By Ramzy Baroud
March 20, 2021 "Information
Clearing House" - -
A much anticipated American foreign policy move
under the Biden Administration on how to counter
China’s unhindered economic growth and political
ambitions
came in the form of a virtual summit on March
12, linking, aside from the United States, India,
Australia and Japan.
Although the so-called ‘Quad’ revealed nothing
new in their
joint statement, the leaders of these four
countries spoke about the ‘historic’ meeting,
described by ‘The Diplomat’ website as “a
significant milestone in the evolution of the
grouping”.
Actually, the joint statement has little
substance and certainly nothing new by way of a
blueprint on how to reverse – or even slow down –
Beijing’s geopolitical successes, growing military
confidence and increasing presence in or around
strategic global waterways.
For years, the ‘Quad’ has been busy formulating a
unified China strategy but it has failed to devise
anything of practical significance. ‘Historic’
meetings aside, China is the world’s only major
economy that is predicted to yield significant
economic growth this year – and imminently.
International Monetary Fund’s projections
show that the Chinese economy is expected to
expand by 8.1 percent in 2021 while, on the other
hand, according to data from the US Bureau of
Economic Analysis, the US’ GDP has declined by
around 3.5 percent in 2020.
The ‘Quad’ – which stands for Quadrilateral
Security Dialogue –
began in 2007, and was revived in 2017, with the
obvious aim of repulsing China’s advancement in all
fields. Like most American alliances, the ‘Quad’ is
the political manifestation of a military alliance,
namely the Malabar Naval Exercises. The latter
started in 1992 and soon expanded to include all
four countries.
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Since Washington’s ‘pivot to Asia’, i.e., the
reversal of established US foreign policy that
was predicated on placing greater focus on the
Middle East, there is little evidence that
Washington’s confrontational policies have
weakened Beijing’s presence, trade or diplomacy
throughout the continent. Aside from close
encounters between the American and Chinese
navies in the South China Sea, there is very
little else to report.
While much media coverage has focused on the US’
pivot to Asia, little has been said about China’s
pivot to the Middle East, which has been far more
successful as an economic and political endeavor
than the American geostrategic shift.
The US’ seismic change in its foreign policy
priorities stemmed from its failure to translate the
Iraq war and invasion of 2003 into a decipherable
geo-economic success as a result of seizing control
of Iraq’s oil largesse – the world’s second-largest
proven oil reserves. The US strategy proved to be a
complete blunder.
In an article published in the Financial Times in
September 2020, Jamil Anderlini
raises a fascinating point. “If oil and
influence were the prizes, then it seems China, not
America, has ultimately won the Iraq war and its
aftermath – without ever firing a shot,” he wrote.
Not only is China now Iraq’s biggest trading
partner, Beijing’s massive economic and political
influence in the Middle East is a triumph. China is
now, according to the Financial Times, the Middle
East’s biggest foreign investor and a strategic
partnership with all Gulf States – save Bahrain.
Compare this with Washington’s confused foreign
policy agenda in the region, its unprecedented
indecisiveness, absence of a definable political
doctrine and the systematic breakdown of its
regional alliances.
This paradigm becomes clearer and more convincing
when understood on a global scale. By the end of
2019, China became the world’s leader in terms of
diplomacy, as it then
boasted 276 diplomatic posts, many of which are
consulates. Unlike embassies, consulates play a more
significant role in terms of trade and economic
exchanges. According to 2019 figures which were
published in ‘Foreign Affairs’ magazine, China
has 96 consulates compared with the US’ 88. Till
2012, Beijing lagged significantly behind
Washington’s diplomatic representation, precisely by
23 posts.
Wherever China is diplomatically present,
economic development follows. Unlike the US’
disjointed global strategy, China’s global ambitions
are articulated through a massive network, known as
the Belt and Road Initiative,
estimated at trillions of dollars. When
completed, BRI is set to
unify more than sixty countries around
Chinese-led economic strategies and trade routes.
For this to materialize, China quickly moved to
establish closer physical proximity to the world’s
most strategic waterways, heavily investing in some
and, as in the case of Bab al-Mandab Strait,
establishing its first-ever overseas military
base in Djibouti, located in the Horn of Africa.
At a time when the US economy is shrinking and
its European allies are politically
fractured, it is difficult to imagine that any
American plan to counter China’s influence, whether
in the Middle East, Asia or anywhere else, will have
much success.
The biggest hindrance to Washington’s China
strategy is that there can never be an outcome in
which the US achieves a clear and precise victory.
Economically, China is now driving global growth,
thus balancing out the US-international crisis
resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Hurting China
economically would weaken the US as well as the
global markets.
The same is true politically and strategically.
In the case of the Middle East, the pivot to Asia
has backfired on multiple fronts. On the one hand,
it registered no palpable success in Asia while, on
the other, it created a massive vacuum for China to
refocus its own strategy in the Middle East.
Some wrongly argue that China’s entire political
strategy is predicated on its desire to merely ‘do
business’. While economic dominance is historically
the main drive of all superpowers, Beijing’s quest
for global supremacy is hardly confined to finance.
On many fronts, China has either already taken the
lead or is approaching there. For example, on March
9, China and Russia
signed an agreement to construct the
International Lunar Research Station (ILRS).
Considering Russia’s long legacy in space
exploration and China’s recent achievements in the
field – including the first-ever spacecraft
landing on the South Pole-Aitken Basin area of
the moon – both countries are set to take the lead
in the resurrected space race.
Certainly, the US-led ‘Quad’ meeting was neither
historic nor a game-changer, as all indicators
attest that China’s global leadership will continue
unhindered, a consequential event that is already
reordering the world’s geopolitical paradigms which
have been in place for over a century.
– Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor
of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five
books. His latest is “These
Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian
Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons”
(Clarity Press). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior
Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global
Affairs (CIGA) and also at the Afro-Middle East
Center (AMEC). His website is
www.ramzybaroud.net
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