Hello everyone, I often make many videos here drawing historical analogies for you from past conflicts such as World War II, the Cold War, and how these past situations are repeating themselves today. But in today's video, I want to go back a little further in time and bring World War I as a reference, showing you how many things that happened then that led to World War I may be repeating and perhaps leading us to World War III.
British historian Paul Kennedy explained in his book The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism, 1860-1914, how two traditionally friendly nations ended up in a spiral of mutual hostility that led to World War I.
Large structural forces drove competition between Germany and the United Kingdom, such as economic imperatives, geography, and ideology. Germany's rapid economic growth shifted the balance of power and allowed Berlin to expand its strategic objectives. Part of this expansion, especially in the maritime field, occurred in areas where the British had deep and well-established strategic interests.
The two powers, Germany and the United Kingdom, began to see each other as ideological opponents, often exaggerating the differences. The Germans painted a caricature of the British as greedy exploiters of the world, and the British saw the Germans as authoritarian wrongdoers seeking expansion and repression. The two countries seemed to be on a collision course destined for war, but it wasn't the (3:26) structural pressures, important as they were, that triggered World War I.
The war happened because of misguided individual decisions and deep shortsightedness on both sides. To be clearer, war was always likely, but it was far from inevitable. For example, the war might not have happened if the German leaders after Chancellor Otto von Bismarck hadn't been so bold in altering the balance of naval power.
Germany celebrated its dominance in Europe and insisted on its ambitions as a great power, disregarding international rules and norms. This stance alarmed not only England but also other countries. This was justifiable, as Germany made little effort to portray all this as merely the creation of a new, fairer world order.
A similar shortsightedness prevailed on the other side. Churchill, the head of the British Navy at the time, concluded in 1913 that his country's prominent global position, quote, "often seems less reasonable to other countries than to us," unquote. In other words, the British had great difficulty understanding how others saw them.
British officials and media spread harsh criticisms against Germany, particularly against German commercial practices. London viewed Berlin cautiously, interpreting all its actions as evidence of aggressive intentions and failing to understand Germany's fears about its own security in a continent where the Germans were surrounded by potential enemies. British hostility only deepened German insecurities and fueled their ambitions.
Something very similar is happening in the world today. Just as Germany was to England before World War I, China and the United States seem caught in a downward spiral that could end in disaster for both countries and the entire world. Much like at the beginning of the last century, deep structural factors are fueling the antagonism between the two.
Economic competition, geopolitical insecurity, and a profound mistrust are increasing the chances of conflict today. But structural factors are not destiny. The decisions leaders make can prevent a war or better manage the tensions that inevitably arise from competition between great powers.
Now, let me deepen the historical parallel so you can understand the similarities between these two moments. Just like the hostility between Germany and Britain over a century ago, the antagonism between China and the United States has deep structural roots that were born at the end of the Cold War. In the final stages of that conflict, Beijing and Washington were, in a way, allies, as both feared the power of the Soviet Union more than they feared each other.
But the collapse of the Soviet state, their common enemy, or the common enemy of both, almost immediately caused leaders to focus more on what separated Beijing and Washington than what united them. The United States increasingly condemned China's repressive government. Meanwhile, China (6:50) resented America's global hegemony and interventionism.
However, this escalation of opinions did not lead to an immediate decline in relations between the United States and China. In the decade and a half following the end of the Cold War, successive American administrations believed they had much to gain by facilitating China's modernization and economic growth. Just like the British, who initially embraced the unification of Germany in 1870 and its subsequent economic expansion, the Americans were motivated by self-interest in supporting Beijing's rise.
China was a huge market for U.S. products and capital, and at that time, the country seemed willing to do business in the American way, importing the American lifestyle, consumer habits, and even embracing the American ideology of how economies and markets should function. However, on a geopolitical level, China was considerably more cautious toward the United States. The collapse of the Soviet Union shocked Chinese leaders, and the U.S.'s military success in the Gulf War of 1991 showed them that China now existed in a unipolar world in which the U.S. could exercise its power almost at will.
In Washington, many were outraged by China's use of force against its own population, in the Tiananmen Square incident in 1989 and elsewhere. Just like Germany and Britain in the 1880s and 1890s, China and the United States began to view each other with more hostility, even as trade between them grew. What truly changed the dynamic between the two countries was China's unparalleled economic success.
By 1995, China's GDP was about 10% of the United States' GDP. By 2021, it had grown to around 75% of the U.S. GDP. In 1995, the United States produced about 25% of the world's manufactured goods, while China produced less than 5%.
But now China has surpassed the United States. Last year, China produced nearly 30% of the world's manufactured goods, while the United States produced only 17%. These are not the only figures that reflect a country's economic importance, but they give an idea of a nation's weight in the world and indicate where the capacity to manufacture things lies, including military equipment.
Things began to worsen and sour even more in 2003, with the U.S. invasion of Iraq. China opposed the U.S.-led attack, even though Beijing cared little for the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. More than the devastating military capabilities of the United States, what truly shocked leaders in Beijing was how easily Washington could disregard issues of sovereignty and non-intervention, concepts that were pillars of the very international order that the Americans had persuaded China to join.
The Chinese were concerned that the Americans did not follow international rules, yet at the same time forced other countries to abide by them. In other words, today’s Iraq could be tomorrow’s China. Meanwhile, China’s military budget doubled between 2000 and 2005, and then doubled again by 2009.
Beijing launched programs to better train its army, improve its efficiency, and invested in new technologies, revolutionizing its naval and missile forces. At some point between 2015 and 2020 the number of Chinese naval ships surpassed that of the U.S. Navy. Some argue that China would have dramatically expanded its military capabilities regardless of what the United States had done two decades earlier.
After all, this is what rising great powers do as their economic power increases. This may be true, but the specific timing of Beijing’s expansion was clearly linked to its fear that the world’s sole superpower, the United States, had both the will and the capability to contain China’s rise, should it choose to do so. Just as Germany began to fear being contained both economically and strategically in the 1890s and early 1900s, exactly when Germany’s economy was growing most rapidly, China began to fear being contained by the United States precisely when its own economy was on the rise.
One of the greatest examples of how presumption and fear can coexist was in Germany under Kaiser (11:40) Wilhelm II. The Germans believed both that their rise was inevitable and that Britain represented an existential threat to that rise. German newspapers were full of stories about the country’s economic, technological, and military advances, predicting a future in which Germany would surpass all others.
According to many Germans, their model of government, which they defined as a hybrid of democracy and authoritarianism, was the envy of the world. They claimed that Britain was not truly a European power, insisting that Germany was now the strongest power on the continent and should be free to rationally reorganize the region according to the reality of its strength. Nationalist passions increased in both countries from the 1890s onwards, while their perception of each other deteriorated.
Fear grew in Berlin that its neighbors and Britain were determined to halt Germany’s natural development in its own continent and prevent its future predominance. Unaware of the impact of their aggressive rhetoric on others, German leaders began to see British interference as the root cause of the country's problems, both at home and abroad. They viewed British rearmament and more restrictive trade policies as signs of aggressive intentions.
On the other hand, British leaders imagined that Germany was largely responsible for the relative decline of the British Empire, although many other powers were growing at Britain’s expense. China today shows many of the same signs of presumption and fear that Germany exhibited after the 1890s. Leaders of the Chinese Communist Party, the CCP, took great pride in how their country handled the global financial crisis of 2008 and its aftermath more efficiently than their Western counterparts.
Many Chinese saw the global recession at that time not only as a calamity manufactured in the U.S., but also as a symbol of the transition of global economic leadership from the U.S. to China. Chinese leaders, including those in the business sector, spent much time explaining to others that China’s inexorable rise had become the defining trend in international affairs. In its regional policies, China began to act more assertively towards its neighbors, (14:16) such as by repressing self-determination movements in Tibet and Xinjiang, destroying Hong Kong's autonomy, and in recent years, more frequently insisting on its right to take Taiwan by force, if necessary.
Together, China’s growing presumption and rising nationalism in the U.S. helped bring Donald Trump to the presidency in 2016, after he portrayed China as a malign force on the international stage. Once in office, Trump initiated a military buildup aimed at China and launched a trade war to reinforce U.S. commercial supremacy, marking a clear break from the less hostile policies pursued by his predecessor, Barack Obama. When Joe Biden replaced Trump in 2021, he maintained many of Trump’s China-targeted policies, supported by a bipartisan consensus that sees China as a major threat to U.S. interests. Since then, Biden has imposed more trade restrictions aimed at hindering Chinese companies from acquiring advanced technology.
Beijing (responded to Washington's hardening stance with both ambition and insecurity in its relationships with other countries. Some of its complaints about American behavior are surprisingly similar to those Germany made against Britain in the early 20th century. Beijing accused Washington of trying to maintain an inherently unjust world order, the same accusation Berlin made against London.
Meanwhile, the U.S. has tried to develop a policy towards China that combines deterrence with limited cooperation, similar to Britain's approach to Germany in the early 20th century. In the Anglo-German relationship, three main conditions turned this growing antagonism into war. The first was that the Germans increasingly convinced themselves that Britain would not allow Germany to rise under any circumstances.
At the same time, German leaders seemed incapable of defining for the British or anyone else how, concretely, the rise of their country would change or not change the world. The second condition was that both sides feared the weakening of their future positions. This view encouraged some leaders to believe that they should fight a war sooner rather than later.
The third condition was an almost total lack of strategic communication. In 1905, Alfred von Schlieffen, the chief of the German general staff, proposed a battle plan that would ensure a quick victory on the continent, where Germany had to deal with France and Russia. This plan leaked, and it was enough to confirm British fears of the Germans.
All these conditions now seem to be present in the U.S.-China relationship. Chinese President Xi Jinping and the Communist Party leadership are convinced that the primary goal of the United States is to prevent China's rise. China's own statements about its international ambitions are so vague as to be practically meaningless.
Internally, Chinese leaders are seriously worried about their country's slowing economy and the loyalty of their own people. Meanwhile, the United States is so politically divided that effective long-term governance is becoming almost impossible. The potential for strategic miscommunication between China and the U.S. is enormous due to the limited interaction between the two sides.
All current evidence points to China making military plans for one day invading Taiwan, producing a war between the U.S. and China, just as Germany's military plan helped produce a war between Germany and Britain in World War I. During intense competition between great powers, even small conflicts could easily have disastrous consequences, as the lead-up to World War I showed. Take, for example, a conflict that isn't so small—the current Russian war of aggression against Ukraine.
Many in the Western camp hope that China could play a constructive role in peace negotiations for the conflict since Beijing has emphasized respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all countries. China should remember that one of Germany's biggest mistakes before World War I was supporting Austria-Hungary as it threatened its neighbors in the Balkans. All this while German leaders appealed to high principles of international justice.
This hypocrisy helped produce the war in 1914. At this moment, China is repeating that mistake with its unconditional support for Russia. Although Ukraine is currently causing the most tension, it is Taiwan that could be the Balkans of the 2020s—the potential spark for our World War III.
Both China and the United States remain asleep to the increasingly likely chances of a conflict happening in Taiwan at some point within the next decade. And it is never too much to remember, a conflict between the two would trigger World War III.
Professor HOC
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