America's Trump-Accelerated Decline Doesn't China's Taking Over
The end of the American Century brings chaos, not the start of a Chinese Century
President Donald Trump visited China, prompting thoughts of a global transition of power. The trip comes amidst America’s ongoing hegemonic suicide, as Trump is creating chaos at home, alienating allies abroad, damaging domestic and international institutions, egregiously violating U.S. and international law, breaking the U.S.-led system of open trade, and trashing U.S. credibilityin ways that will be difficult, perhaps impossible to reverse. Trump is throwing away many of the things that made America the world’s premier power, and as the United States declines, China has the most to gain.
The biggest factor is Trump’s horribly misguided Iran war, an unnecessary act of aggression that casts today’s America as more akin to Putin’s Russia than to Eisenhower, Reagan, or Obama’s United States. In prompting Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz—through which over 100 ships a day carrying oil, natural gas, fertilizer, and other essential commodities flowed freely before the war—and apparently having no idea how to fix the situation, Trump forfeited America’s position as the guarantor of freedom of navigation and global commerce.
Meanwhile, China has been rising—economically, technologically, militarily—and looking to many countries like a more attractive option merely by being consistent compared to the now volatile, unreliable, and combative United States.
On May 13, Trump went to meet Chinese leader Xi Jinping and spoke very positively of him, clearly taken in by Xi’s displays of authoritarian pomp. By contrast, Xi warned of a “Thucydides Trap”—the supposed inevitable conflict between a rising and an established power—and told Trump to stay out of the Taiwan issue. Trump went pursuing concessions on trade and deals for American businesses, and practically begged Xi for help opening the Strait of Hormuz. He got none of that.
Shortly after, Xi is scheduled to host Russian leader Vladimir Putin. The Trump and Putin visits have Xi looking like the most powerful person in the world.
But just because America is declining and China is rising does not mean China is poised to take over as global leader. Instead…
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