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China I: The Coming Conflict with America

By Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro
March/April 1997
Article Summary and Author Biography

Many American policymakers and Sinologists believe that China will inevitably become non-ideological, pragmatic, materialistic, and progressively freer in its culture and politics. Beijing, however, sees the United States not as a strategic partner but as the chief obstacle to its regional and global ambitions. Under cover of its current conciliatory mood, China acquires the wherewithal to back its aspirations regarding Taiwan and beyond with real power. America's number one objective in Asia must be to derail China's quest to become a 21st-century hegemon.

Richard Bernstein is a New York Times book critic and was Time magazine's first Beijing Bureau Chief. Ross H. Munro was Beijing Bureau Chief for the Toronto Globe and Mail and is Director of the Asia program at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. This article is drawn from their recent book, ‘The Coming Conflict with China.’

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