“The Indo-Pacific region has become the epicentre of intensifying great power competition…that’s primarily China and the United States moving around.” – Nick Warner, director-general, Australian Office of National Intelligence (ONI)
Professor Graham Allison of Harvard University and Author of Destined for War, studied human history over the last 500 years and found 16 cases of Thucydides trap, where a rising power threatens to displace a ruling power. Twelve of those cases led to war. As China rises to threaten the rule of the USA, it is widely acknowledged we are indeed within a new Thucydides trap.
Unless we come to terms with the need to circumvent a deteriorating cycle, the world’s two super powers are heading towards a major conflict, with a historical 75 per cent likelihood of war. Professor Hu Bo of Peking University told the BBC Radio 4 on April 4, “The harder the US push, the greater the China threat will be. The US should be more patient and calm when facing China’s rising. The US should avoid overstating China’s capabilities or judging China’s intentions just on the basis of China’s capabilities. If the US is over reacting based on its own logics and own experience, I think there is a real possibility of self-fulling prophecy.”
In our podcast discussion with Dr Malcolm Davis of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Malcolm explains, “you have a growing assertive confident China that is directly challenging U.S. strategic primacy across the Indo-Pacific region and is seeking to assert itself in and generate a new hegemonic power in Asia and from the Chinese perspective what they’re doing is seeking to restore China to its rightful place as the Middle Kingdom in Asia.”…Click here to read full article.
