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I strongly recommend the book "The Hundred Year Marathon" by Michael Pillsbury. The short version is that in the 20th century, Americans agreed with this, and made many efforts to support the fledgling Chinese state and connect economically. Unfortunately, during this entire period, China was doing everything in its power to subvert and take advantage of America. One of the best known examples is industrial espionage, which China continues to this day.
I know it may seem reductive to say "The Chinese are to blame" but the history backs this up. China and America are in conflict because China believes only one country can be on top, and that global relations are a zero-sum game. I personally think this is the natural consequence of a communist mindset, which is notably zero-sum about everything.
Of course there are plenty of people in China who don't think this way, mainly businessmen, but China is structured in such a way that those people are subject to the control of the ideologically driven politicians.
I also think the Tanner Greer theory about Chinese fear of US soft power is relevant.
The basic thesis (see for example this blogpost but it is a theme of much of Greer's work) is:
The Chinese regime cares about its own survival a lot, as you would expect
The Chinese regime is more likely to be defeated by American soft power (as the USSR regime arguably was) than by American hard power - there is no scenario where America (or a broader Western alliance) acquires the ability to enforce regime change in mainland China militarily. In fact, American (or western more broadly depending on your point of view, but probably almost entirely American) soft power is the main threat to the survival of the Chinese regime.
China spends a huge amount of resources (e.g. the Great Firewall) defending itself against American soft power, but as long as China has to do business with the rest of the world the potential effectiveness of this approach is limited.
The nature of American soft power is that America can't turn off their soft power threat to China, even if they wanted to.
Accordingly the Chinese regime will not feel secure as long as America looks like a powerful, attractive alternative, and Chinese policy reflects this.
All this applies whether or not China wants to spread their system - or indeed whether America wants to spread theirs. Freedom wants to spread even if individual free countries don't care about spreading it.
To relate this back to the chip export issue: even if you don't believe in the immediate threat or power of AI (you deny that the sprint finish scenario is going to happen), it seems obvious to me that there are intermediate abilities unlocked by advanced AI (and therefore enabled by advanced chips) that can threaten either side in this conflict. Cyber security threats are maybe first and foremost, and are of immediate relevance in the ideological/soft power battle. If AI advances to the point of rendering non-frontier AI driven cyber security obsolete, then how would that impact the ability of the Chinese regime to maintain the great firewall? What if advanced AI was able to hack or manipulate the censorship system, or edit broadcasts, or enabled manipulation of the Douyin algorithm? These kind of capabilities alone (if you assume an attack vs defence paradigm) would justify interest developing not just advanced AI systems, but systems that exceed the opponent's in capability. Chip export restrictions would then be relevant in this scenario.
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I do not like this "you started it first", "no, you started it first" nonsense. As with every competition before and after this one, the situation is complicated and dynamic. It does not have a simple, elegant explanation you can point to and say, "this is why we hate them!". I do not want to waste your time or mine digging up why the Chinese think it was the Americans who failed us. You can try asking Claude or ChatGPT or GLM or whatever, it will give you our point of view more eloquently than I can. It's a paralyzing train of thought, and it is why I think many disputes can never get resolved, whether Republican-Democrat fissures or the conflicts in the Middle East.
It means nothing to me, because it is not constructive. Where we go from here, and how people can solve this without putting everyone's lives on this planet at risk, that is what matters.
I don't intend this as confrontational, but you are also controlled by ideologically driven politicians. This is a simple fact. You yourself are also likely not one of those ideologically driven politicians. Your position is not meaningfully different from that of the Chinese businessman you disagreed with.
I have never understood this point about "being controlled by X". What does that even mean? Everything is "controlled" by something else if you think about it long enough. What is the whole point of pretending to have "individual thoughts" (of course it brings you comfort and I think that's good) in a debate? Have you ever thought about where those individual thoughts come from?
Looks like I really struck a nerve. If you want to actually understand this, read the book I recommended. I won't be going through the last hundred years of history in this comment.
Americans don't hate the Chinese. In fact many of us quite like your culture and people and find much to admire. However, we cannot trust you. We can't trust you because when America came as a friend, China lied to us and betrayed us.
This seems like performative outrage. I know you must be aware that the CCP has a much higher level of control over Chinese businesses, especially state owned enterprises, than in America.
Again, not trying to argue with you. I want to explain why Americans have this perspective. If you really want to understand, read that book, or at least the LLM summary.
Looks like I’d have to do this particular dance again.
First of all, “I really struck a nerve”. What does that mean? It means I feel strongly about something you said. Does that automatically mean I’m wrong? This “oh you’re angry, hohoho, pwned” routine while basking in one’s own intelligence is boring and unbecoming of a decent discussion. One of the most commonly used tactics by Chinese nationalists back home is to say you’re “急了” (angry). You’re probably more familiar with the term “triggered,” though you didn’t exactly use that phrase.
I feel protective about China, yes, but I also feel strongly about arguments I find silly. I felt the same way about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict when people argue over who started it first. You’d “strike a nerve” there too with those arguments.
You’re missing my point. I know very well that your people and your elite do not trust us. The fact that you feel the need to spell this out tells me you’re not getting what I’m saying. I acknowledged in my original post that there is little trust between the two countries.
The characters of both our countries have meaningfully changed in the past 80 years since the founding of the PRC. Neither yours nor mine can claim a coherent, consistent goal throughout that period. Saying “we trusted you in 1911, so we already gave you a chance” makes little sense. Your country now and Woodrow Wilson’s America are different in fundamental ways. And however much kindness and selflessness your missionaries and China hands showed, your country’s leadership has never had altruism at heart.
I’ll say it again: I’m against the whole exercise of assigning blame for complex events spanning decades or centuries. It isn’t helpful or constructive. By the same logic, I don’t think Chinese hatred toward Japan over wartime atrocities is particularly healthy either.
And this point stands: mistrust doesn’t matter, because the optimal choice is still engagement and dialogue. Mistrust can only be resolved through engagement, not sanctions, and certainly not violence. Maybe violence works for your mistrust toward Iran, though even that is doubtful. Needless to say, we are not Iran.
I’m not going to read that book, because I already know that history. I did read the AI summary you suggested, so I held up my end. Would you mind having your AI summarize our grievances in return?
I don’t agree with your grand historical arc that China betrayed America while Americans were being taken advantage of. Your people have a particular tendency to frame things as others failing you. It has happened multiple times with me on this forum, and at some point that pattern is worth reflecting on.
That said, I partly agree with you. Before the PRC, America was, as I’ve said elsewhere, one of the only Western powers that helped China in its direst moments. America did not participate in carving up China. It helped return Boxer Indemnity funds, along with numerous policies during Wilson, and it helped us tremendously, bravely fight the Japanese of course. But it also passed the Chinese Exclusion Act and exploited Chinese labor to build its railways. Taking everything together, America was still probably the most beneficial Western country toward China during that era, with Germany perhaps a close second.
But after 1949, America was hostile. Are you denying that? The US government, driven by anticommunist fervor, treated China as an enemy and actively worked to obstruct Chinese development through sanctions, coordinated pressure from its allies, and most significantly, the continued disruption of reunification with Taiwan. You could argue that was opposition to communism rather than to China specifically, but I don’t think most Chinese people do or should care about that distinction. The rapprochement after the Sino-Soviet split was transparently a strategic compromise on both sides to counter the Soviets. You don’t get to claim naivety or selflessness for that.
You, and many others, have a habit of emphasizing your contributions while minimizing your gains. American actions are first and foremost in the interest of Americans, whether all Americans or specific segments of them. When those actions have genuinely benefited China, I have no problem acknowledging it. But if you insist on pretending America always acts out of the goodness of its heart, you’re certainly free to believe that. That’d just be naive.
I don't think I implied that America was acting out of the goodness of their own hearts. I'm simply trying to point out why we are in conflict.
To get off the historical finger pointing, I do think the issue is ideological.
One of the main points of the book is that Chinese grand strategy is based off the lessons of the warring states period, of a lesser state rising up to supplant the hegemon. The strategies that China has used towards this goal are fundamentally deceptive. From what I've read, this is not unusual in Chinese thinking, to the point that Chinese people consider deception to be completely normal and expected practice in dealings between states. Maybe you can correct me on this, but it's certainly the conclusion reached by American thinkers on the topic.
The issue, then, is that American moral thinking sees deception as fundamentally wrong. Whether this comes from Judeo-Christian or Puritan values is not important. What matters is that Americans have an instinctive distaste for the way the Chinese state operates as a matter of course. When it comes to our relations with other nations, at least those we consider friends, those nations do not lie to us about their essential nature and goals with the intent of harming us. China does. Americans even prefer a nation like Russia that is open about its conflict with the West over a nation like China that pretends to be our friend while secretly undermining us, which in our moral calculus is considered the lowest of the low and a moral evil.
I’m sorry, but this is self-serving, if I may, lies.
Your state constantly engages in lies and deceptions. What is the Iraq war but lies and deceptions? What is the Tonkin incident but lies and deceptions? Look at the current administration. Trump is probably the most quintessentially American president, as far as the rest of the world is concerned. What does he engage in? Lies and deceptions, constantly, to the point that people here argue you have to read him “seriously but not literally”. What is that but a convenient excuse for lies?
Your claim that “Chinese strategy is based off the Warring States” and the implication that this strategy is lies and deceptions makes little sense, and, to be very polite, smells of selective reading and biased thinking. The Warring States period left us with two major branches of thought: Confucianism, which grounds itself in virtue, idealism, and hierarchy; and Legalism, which grounds itself in force, realism, and statism. The rest of Chinese political history is the struggle and synthesis between these two schools, to put it simply. Legalism prevails during chaotic periods of imperial collapse and subsequent re-establishment. Confucianism wins during periods of peace and prosperity, and eventually leads to decadence and complacency until the empire shatters again. There is nothing insidious in this, as you implied, and if you want to know more, there are plenty of books on it.
Anyway, I’d like to thank you for sharing your opinions. It is, I admit, a bit shocking to see what some Americans really think of us. Shocking perhaps because I was slow to believe it. I never thought reasonable people actually held these views, and always wrote it off as politicians stoking fear, business as usual. I still think this is something that dialogue and engagement can help.
I appreciate your response! Again, the Warring States comparison is from the book I recommended. It describes the strategy taken by a lesser state to undermine and eventually supplant the greater, using tools like 'appear weaker than you are', 'exploit internal divisions in the enemy', 'control information' etc. We know that Chinese strategic thinkers base their thinking on this period because they write about it. What you have described as Confucianism vs Legalism is internal politics, whereas this is foreign affairs, two totally different things.
The other distinction I would draw is between the 'lies' of a politician and diplomatic subversion. All politicians lie, that has little to do with the relations between states. On the other hand, the US State Department operates on an extremely high level of trust. If a US diplomat were to deliberately deceive their counterpart from a friendly nation, that would be a serious breach of trust, a betrayal, that could badly damage relations between the two nations. Especially if the deception was in service of harming or undermining the other nation! Your example of the Iraq war only strengthens my point here - despite the fact that it wasn't even a deliberate deception (but instead bad intelligence about WMDs), this remains a point of contention and friction decades later. Now imagine if a country were conducting deceptions of this sort constantly and with malice - that's China.
I'll lastly just note that you haven't even tried to dispute the historical facts that lead American thinkers to this conclusion. Rather, it seems to me that you are passionately defending your country's honor, which I can certainly admire. But that sense of honor, and the passion it inspires, will prevent you from clearly seeing things from the outside perspective. Of course the Chinese see themselves as the hero of the story, just as everyone does, the Russians, the IRGC, everyone. That doesn't make it so.
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Speaking in terms of industry, China did, indeed, start it first. China can claim the british/japanese started things even firster, but excepting perhaps the boxer rebellion, the United States didn't make any particular effort to stifle china's economic growth until well after china began it history of stealing american IP. I don't judge china for doing that because intellectually property law-- i.e. government-issued monopolies on ideas-- is fundamentally bullshit rent-seeking. But relative to the diplomatic agreements in place, the chinese government promised one thing and delivered another.
This isn't even going to be a debate in 100 years-- just like Americans don't bother denying our rampant theft of british IP during the early industrial revolution.
I don't count Japanese crimes as American crimes. I don't really think British crimes should be laid at American hands either, though Britain is no longer a country I can hold a grudge against. For many people, everything white people did naturally falls on the major white country with agency, but I don't agree with that view.
I agree with you that the Americans were particularly benevolent even during the most chaotic years of the Chinese nation. Of all the powers, America perhaps took the least advantage of us and helped us the most, owing partly to the missionaries and the old China hands. I think the Boxer Indemnity Scholarship Program is obvious evidence of that. It is taught in Chinese schools.
I disagree. The US was hostile toward communist China well before China began its history of stealing American IP. You can argue the hostility was directed at communism, not at the Chinese people, but for the Chinese people, like the Iranian people right now, what difference does that really make? Should we really say thank you?
Anyways, I don't think this discussion is particularly fruitful. These "who's to blame" questions make my country revanchist and give us an inferiority complex that's hard to root out. It's also not helpful for Americans to see things through that lens, for the reasons I've already said.
Look, maybe the problem is that a lack of education is responsible for my ignorance of american attempts to restrict chinese economic growth. But if it is... what history lesson am I missing? As far as I remember, the rough chain of events was, WW2 -> chicoms defeat republican china -> korean war (attempt to constrain china's hard power, not economic power) -> sino-soviet split (leading to us/china rapproachment) -> vietnam war (again, not an attempt to restrain china's economic power specifically) -> nixon goes to china -> US/chinese economic alignment (including chinese stealing american IP) -> modern worsening of relations. Did I miss america backstabbing china industrially during the sino-soviet split?
I don't think it's a lack of education. Until very recently there was no reason or incentive for Americans to care about what the Chinese think. And until now there's been no reason for American media or policy wonks to represent Chinese perspectives.
From 1949 until Nixon, the US maintained a comprehensive embargo on China (through CoCOM/CHINCOM, which is even stricter than against the Soviets). You can frame that as anti-communism and constraining hard power, but it absolutely hurt and was meant to hurt the Chinese economy, which was already reeling from internal mismanagement and near-total isolation from the productive world. It's hard to imagine a country acting militarily against another without also acting economically, right? I'm not assigning blame here, because China did align with the Soviets.
A few things worth noting in this timeline.
There is a genuine window of collaboration, after Nixon and most notably during the Reagan era.
In 1989 after Tiananmen the US and the west placed comprehensive sanctions against China. The US suspended military sales, blocked World Bank loans to China, and imposed restrictions on technology transfer. Some of these were never fully lifted to start with.
In 1996, CoCOM, a Cold War era economical sanction against the eastern bloc, was succeeded by the Wassenaar Arrangement, which continues to prohibit a wide range of goods and technology sales to China. So even during the period of supposed "economic alignment," the US and its allies maintained significant restrictions on technology transfer. And there are the Cox Report followed by the Wolf Amendment, which China sees as baseless.
It's also important to consider the reasons the US gives for sanctioning China, usually framed around "dual-use technologies" and "human rights abuses." Especially given how the current administration behaves, it is very difficult for us to believe that these measures are genuinely motivated by concern for human rights in China, and even if a fraction of the American policy makers did genuinely believe that, I think they're usually carrying water for the hawkish Cold War types still. They are far more easily read as a hypocritical use of human rights to justify economic encirclement. And also what exactly do Americans want China to do to lift those sanctions? Regime change is off the table, there is a period (2000-2010s) where there is genuine improvement on the human rights front, does that lift the sanctions? My reading is that nothing can result in lifting the sanctions because sanction is the point.
And one cannot expect the other party to overlook outright provocations even if not economic, most importantly US arms sales to Taiwan, especially in the period surrounding the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis. For added context: during that period the US Congress and the State Department were sending contradictory signals, which is part of why I've argued that the current worsening of relations is often an extension of domestic politics. In this case, it was the active sabotage of executive branch policy by the opposition party in Congress. One example here:
Edit: and this soured the relationship from the very beginning. Another example of the president's policy being sabotaged by opposition.
Things like this happens multiple times and I don't want to list them all. Just to show you that from the Chinese perspective it is difficult to trust the Americans, because when you negotiate with Americans you cannot guarantee that the other branches of the government, or the next government, will honor their promises. I think Iran understands that pretty well by now.
Again I think this particular practice of finding out who shoot first is unproductive. I think for China and the US, we're roughly even. And more importantly moving on is to find common ground and collaborate, which I think has great potentials.
I'll concede this argument, thank you for the history lesson and for citing your sources.
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America didn't help China out of the goodness of its heart. USA decided to be more friendly with China when Sino-Soviet relations deteriorated, so all this generosity with intelligence and technology sharing was a strategic decision to create additional pressure on USSR by creating a problem right on its border. And China, being pragmatic, took full advantage of this opportunity.
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