Opinion

Singapore summit and growing US-China rivalry

June 11, 2018
Singapore summit and growing US-China rivalry

Hussein Shobokshi

THE world anxiously awaits the upcoming summit between the North Korean leader and the US president, which is scheduled to take place in Singapore tomorrow. It is clear to all that the main reason for Trump to meet with the North Korean president is to persuade him to abandon his nuclear arsenal. That is true, but it is also clear that North Korea is preparing for a “transformation” that could lead to its integration and unity with South Korea.

America has a strong conviction that a united Korea will be a redoubtable force to rein in China’s growing economic ambitions. Korean companies have grown up and have the experience and knowledge to take advantage of cheap labor in North Korea and with the passage of time a unified Korea can be as strong as Japan in the face of China’s growing economic profile. The main axis of US policy vis-à-vis China is to “launch” and “strengthen” the pivotal countries in Asia that are capable of competing economically with China and the United States will be keen to intensify investments in Japan, South Korea, Indonesia and other Asian tiger countries, while exerting strong pressure on China through harsh economic sanctions.

The North Korean file is intended to strengthen a united Korea to check China’s economic growth. China is fully aware of this and therefore wants to have a say in the upcoming talks, especially as it is the “rope of life.” But China’s cards are limited as North Korea has only nuclear arsenal, which it needs to abandon for the desired political protection for the next stage, leading to expected Korean unity. China in turn is exerting pressure of another kind on the United States in Asia today by imposing a new reality on the ground in its sea dispute with Vietnam, Philippines and Japan that have concentrated and intensified their military and human presence on these sites.

China has stepped up its military operations in an unprecedented manner and raised the rhetoric of “annexing” Taiwan to the motherland being indifferent to the US objection. China has begun to prepare the second aircraft carrier to enter the service, which it had purchased from Ukraine in poor condition and is seeking to develop and modernize. Meanwhile, the number of aircraft carriers in the US fleet is ten and the addition of two fleets will happen soon. But it seems that the old continent in Europe is also mired in the confrontation between China and United States. There are growing political forces that aim to get out of the European Union (a bloc of China’s growing economic power through huge and varied investments).

It may seem to be a traditional trade war (as it happened in the past with Japan), but China is a size and weight different from Japan as well as its political system. The United States is fully aware that it has “catch” to China’s cash reserves linked to dollar bonds and is the largest market for Chinese products and its largest investor and recognizes that it has a technical superiority, but the gap is narrowing and the trade war between them is clearly intensifying on more than one front.


June 11, 2018
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