Will China challenge the US unilateralism and expands beyond its “Great Wall”?

Written by – Elijah J. Magnier:

The Chinese Communist Party started its week-long 20th Congress to reaffirm President Xi Jinping’s tenure in office for a third term (until 2027)following constitutional amendments. It will map out the country’s domestic and foreign policies for the years to come. This congress comes whilst a fierce war is being waged in Ukraine, challenging the US global hegemony without the aim of replacing it with the dominance of any other country (Russia or China). It is also held in the light of US provocations which angered China on Taiwan through the visit of the US Congress Speaker Nancy Pelosi and America’s sale of $1.1 billion in weapons to the “self-governed” Chinese island. The US double standards consist in arming Taiwan and encouraging its government to challenge Beijing whilst recognizing China as one state, including Taiwan as part of it. This was confirmed by President Xi in the opening speech where, in a sharp tone, he warned the US he would “take all measures necessary against outside forces’ interference” and against “turning the Taiwan issue into an international affair”. However, the US hostility against Beijing intensified to push China away from Russia, hence Beijing’s hesitation to support Moscow in its war against NATO countries. President Xi aims to avoid western economic sanctions but nevertheless remains President Vladimir Putin’s close partner. Can Beijing still withstand Western aggression as it has done for decades?

China’s policy of internal reform and opening to the outside World began in December 1978 when President Deng Xiaoping announced the “open door policy” for foreign companies and investors. This was the first step since the era of the Kuomintang, the only party that ruled China from 1927 to 1949, in a policy of promoting economic growth and a policy of getting out of poverty. Since that time, China rose from 32nd to 13^th in the World in export volume until 2010, when China had a 10.4% share of the world market, surpassing the US as the World’s largest trading nation with imports and exports of more than $4.16 trillion per year in 2010 and $5.3 trillion in 2019.

China also uses its wealth domestically to change its citizens’ way of life. It has spent $224 billion and moved millions of families into a developed agricultural, educational and economic environment to bring 770 million people out of extreme poverty and to announce by 2020 that it has wholly eradicated poverty. This is one of the main reasons why China has become the focus of world leaders’ attention, in light of the country’s progress and rapid economic, scientific and industrial rise. At the same time, Europe is suffering a deterioration of European industry primarily due to the energy shortage. Europe is going through a periodof upheaval, lacking cheap Russian energy from the five pipelines now feeding only 41% of the EU’s energy needs following the Ukraine war and the western sanctions on Russia.

Consequently, Western countries face a super Chinese state with grown and modernized nuclear weapons, advanced weapons, the “Beidou” satellite navigation system (a competitor to the US GBS), and a substantial emerging economy. China has its own magnetic card payments (1.3 trillion dollars for 800 million cards) for the “card Mir” that is also used by the Russians (after Visa, MasterCard and American Express ceased operations in Russia). Beijing has strengthened tourism and travel projects, built infrastructure, connected cities with a global high-speed rail network of 40,000 km and developed250 airports, doubling the numbers of passengers in air transit very quickly.In light of the failure of Western democracies, Beijing is adopting a different model to the West, which was imposed through the US unilateral hegemony on the World. China is learning from the West’s mistakes where the strong country dominates the weaker, energy companies’ owners, arms manufacturing institutions, and wealthy holders of the mainstream media control the political decision-makers and form the deep ruling state. The soft US power, not the actual value of “human rights” and the principle of “democracy”, is used only against countries that refuse the American dictates or submission. Western wars 

Proofread by: Maurice Brasher