-
周波:哪怕美国国运式微,中国也不需要建立势力范围
最后更新: 2020-11-07 13:47:18Does a stronger China need a sphere of influence? I asked myself this question when I came across the article, “The New Spheres of Influence”, in Foreign Affairs by Harvard professor Graham Allison. Allison argues that, after the Cold War, the entire world became a de facto American sphere. But now the unipolarity is over. The United States must share its spheres of influence with other great powers such as China and Russia.
I imagine for a moment where a Chinese “sphere of influence” might be. Not in Central Asia, where Russia’s influence is dominant. Not in South Asia, where India’s influence is paramount. Only East Asia looks likely, given its historical and cultural ties with China.
But, if a sphere of influence means a state has a level of exclusive control in cultural, economic, military or political matters, to which other states show deference, East Asia can hardly be described as China’s sphere of influence.
North Korea has developed nuclear weapons despite China’s disapproval. Japan, South Korea and Thailand are American allies. Some member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, such as Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei, have territorial disputes with China in the South China Sea.
With Chinese and Russian as its official languages, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), which has no Western members, might look like a joint sphere of influence for China and Russia. But it has proven more inclusive than anticipated. Turkey, a Nato member, is a dialogue partner of the SCO. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had even asked to join the organisation as a full member.
India and Pakistan became member states in 2017. The inclusion of two long-time arch-rivals could bring problems, but their membership also increases the influence of the organisation, which straddles the Eurasia continent, and strengthens efforts to tackle the so-called “three evils” of terrorism, separatism and extremism that have plagued the region.
Perhaps nowhere looks more like China’s sphere of influence than the South China Sea. Much has been said about how China is turning the region into a “Chinese lake”, especially as its land reclamation has enhanced its physical presence there.
But no international laws prohibit land reclamation, and some other claimants have done the same. China maintains that around 100,000 ships transit through the South China Sea every year without freedom of navigation problems. What China opposes are military activities against the interests of the littoral states in the name of freedom of navigation.
The Chinese government has repeatedly stressed that China would not seek to be a hegemon even if it became developed. Although this might sound like lip service to some, its assertion is backed by history. For 2,000 years, much of East Asia was part of the Chinese sphere of influence, but that influence was primarily cultural.
Admiral Zheng He’s seven voyages in the Indian Ocean showed the sweeping power of the “Celestial Empire” in the Ming dynasty, but the Chinese didn’t bother establishing a single military base in any of these places. It was only 600 years later that the People’s Liberation Army established a logistics base there in support of counter-piracy efforts in the Indian Ocean.
Influence and a sphere of influence are two different things. Today, China’s influence almost overlaps with that of the United States. Such influence will grow further since China is widely expected to surpass the US to become the world’s largest economy in terms of gross domestic product in 10 to 15 years. In other words, a global China that is already influential enough doesn’t need any spheres of influence.
This then invites two most important questions for the 21st century: how will the world accommodate China’s rise? And, what can China bring to the world?
China’s Belt and Road Initiative might provide an answer to the second question. The initiative is ambitious, but it is not a gilded instrument of a new Chinese order, as The Economist asserted. It is not charity – China invests for mutual benefit. Neither is it a “debt trap” – who would spend trillions of dollars to lay such a mega trap? Any such grand scheme might take generations to finish. But the projects are, day by day, changing the economic landscape of the developing countries along the belt and road for the better.
Contrary to Allison’s suggestions, the last thing the US wants is to cede any sphere of influence to China, its primary competitor in what it sees as a new era of great-power competition. In East Asia, the challenge is how Beijing and Washington, with their overlapping influence, could coexist.
The US suspects China is trying to drive it out of the region. It has stepped up its provocations in the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea, which risk testing the patience of a PLA growing ever stronger.
Winston Churchill once famously quipped: “There is only one thing worse than fighting with allies, and that is fighting without them.” Not really. In East Asia, America’s allies are steeling themselves and tiptoeing between their ally and their top trading partner. So far, none has joined the US Navy on its freedom of navigation operations in the 12-nautical-mile waters off Chinese rocks and islands in the South China Sea.
There is no guarantee the US could win in a military conflict with China in the first chain of islands stretching from Japan to the Philippines and the South China Sea. But should it lose, the consequence is not moot: it would lose prestige and credibility among its allies and partners in the region. The alliance would fall apart and it may have to go home. In that sense, only the United States can displace the United States in the Western Pacific.
Allison is right to conclude the illusion that other nations will simply take their assigned place in a US-led international order is over. But even if that means there are indeed spheres of influence in the world today, China should beware and stay away from them. They look more like perilous traps than power vacuums awaiting China.
(Senior Colonel Zhou Bo (retired) is a senior fellow at the Centre for International Security and Strategy, Tsingha University, and a China Forum expert)
本文系观察者网独家稿件,文章内容纯属作者个人观点,不代表平台观点,未经授权,不得转载,否则将追究法律责任。关注观察者网微信guanchacn,每日阅读趣味文章。
-
本文仅代表作者个人观点。
- 责任编辑: 朱敏洁 
-
美驻华使馆:不管结果如何,中美关系将继续是世界最重要的关系
2020-11-07 13:46 中美关系 -
习近平为何强调这七种能力?
2020-11-07 12:37 新时代新气象新作为 -
习近平总书记指挥谋划“十四五”——五中全会 擘画未来
2020-11-07 12:29 新时代新气象新作为 -
“5.6万人接种后离境零感染”,国药集团董事长还举了个例子
2020-11-07 11:41 新冠肺炎抗疫战 -
海关总署:10月份我国外贸进出口增长4.6%
2020-11-07 11:23 中国经济 -
习近平为柬埔寨太后举行中华人民共和国“友谊勋章”颁授仪式
2020-11-07 10:12 新时代新气象新作为 -
145万欧元,成交!
2020-11-07 09:19 进博会 -
国家卫健委:新增33例,均为境外输入
2020-11-07 08:51 新冠肺炎抗疫战 -
联播+|推动世界共同发展,习近平这些妙喻寓意深远
2020-11-07 08:30 进博会 -
第一观察|这位网友的建议写入了党中央文件
2020-11-07 08:24 新时代新气象新作为 -
微纪录丨习近平为柬埔寨太后莫尼列举行“友谊勋章”颁授仪式
2020-11-07 08:20 新时代新气象新作为 -
未归案“红通人员”中20人藏匿美国,美沦为腐败分子避风港
2020-11-07 07:32 中美关系 -
向全球发出上海邀约!2020上海城市推介大会今天举行:全面打造充满机遇、活力、温度的城市
2020-11-06 22:40 上海观察 -
将法治打造成为上海城市核心竞争力的重要标志!中央依法治国办督察组来沪实地督察
2020-11-06 22:35 上海观察 -
习近平为柬埔寨太后莫尼列举行“友谊勋章”颁授仪式
2020-11-06 21:37 观察者头条 -
习近平夫妇会见柬埔寨国王和太后
2020-11-06 20:51 中国外交 -
习近平为柬埔寨太后莫尼列举行中华人民共和国“友谊勋章”颁授仪式
2020-11-06 20:46 -
内蒙古致32死瓦斯爆炸事故案宣判:32人被判刑
2020-11-06 19:47 依法治国
相关推荐 -
继续升级!威胁停学、惊现“狙击手”、学生占领行政楼 评论 240“中国制造2025已实现86%,证明美国制裁无效” 评论 350“不管枪支教育,却禁掉我谋生工具,这就是我的国家” 评论 185外交部回应布林肯:中方从来没有兴趣,不要疑神疑鬼 评论 330护栏被冲破!美国校园两派“开打” 评论 355最新闻 Hot
-
CNN最新民调,拜登尴尬了…
-
特朗普与德桑蒂斯“破冰”会面,讨论筹集竞选资金
-
美国宣布以军5支部队“侵犯人权”,但不提制裁
-
美国记者问西方走到尽头是什么?杜金的回答很有意思
-
外媒紧盯福建舰:或马上开始海试
-
继续升级!威胁停学、惊现“狙击手”、学生占领行政楼
-
“23条立法不额外限制媒体批评政府自由,无论有多尖锐”
-
美国终于给他“撑腰”
-
“中国制造2025已实现86%,证明美国制裁无效”
-
印度人“后槽牙都咬碎了”
-
他施压内塔尼亚胡:不进攻拉法,政府就会被推翻
-
他“催”哈马斯尽快接受停火协议:以色列异常慷慨
-
禁了TikTok,谁会得利?看看印度......
-
在这一领域,中国占6成,远超欧洲的19%和美国的9%
-
美报告挑事:欧盟任何惩罚都过于温和,无法阻止中国电动车,除非...
-
所罗门群岛总理索加瓦雷退出新任期竞选
-