By: Azhar Azam
Out of sheer frustration and akin to some of the other loudmouthed White House officials including President Donald Trump himself, the US Attorney General William Barr on Thursday made a narcissistic attempt to obscure China’s peaceful economic rise, its landmark Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)and territorial integrity in South China Sea (SCS).
In a speech swarmed with malice and fears of China’s emergence to the global center, he contended “Made in China 2025” as a centerpiece of its high-tech domination that threatens to end American technological leadership and alleged Beijing is “engaged in economic blitzkrieg” and seeks to surpass Washington as the world’s eminent power and replace American Dream with “Chinese solution.”
Barr completely overlooked that it is the sovereign right of China to take appropriate measures to boost its economy and protect the hard-won prosperity of its 1.4 billion people. Beijing has always welcomed the development of all the countries and expects them to hail its growth as well, which advocates win-win cooperation, enhanced trade and mutual advancement.
Amid Covid-19 challenges that have dragooned global economy to the biggest slump in 90 years and trade to fall dramatically, China thrashed all market expectations and imported 2.7% more goods in June by 2.7% as compared to a year earlier. Experts believed it was an indication of the country's accelerating economic recovery; it was also an upbeat sign of the revival of global trade and manufacturing activities by Beijing-powered initiatives.
BRI has transformed from infrastructure plan into a more wider model of health, social-economic progress and reciprocal growth for unlocking development potential but Trump’s aides still are entwined in presenting that Chinese investments would spread its power and influence or serve strategic interests domestic economic needs of Beijing.
Although the coronavirus outbreak has slashed China’s total foreign trade by 4.9%, it is fluffing to make any impact on its trade with BRI countries that rose 0.9% in the first four months of 2020 or investments, which surged 13.4%. It winked about the nascent trust and belief of the partner nations on Beijing and was yet another strong punch to the US propagation.
The Chinese government is steward of the country’s borders and the warden of peace inside the state that lays the onus of securing China’s defense on land, in air and at sea an essential duty of the overseers in Beijing as well as binds them to make legislation to safeguard people’s lives and national security interests.
China has unvaryingly respected the territorial integrity of all nations and adhered to international principles of non-interference and non-intervention in the domestic affairs of other countries, hoping to be returned with same force of commitment from international community on its sovereignty and right to self-govern its soil in a legal and political manner.
But Washington consistently fails to behave as a responsible international state and continues to see Beijing’s wholesome global economic contribution, its massive inter-continental connectivity BRI program, indigenous “Made in China 2025” blueprint to upgrade manufacturing sector, steps to bring back Hong Kong’s lost legacy of being a peaceful society and defending of maritime jurisdiction in SCS through the lens of delusive theme of “strategic competition” with China.
Beijing ranks consensus, cooperation and dialogue before discord, rhetoric and confrontation – therefore unlike the US provocative military actions that serve as a regional node to peace and stability in SCS – it has exercised maximum restraint and looks to resolve the oceangoing disputes with neighboring countries through diplomatic channels.
For the existing US federal government, anyone individual, enterprise or country – which believes in strengthening international trade in a chaotic global health and economic environment – undermines American national and foreign policy objectives and is labeled “pawns of Chinese influence” or indicted to build “the Great Firewall of China.”
In a bid to intensify off-the-cuff anti-China campaign and reverse the declining trend in Trump’s approval ratings ahead of 2020 presidential elections, the US president and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been mounting torrential pressure on American companies to relocate their manufacturing in America. Joining the two, Barr also blasted Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and Apple and Hollywood for their collaboration with Chinese Communist Party.
Apple denied the charges and pressed the US for engagement with Beijing “even where we may disagree with a country’s laws.” The technology giant carried the steep worries of many US companies that were stewed of stirring up nationalistic sentiments for political gains and urged a dialogue between the two largest economies of the world to prevent a loggerhead-situation.
In a perfect clap-back to Barr and other hawkish US officials, Apple on Friday opened an entirely new megastore in Beijing’s Sanlitun that is twice in size of the original all-glass building and unveiled several firsts for it in China, a major source for Apple to find manufacturing partners and pouch beefy revenues from its App Store and iPhone sales.
The inauguration of Apple Sanlitun was itself a full-throttle rebuke and passed a cloaked message to hardliners in the Trump administration to abscond their hostile attitude toward anyone, which does not kneel to its exceptionalism and was even pushing their own companies on a sticky wicket.
Until and unless, Washington stops seeing Beijing as a “strategic competitor” and changes its Cold War mentality, it would continue to encounter such pushbacks from inside America and across the globe. The US’ aggressive China policy and swaying tactics to dominate the world are unsustainable and plead for an extensive overhaul, starting off from ending its crusade against Beijing and the global economy.
In a speech swarmed with malice and fears of China’s emergence to the global center, he contended “Made in China 2025” as a centerpiece of its high-tech domination that threatens to end American technological leadership and alleged Beijing is “engaged in economic blitzkrieg” and seeks to surpass Washington as the world’s eminent power and replace American Dream with “Chinese solution.”
Barr completely overlooked that it is the sovereign right of China to take appropriate measures to boost its economy and protect the hard-won prosperity of its 1.4 billion people. Beijing has always welcomed the development of all the countries and expects them to hail its growth as well, which advocates win-win cooperation, enhanced trade and mutual advancement.
Amid Covid-19 challenges that have dragooned global economy to the biggest slump in 90 years and trade to fall dramatically, China thrashed all market expectations and imported 2.7% more goods in June by 2.7% as compared to a year earlier. Experts believed it was an indication of the country's accelerating economic recovery; it was also an upbeat sign of the revival of global trade and manufacturing activities by Beijing-powered initiatives.
BRI has transformed from infrastructure plan into a more wider model of health, social-economic progress and reciprocal growth for unlocking development potential but Trump’s aides still are entwined in presenting that Chinese investments would spread its power and influence or serve strategic interests domestic economic needs of Beijing.
Although the coronavirus outbreak has slashed China’s total foreign trade by 4.9%, it is fluffing to make any impact on its trade with BRI countries that rose 0.9% in the first four months of 2020 or investments, which surged 13.4%. It winked about the nascent trust and belief of the partner nations on Beijing and was yet another strong punch to the US propagation.
The Chinese government is steward of the country’s borders and the warden of peace inside the state that lays the onus of securing China’s defense on land, in air and at sea an essential duty of the overseers in Beijing as well as binds them to make legislation to safeguard people’s lives and national security interests.
China has unvaryingly respected the territorial integrity of all nations and adhered to international principles of non-interference and non-intervention in the domestic affairs of other countries, hoping to be returned with same force of commitment from international community on its sovereignty and right to self-govern its soil in a legal and political manner.
But Washington consistently fails to behave as a responsible international state and continues to see Beijing’s wholesome global economic contribution, its massive inter-continental connectivity BRI program, indigenous “Made in China 2025” blueprint to upgrade manufacturing sector, steps to bring back Hong Kong’s lost legacy of being a peaceful society and defending of maritime jurisdiction in SCS through the lens of delusive theme of “strategic competition” with China.
Beijing ranks consensus, cooperation and dialogue before discord, rhetoric and confrontation – therefore unlike the US provocative military actions that serve as a regional node to peace and stability in SCS – it has exercised maximum restraint and looks to resolve the oceangoing disputes with neighboring countries through diplomatic channels.
For the existing US federal government, anyone individual, enterprise or country – which believes in strengthening international trade in a chaotic global health and economic environment – undermines American national and foreign policy objectives and is labeled “pawns of Chinese influence” or indicted to build “the Great Firewall of China.”
In a bid to intensify off-the-cuff anti-China campaign and reverse the declining trend in Trump’s approval ratings ahead of 2020 presidential elections, the US president and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been mounting torrential pressure on American companies to relocate their manufacturing in America. Joining the two, Barr also blasted Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and Apple and Hollywood for their collaboration with Chinese Communist Party.
Apple denied the charges and pressed the US for engagement with Beijing “even where we may disagree with a country’s laws.” The technology giant carried the steep worries of many US companies that were stewed of stirring up nationalistic sentiments for political gains and urged a dialogue between the two largest economies of the world to prevent a loggerhead-situation.
In a perfect clap-back to Barr and other hawkish US officials, Apple on Friday opened an entirely new megastore in Beijing’s Sanlitun that is twice in size of the original all-glass building and unveiled several firsts for it in China, a major source for Apple to find manufacturing partners and pouch beefy revenues from its App Store and iPhone sales.
The inauguration of Apple Sanlitun was itself a full-throttle rebuke and passed a cloaked message to hardliners in the Trump administration to abscond their hostile attitude toward anyone, which does not kneel to its exceptionalism and was even pushing their own companies on a sticky wicket.
Until and unless, Washington stops seeing Beijing as a “strategic competitor” and changes its Cold War mentality, it would continue to encounter such pushbacks from inside America and across the globe. The US’ aggressive China policy and swaying tactics to dominate the world are unsustainable and plead for an extensive overhaul, starting off from ending its crusade against Beijing and the global economy.
*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared at "China Global Television Network (CGTN)":
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-07-19/U-S-aggressive-China-policy-pleads-for-an-extensive-overhaul-SfNTFabfuo/index.html
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-07-19/U-S-aggressive-China-policy-pleads-for-an-extensive-overhaul-SfNTFabfuo/index.html