Does great power preventive war make sense for faltering challengers when the leading power is America and the challengers are in Eurasia?
Preventive war logic makes sense. A power gets close to passing an enemy in power but falls short and declines. So it goes to war to keep the other power from being able to strike when more powerful. The Thucydides Trap. Is China that worried power?
China’s power is peaking, and its more aggressive international stance reflects Levy’s theorized actions of a declining power.
While China’s economic power now rivals America’s, it has built its prosperity on the back of a one-child policy and the issuance of debt that makes future prospects look relatively bleak. Who will pay for this debt as workers age and more working-aged people are required to take care of their parents and grandparents, instead of working to propel China’s economy and military forward? Xi probably feels cornered, with time running out on China’s ambitions.
This feeling expresses itself through action, including China’s “wolf-warrior diplomacy,” its violent domestic crackdowns in Hong Kong, Xinjiang, and Tibet, and aggressive threats to its neighbors in the South and East China Seas. These actions are supported by the logic of preventive war. Specifically they suggest that China will make a play to envelop Taiwan while it still has the chance.
Maybe. But China was getting more aggressive before China's peak was recognized as likely falling short of America. And "wolf-warrior diplomacy" is not action. It's bluster. As for Hong Kong, Xinjiang, and Tibet, those are internal matters. How do they fall under preventive war theory?
And in the age of Thucydides, losing a war to an enemy meant extinction and slavery, even for powerful city-states. Now? America isn't going to do that as China's relative power declines. Can't do that. We're not large enough and certainly not close enough.
Which is also why America didn't go to war with China already. Remember, the power transition also means the stronger power is supposed to have incentive to strike the rising power before the stronger power slips into second place. I guess America didn't do that. Although perhaps the American economic "decoupling" is a non-war attack on a stronger China. Still, I think China has stopped it rise all on its own without American action.
Further, when preservation of the Chinese Communist Party is the party's top priority, how does risking national defeat support that? It might. The CCP in the face of revolution might decide that even losing a foreign war is worth it if it gives the CCP the power and propaganda to suppress the revolutionaries at home. But explain to me how the preventive war framework provokes war.
And aren't nuclear weapons supposed to prevent that sort of destruction or subjugation of your entire nation?
Losing the power transition for China simply means it continues to peacefully develop. And maybe wait for America to falter or for China to restore growth. I'm told China plays the long game (although, LOL). Why would they strike while outgunned as their first reaction?
China may well try to invade Taiwan, a longstanding objective. But it won't be prompted by the preventive war logic. Don't get stuck in the framework of judging China's actions toward Taiwan as reactions to relations with America or comparisons to American power. Heck, be more specific and wonder what the more narrow wants and needs of the Chinese Communist Party are.
As for Russia, its invasion of Ukraine isn't a preventive war. Russia is too far behind American power to have thought the time was now or never in early 2022. It's a restorative war. Restoring the Russian/Soviet empire.
If Russia really invaded Ukraine this year because it fears the balance will never get better for Russia, that's pretty damning of Russian chess play. Until Russia got all aggressive in 2008, Europe was busy disarming and America was busy leaving Europe to defend itself. Russia was not losing ground.
And war made no sense this year. Even if Russia gained ground by easily capturing Ukraine, Europe and America are strong enough to hold off Russia until European and American strength is increased. And even Ukraine--backed by the West--is enough to hold off Russia. If preventive war made sense, Russia would have attacked China.
Is the Thucydides Trap applicable to any Old World power challenging America?
NOTE: War updates continue here.
