America isn’t weaker than China and Russia — it’s just held to a different standard
it’s not that the United States is weak and China and Russia are strong, per se. It’s that the way we think about power in world affairs fundamentally disadvantages the United States, making it seem weaker than it is and its competitors appear stronger than they are.
The United States: A world power perpetually in decline
If a country’s strategic portfolio is essentially the entire world, almost any challenge to its position and interests — or to the order it underpins — can be construed as a sign of weakness. ...
despite having faced numerous strategic setbacks and endured multiple cycles of “declinism,” the United States today finds itself in an enviable position. As Foreign Affairs editor Gideon Rose puts it, the United States “may be richer, stronger, and safer than it has ever been; if not, it is certainly close to it.” Rose continues:
It has a defense budget equivalent to those of the next seven countries combined and together with its allies accounts for three-quarters of all global defense spending. It has unparalleled power-projection capabilities and a globe-spanning intelligence network. It has the world’s reserve currency, the world’s largest economy, and the highest growth rate of any major developed country. It has good demographics, manageable debt, and dynamic, innovating companies that are the envy of the world. And it is at the center of an ever-expanding liberal order that has outwitted, outplayed, and outlasted every rival for three-quarters of a century.
Paradoxically, the reflexiveness with which observers discern US weakness is a testament to both its preeminence and the inability of any other country (such as China) or coalition to replace it as the underwriter of world order.
China: a resurgent power chipping away at the current world order ...
While China watchers focus intensely on its growing ability to challenge US Navy operations in the Western Pacific, the core of China’s strength is economic. It is the world’s largest exporter and trading country, and at roughly $3.2 trillion its stockpile of foreign exchange reserves is also the biggest. Finally, despite its slowing growth rate, its gross domestic product is on course to overtake America’s soon.
With its prodigious economic power, China is proactively deploying a range of initiatives to draw the Asia-Pacific more tightly into its strategic orbit and, in time, gain greater influence across Eurasia. ...
Although the United States lobbied vigorously against the AIIB, 57 countries — including many of America’s closest allies — signed up to be founding members. ...
China is pursuing these initiatives under the auspices of the “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) project, which, in its most expansive conception, would cover 65 countries and approximately 40 percent of the world economy. ...
Few observers would dispute that China is getting stronger, whatever criteria one uses. Tellingly, though, it is not asked to sustain the current world order or assume responsibility for its renewal — at least not to nearly the same extent as the United States.
Moreover, while it (properly) calls for a greater role within central international institutions and criticizes what it regards as the intrusiveness of today’s system, it is unprepared to offer an alternative. The chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of China’s National People’s Congress, Fu Ying, observes that while China is “dissatisfied and ready to criticize,” it is “not ready to propose a new design.” ...
On the flip side, it is rarely charged with weakness for setbacks that would likely render the United States vulnerable to that accusation: Its conduct in the East and South China Seas has alienated many of its neighbors; it has been unable to dissuade North Korea from increasingly brazen provocations; and it has had little success boosting its soft power around the world.
Russia: a power constrained on all sides
The case that China exhibits strength in world affairs is plausible, even though it has to clear a lower threshold than the United States. The argument that Russia does so, however, is perplexing. Its economy is performing poorly, its demographic outlook is bleak, and its behavior in recent years has given renewed purpose and momentum to NATO, the very organization whose expansion it resents most.
Further, its alleged strategic alliance with China is, in fact, an increasingly asymmetric relationship. While the two countries routinely hail their friendship and criticize the reach of Western power — witness the joint statement they released last month — China has exhibited little compunction over encroaching upon Russia’s traditional sphere of influence. It has eclipsed Russia as the preeminent economic power in Central Asia and exploited Russia’s economic frailty to extract significant concessions on energy imports.
Meanwhile, as China seeks to find productive uses for its surplus labor and accelerate its “March West” campaign, it discerns a compelling opportunity to resettle millions of Chinese in Russia’s sparsely populated Far East. Zbigniew Brzezinski argues that unless Russia “become[s] a major and influential nation-state that is part of a unifying Europe,” it will be progressively less capable of “withstand[ing] growing territorial-demographic pressure from China, which is increasingly inclined as its power grows to recall the ‘unequal’ treaties Moscow imposed on Beijing in times past.” ...
Declining internally, and increasingly encircled along both its eastern and western peripheries, Russia is far less capable of playing a constructive role in Eurasia’s evolution than it was prior to its annexation of Crimea in 2014. In the early years of this decade, Vladimir Putin often expressed his hope that Russia would function as a vibrant economic bridge between Western Europe and the Asia-Pacific.
Today, however, with the prospect of a rapprochement with the former becoming less likely, and the potential of its outreach to the latter inherently limited, it is far less capable of fulfilling that intermediary role. Instead, it has largely been reduced to demonstrating strength by destabilizing eastern Ukraine and contributing to the chaos that has engulfed Syria. ...
Power is relative
The bottom line is that comparisons of US, Chinese, and Russian strength in world affairs are misleading without taking into account the relevant benchmarks. The United States is asked to oversee a world order that withstands increasing shocks; recognizes the demands and grievances of newly confident blocs of power; and devises rules of the road for novel domains of interaction, such as cyberspace.
That task is more daunting than staking incremental, concerted challenges to said system (China), and far more demanding than poking occasional holes in it (Russia). While the United States faces significant challenges at home and abroad, it is better positioned to manage complexity in the 21st century than any other country.
http://www.vox.com/2016/7/26/12281000/us-america-weak-china-russia
Long story short, from that article:
* USA is the lynchpin of the global system
* It's the global superpower, with the hugest military, more defense spending than the next 8 nations combined
* China is a rising power, already has a huge commercial empire, but otherwise it's not going to have anything for a long time, to "replace" the US-dominated system
* China has a "March West" campaign, to settle Siberia. This is concerning to some in Russia, even though they've allied.
* Russia is "constrained on all sides," and "is reduced to demonstrating strength by destabilizing eastern Ukraine and contributing to the chaos that has engulfed Syria"
* Russian economy is in decline
Overall, the article says the US is judged unfairly. It's easy to say other nations are "strong," and the US "weak," because the latter is a goliath and responsible for the entire world order. Some setbacks, don't really mean it's "weak."
Also, the writer concludes that the US is in the best position overall, for the future, compared to any other nation.
Some things, that I would note:
* US has the highest GDP in the world at $17 trillion, one trillion more than EU
* US has more GDP growth, than the EU or Japan
A big policy in the future looks to be the "pivot to Asia." US lost out with the China Bank; some American allies actually joined it, as founding members.
But the US is making some moves lately in the Pacific, to compete with China.
The estbalishment wants the TPP trade bloc passed, as a way to increase GDP growth, and also tie the Pacific together under US leadership.
From the article, this is the summation of the US position in the world:
It has a defense budget equivalent to those of the next seven countries combined and together with its allies accounts for three-quarters of all global defense spending. It has unparalleled power-projection capabilities and a globe-spanning intelligence network. It has the world’s reserve currency, the world’s largest economy, and the highest growth rate of any major developed country.
It has good demographics, manageable debt, and dynamic, innovating companies that are the envy of the world. And it is at the center of an ever-expanding liberal order that has outwitted, outplayed, and outlasted every rival for three-quarters of a century.
So, does anyone have thoughts about this? Is the US actually "weak," compared to other nations? Would isolationism and retreat from globalism and world leadership, increase or DECREASE, overall GDP?
And those of you that are against "the US global establishment" -- do you recognize the reality that even Putin says the US is the only superpower, and Russia needs it, and the world needs it? Do you guys actually realize the US really is the "lynchpin" to the world, and that even if it withdrew, there's "nothing else to replace it with?"