brother', who along the recorded history has treated us as their tributary state. And they do even more today. We all know that Chinese are selfish to the core, even among themselves. The evidence, ah yes, just look at their whole history.

What will China be like tomorrow?

Almost gone are the days of the old-world order in which the US and its European allies, big and small, and with the consent of other major democratic countries like Japan, would set the rules of the game for collective global security and free trade. Now, Russia has been resurging. Russia has been flexing their military muscle in eastern Europe and the Middle East. They are spreading their sphere of influence over the Eurasia continent. They are drawing India close to them. China is poised to soon become the largest economy in the world ‘within a decade’. They have been building a ‘Belt and Road’ initiative that will be the most ambitious geopolitical plan in modern days.

Yes, in world history China was always a heavyweight. The Han empire of China was on par with the Roman empire of the west in the early centuries of the first millennium. The Tang empire of the Seventh century AD was bigger in size than the Roman empire and was way ahead of its western counterparts in terms of almost everything; from wealth, innovations, culture, and military might. That is what you call a superpower.

Some like to argue that China was never a superpower. That throughout their history, they say you need to be able to project your power and influence on more than one continent of the world. Romans held sway over regions in Europe, Asia, and Africa. The Mongol empire of the thirteenth century almost overran the whole of Eurasia. The Brits were everywhere. In the case of China, their projection of power never reached out of Asia, but one thing those scholars forgot to mention was China's ‘soft power’ in the past.

China was the 'Middle Kingdom'. Everybody traded with China. And then there were their technologies, (paper making, the printing press, guns, gunpowder, paper money, porcelain, etc.) that changed the surface of the earth in a magnitude that nothing in history was comparable with. Now, everybody is talking about China. They are overtaking the US economically and strengthening its military muscles. They are now claiming the South China sea almost all for themselves.

Diplomatically, in terms of the numbers of countries they have set up diplomatic relations with, they have already left the US behind. They have history of over 5000 years of continuous civilization, a population of 1.4 billion, and in terms of sheer geographic size, of economic and military heft, they have all the factors necessary. The the rest of the world, including the US, will now need to look to China for their future. Trump should have signed the trade deal. China's unicorns are now buying up Europe's trademark companies, and in some cases, their landmarks as well. That is who China is becoming today.

What will it be like in the near future, say in 2030, when it is predicted to be the world's largest economic powerhouse? Because of that, whether they accept it or not, policy decisions of other countries will be based upon that.

Yes, it is true that China historically was never a country of militant character. They tried to push back Nomadic invaders to their Central Asia homelands during ancient times and during the middle ages, the Huns, Xingu’s, and Mongols. They built the Great Wall in order to fence them off, yet they barely adopted an offensive military doctrine against their neighbors. The territorial expansions during the time of the Tang empire were the result of chasing after those pin prick attacks of the nomads. China is large and multicultural. China is also resourceful. Its people are very inventive, and they are great traders. It has everything it needs within its own boundaries, so time and again, it inclined to practice secularism, which led it to its downfall. The last foreign rulers of China, the Manchus shut their Qing Empire off from the outside world only to find out that the policy, in the end, made them a watermelon to be sliced down by the great powers of Germany, France, the US, Britain and Japan. Then came Mao Zedong who repeated the disastrous history of China by his 'Great Leap Forward' policy and about 30 to 40 million Chinese were gone due to famine and civil unrest during that era.

Now the policy of China has changed and is designed to correct its shortcomings in the past while at the same time aiming to reach back again to its former historical glory in full Chinese essence. With the Belt and Road policy, it is determined to be the Middle Kingdom again. Countries from all the corners of the globe will be trading with them. China will be the big brother to all, whether theat plan will healthily come to life or not. We still need to wait and see.

China is no democracy. Neither are they a Japan or Germany, reaching out to less prosperous countries to give them help and aide and to develop co-prosperity. China these days loves to lend money to developing countries at high interest rates. When those countries can’t return the money when due, then they have to deal with the 'terms of the loan’. A striking example was Sri Lanka failing to return the Chinese loans needed to let China's blue navy fleet to use its largest port for 30 years. The port became a dot in the Chinese string-of-pearls (that is 'the term).

But if one has a wider view, one will find out that the subject of China's money is a very controversial issue. For example, a landlocked, time wrapped southeast Asian country such as Laos could recently come up as an emerging economy thanks to that Chinese money and aide. Also, the economy of Bangladesh, under Chinese economic influence, is currently so healthy that it is forecasted by the global institutions to be among the world's top 30 in 2050. The point is, it seems one needs to be extremely careful and use rationalized thinking about the matter, based on the data collected, when it comes to borrowing money from China. You need to take everything with a grain of salt.

Almost all the countries of Africa are doing business with China these days. Some ridiculously have called Africa, “China's China”. Africa has been forgotten and left to their own devices by their former colonial power to become a truly 'dark continent'. Now, with mainly thanks to Chinese aides and diplomatic assistances at the UN, one thing is undeniable, they are rising to become a combined force to be reckoned with. In the foreseeable future this trend will go on and Africa will become the one standing together with China on the world stage. China lifted its own 800 million people out of poverty in the past 30 years. This time it will be Africa.

China has not been like Putin's Russia. Along the way, Russia has been more than happy to insert itself into the ongoing global order. Given its stature today, it just wants to amend the existing international rules and orders and make modifications to them to favor its own interests and goals.

Judging from China's history (of the middle Kingdom dynasties), it seems that once they are nicely accommodated in the world community, China will become benign, will take more responsibilities in issues relating to global peace and stability. China has been a big contributor to the UN. China is rigorously putting its efforts into maintaining its ecosystem by planting millions of trees, countrywide. Thinking of going head-to-head with China? Please, remember President Trump’s mis-judgements.

China will become like a giant Singapore in terms of wealth, living standards, global outlook and diplomacy. It will copy the ways of that ‘superstar tiny Island’ founded by Lee Kwan Yu. One thing China loves to boast about is its big cities and how they are they are super-safe. You can go outside of your apartment at midnight and walk the city streets, only to find out that polices are still everywhere like in the daytime. Everybody agrees that “Yes”, China cities are super-safe. Also, in terms of innovation, don't forget that many world changing inventions are still coming from them. They have developed the 5G networks, as well as AI and great progress in solar energy. When it comes to global security, they will simply leave those matters to the US, EU, and Russia. China never ever meddled in global politics. It is ‘cash’ that is the true global politics to them.

Now you have some ideas on what China will be like tomorrow.

Phoe Wa