Opinion The coronavirus is springing the Thucydides trap - War isn’t inevitable, until it is

The coronavirus is springing the Thucydides trap | Spectator USA

A shift into open antagonism means both China and the United States of America taking rapid steps into the ‘Thucydides trap’

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The first casualty of informational war is truth. The first American casualty of COVID-19 was the myth that the United States can ‘manage’ the rise of China as a world power through mutual interest. That mutual interest was only ever economic. Naturally, most of our politicians, business leaders and commentators explained it as strategic too: as technocracy calls GDP the index of human happiness, so it identifies strategic interests with economic ones. The coronavirus crisis has, however, exposed an essential strategic antagonism between the United States and China.

‘‘What made war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta,’ Thucydides wrote in History of the Peloponnesian War. In Destined for War (2017), Graham Allison argued that established powers attack rising powers in order to preempt their own eclipse. COVID-19 is the latest in a series of factors that are dissolving common interests, worsening strategic stresses, and pushing America and China into what Allison calls the ‘Thucydides trap’. On Tuesday, President Trump shifted from praising China’s response to COVID-19 to speaking of the ‘Chinese virus’. On the same day, the Chinese foreign ministry revoked visas for Americans reporting for the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and the Washington Post.

The closing of borders must necessarily lead to the contraction of supply chains. So must the closure of options and expectations. The United States government keeps its military supply chains within its borders in the interest of national security. For similar reasons, the United States pressures allies not to develop their own military industries and to buy American weaponry instead. This is a strategic interest, domestically and globally. The same should have gone for the medical supply chain. But it didn’t. Outsourcing the production of medicines and medical equipment is now revealed for what it was: greedy, reckless and feckless.

This coronavirus is not the common cold, but the COVID-19 blame game is producing a cold war. The American people blame the Chinese people for eating strange food and buying it at wet markets, and American media blame the Chinese government for not reacting quickly enough to the outbreak at Wuhan. Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for China’s foreign ministry, blames the US military: ‘It might be US army who brought the epidemic to Wuhan,’ Lijian tweeted in Chinese and English last Thursday. ‘Be transparent! Make public your data! US owe us an explanation!’ The PRC habitually monitors and scrubs China’s social media sites, but it allows this and other conspiracy theories to circulate online. On Monday, Mike Pompeo issued a demarche to China’s foreign ministry, expressing ‘strong US objection to efforts to shift blame for COVID-19’.

The US’s strategic posture toward China has already shifted under the Trump administration. If the COVID-19 death toll in the United States is high and the economic damage significant, that shift will accelerate, and quickly. The US is already caught in great power rivalry with China in the Pacific rim, while at the same time being excluded from the Chinese-led order that is developing in central Asia. A shift into open antagonism means both sides taking rapid steps into the ‘Thucydides trap’.

Thucydides, being a historian, used ‘inevitable’ in hindsight. But war isn’t inevitable, until it is. In four of Allison’s 16 case studies from the last 500 years, statesmanship stopped the trap from springing. There’s also the problems of reliable information and accurate interpretation. Where Tacitus praises the German tribes in order to implicitly criticize the decay of republican spirit in Rome, and Rousseau idealizes the Spartans to criticize the unmanly ancien règime of the Bourbons, Thucydides the Athenian blames the rise of an intolerable rival. But the true cause, Donald Kagan argued, may have been closer to home.

The ruling classes of Athens and Sparta had, Kagan argued in his New History of the Peloponnesian War, avoided conflict by close co-ordination: an ancient analogue to Niall Ferguson’s mutual-interest ‘Chimerica’, which now resembles a fantasy, like the ancient Greek chimera after which it was named. To Kagan, it was less the rise of Sparta that caused the war, and more the rise of aggressive leaders either unable to control popular anger, or determined to manipulate it for their own advantage. But that couldn’t happen here, right?

Dominic Green is Life & Arts editor of Spectator USA

 

[DumbDude42]

accepting china into the WTO was a mistake
fuckers should have stayed isolated like north korea, would have saved us a lot of trouble that way

 

[Karl der Grosse]

China should be (and are) very cautious about challenging America in a military manner. China hasn't truly won a foreign war in centuries, America is remarkable good at winning foreign wars, ranging from nearby to remarkably far away. Most importantly, Americans are remarkably accepting of military use that causes massive and disproportionate civilian casualties to their enemies. When Americans feel their cause is just, when Americans' wrath is kindled, we firebomb our enemies' cities, we napalm their children, we kill and kill and kill. Some might look at the latest Middle East wars as proof that isn't true, that we don't dare make total war anymore. They would be wrong. If America feels wounded enough, we will strike back with a fury no other country can match, mostly because no other country has anywhere close to the worldwide reach we have. America can and will wage war on their enemies, in their enemies' own lands. No power on earth, even most powers combined, could force us to fight in our own land to defend our own population. And the ultimate argument is that America remains the only country to have used a nuclear weapon. Not once, but twice, on civilian centers of an enemy who was already completely incapable of causing us further harm as a nation.

The Chinese are well aware of all this. They know they can't challenge us militarily. They know that the greatest Chinese military successes have always and only come against their own people in internal massacres. That's why they decided on their economic war strategy. And it's worked to a worrisome degree. But the mask has started to come off, the true face of Chinese supply chain economic dominance is becoming clear. We may have to accept becoming a less affluent nation to wrest control of key industries back from the Chinese. I believe we're equal to the task, personally. We will come through this upcoming plague scenario tested as a nation, and ultimately stronger. China is going to be considerably weaker. Bear in mind that while American companies are shuttering production, China absolutely depends on exports to the US to keep their Potemkin economy afloat. Not only have they had to shutter their factories for an extended period, now that they are beginning to come back online, American companies are ceasing production for an extended period, hugely reducing imports of Chinese parts as well as Chinese finished products. America can withstand this state of affairs longer than the Chinese. Ultimately their economic warfare plan is failing.


ETA: China was accepted into the normalized trade world by President Bill Clinton, who notoriously took shadowy money from shadowy Chinese financiers, on a large scale. It was the best investment China ever made. Cheap, too. I doubt they had to spend more than a few million all told.

 

[Sneed's Feed And Seed]

accepting china into the WTO was a mistake

Stopping the Japanese march after Nanking was a mistake.

 

[The best and greatest]

The easiest (ie globalists' favorite) way to dodge Thucydides's Trap is by ever closer economic entanglements, which will surely be cut to shreds in the aftermath of the virus.

Sort of like economic entanglements brought Rome and Carthage together.

Has "Economic entanglements" between two nations/kingdoms/empires ever successfully prevented a war? Getting the raw end of a trade deal is just as likely to start one.

 

[pwnest injun]

The Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Is nothing compared to the terror bombing Campaigns
However that’s my point if our economy tumbles because of this people are going to want blood Imagine if most Americans wake up and realize that they’re broke hungry and without any economic opportunities
Of course it won’t just be Americans it’ll be the rest of the world looking at China

This time, when the economy tanks, it won't necessarily be a quick recovery, but it will be a real recovery, since we'll be building actual things that require actual laborers.

 

[NyQuilninja]

China should be (and are) very cautious about challenging America in a military manner. China hasn't truly won a foreign war in centuries, America is remarkable good at winning foreign wars, ranging from nearby to remarkably far away. Most importantly, Americans are remarkably accepting of military use that causes massive and disproportionate civilian casualties to their enemies. When Americans feel their cause is just, when Americans' wrath is kindled, we firebomb our enemies' cities, we napalm their children, we kill and kill and kill. Some might look at the latest Middle East wars as proof that isn't true, that we don't dare make total war anymore. They would be wrong. If America feels wounded enough, we will strike back with a fury no other country can match, mostly because no other country has anywhere close to the worldwide reach we have. America can and will wage war on their enemies, in their enemies' own lands. No power on earth, even most powers combined, could force us to fight in our own land to defend our own population. And the ultimate argument is that America remains the only country to have used a nuclear weapon. Not once, but twice, on civilian centers of an enemy who was already completely incapable of causing us further harm as a nation.

The Chinese are well aware of all this. They know they can't challenge us militarily. They know that the greatest Chinese military successes have always and only come against their own people in internal massacres. That's why they decided on their economic war strategy. And it's worked to a worrisome degree. But the mask has started to come off, the true face of Chinese supply chain economic dominance is becoming clear. We may have to accept becoming a less affluent nation to wrest control of key industries back from the Chinese. I believe we're equal to the task, personally. We will come through this upcoming plague scenario tested as a nation, and ultimately stronger. China is going to be considerably weaker. Bear in mind that while American companies are shuttering production, China absolutely depends on exports to the US to keep their Potemkin economy afloat. Not only have they had to shutter their factories for an extended period, now that they are beginning to come back online, American companies are ceasing production for an extended period, hugely reducing imports of Chinese parts as well as Chinese finished products. America can withstand this state of affairs longer than the Chinese. Ultimately their economic warfare plan is failing.


ETA: China was accepted into the normalized trade world by President Bill Clinton, who notoriously took shadowy money from shadowy Chinese financiers, on a large scale. It was the best investment China ever made. Cheap, too. I doubt they had to spend more than a few million all told.

You sum up it perfectly thank you

 

[Sexual Chocolate]

Since the Chinese gave us a virulent, disgusting, nasty disease, it's only fair that we should give them Madonna.

 

[Happy Fish]

The CCP is a puss sack on the ass of humanity that has proven its need to be lanced through this Wu Flu shit.

 

[Azovka]

Oh wow, its the same old shit that I, and everyone else with an International Relations degree, heard about years ago. This is nothing compared to the trade war, fwiw.

Surprised they haven’t mentioned the one thing Thucydides did say that perhaps applies better to coronavirus - “the strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must”. Said ironically enough by the democratic Athens.

 

[Webby's Boyfriend]

We are waiting for WW3 since the late 1940s. When will it finally be here?

 

[MrBlueSocks]

China should be (and are) very cautious about challenging America in a military manner. China hasn't truly won a foreign war in centuries, America is remarkable good at winning foreign wars, ranging from nearby to remarkably far away. Most importantly, Americans are remarkably accepting of military use that causes massive and disproportionate civilian casualties to their enemies. When Americans feel their cause is just, when Americans' wrath is kindled, we firebomb our enemies' cities, we napalm their children, we kill and kill and kill. Some might look at the latest Middle East wars as proof that isn't true, that we don't dare make total war anymore. They would be wrong. If America feels wounded enough, we will strike back with a fury no other country can match, mostly because no other country has anywhere close to the worldwide reach we have. America can and will wage war on their enemies, in their enemies' own lands. No power on earth, even most powers combined, could force us to fight in our own land to defend our own population. And the ultimate argument is that America remains the only country to have used a nuclear weapon. Not once, but twice, on civilian centers of an enemy who was already completely incapable of causing us further harm as a nation.

The Chinese are well aware of all this. They know they can't challenge us militarily. They know that the greatest Chinese military successes have always and only come against their own people in internal massacres. That's why they decided on their economic war strategy. And it's worked to a worrisome degree. But the mask has started to come off, the true face of Chinese supply chain economic dominance is becoming clear. We may have to accept becoming a less affluent nation to wrest control of key industries back from the Chinese. I believe we're equal to the task, personally. We will come through this upcoming plague scenario tested as a nation, and ultimately stronger. China is going to be considerably weaker. Bear in mind that while American companies are shuttering production, China absolutely depends on exports to the US to keep their Potemkin economy afloat. Not only have they had to shutter their factories for an extended period, now that they are beginning to come back online, American companies are ceasing production for an extended period, hugely reducing imports of Chinese parts as well as Chinese finished products. America can withstand this state of affairs longer than the Chinese. Ultimately their economic warfare plan is failing.


ETA: China was accepted into the normalized trade world by President Bill Clinton, who notoriously took shadowy money from shadowy Chinese financiers, on a large scale. It was the best investment China ever made. Cheap, too. I doubt they had to spend more than a few million all told.

They're not stupid. You think they don't have an accurate assessment of their strengths and weaknesses? They may be jingoistic, but they don't have Nazi Germany levels of hubris.

It's been a long time since I scanned through "Art of War" , but I remember it being not about battle tactics and campaign strategy. Instead it was all "lies and spies" . Have better intelligence than your opponent. Always put out misinformation. When strong, appear weak,;when weak, appear strong. Never do the obvious. And always try to win without fighting a battle at all, by maneuvering your opponent into harming himself.
Now, imagine that China isn't just like any other Western Nation, competing hard but (mostly) fair with a common set of rules (even if some are unspoken) .
But instead they :
a) know they are the chosen nation to rule the planet. A few hundred years of English speaking dominance is an anomaly.
b) Play a very long game.
c) Have no concern for individual lives, even their own, much less barbarians.

So, yeah. They won't make any military move until they are certain it's just a coup de grace.
But they very definitely will conduct a long term campaign of using misinformation, lies and manipulation to get their ememies to harm themselves. And absolutely use a disease to help that.

 

[Coldgrip]

They're not stupid. You think they don't have an accurate assessment of their strengths and weaknesses? They may be jingoistic, but they don't have Nazi Germany levels of hubris.

No, they have Chinese levels of hubris, which is far worse.

While I do not doubt they have an assessment of their own strengths and weaknesses, is it accurate? The chinese will lie and exaggerate to their superiors in order to save face or to save their own ass when shit isn't meeting the quotas or standards.

Having said that, I doubt they'd start an outright war. Even if they thought they could win there's still that whole MAD thing.

 

[Übertroon]

Surprised they haven’t mentioned the one thing Thucydides did say that perhaps applies better to coronavirus - “the strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must”. Said ironically enough by the democratic Athens.

That's because Athens has been regularly whitewashed throughout history for being "democratic". For example Athens only allowed proper citizens to vote, and being a citizen isn't like becoming a citizen today, you had to be born in Athens to people who were citizens, no moving in and having 10 children who all automatically get citizenship.
Secondly Athens was less "progressive" than other city states at the time. Sparta actually allowed women positions of power and authority, although not as soldiers as that would not be pragmatic, while Athens viewed women more with the same lens that the later Romans would, should be seen not heard etc.

Not to say these things are negative or makes Athens a bad guy or the Spartans good guys, but Athens wasn't some progressive bastion filled with rainbow flags and multiculturalism, just the pedophiles

 

[TowinKarz]

Getting the raw end of a trade deal is just as likely to start one.

*citation needed*

Seriously, I need you to name a 20th Century war that had it's roots entirely in trade deficit..... I can't recall such a thing.

 

[Sneed's Feed And Seed]

*citation needed*

Seriously, I need you to name a 20th Century war that had it's roots entirely in trade deficit..... I can't recall such a thing.

Having your leader shot puts a damper on trade for a bit as the country mourns. #WW1 #FranzFerdinand

 

[The best and greatest]

*citation needed*

Seriously, I need you to name a 20th Century war that had it's roots entirely in trade deficit..... I can't recall such a thing.

20th century? Can't name one. But do trade deficits alone represent the full spectrum of getting/making bad trade deals?
Also I don't think there are very many wars you can attribute entirely to one specific cause. Things aren't usually that cut and dry.

 

[pwnest injun]

*citation needed*

Seriously, I need you to name a 20th Century war that had it's roots entirely in trade deficit..... I can't recall such a thing.

World War 1 had a large number of causes, but the ascendancy of the German economy was certainly a big part of it. The old powers don't like the new one threatening their dominance.

 

[MrBlueSocks]

*citation needed*

Seriously, I need you to name a 20th Century war that had it's roots entirely in trade deficit..... I can't recall such a thing.

Why 20th Century? Why trade deficit? He said bad trade deal. That's some serious goalpost shifting.
20th C. While not strictly a trade deal, the economic effects of the treaty of Versailles directly led to Hitler & WW2 .
19th C : Opium War was explicitly about trade deficit as I understand it. The chinese sold stuff for gold, but never spent it. A shortage of literal gold coin was fucking with the British and other western economy.
18th C: American revolution was about many things, but unfair restrictive terms of trade was a big part of it.

 

[Sexual Chocolate]

They're not stupid. You think they don't have an accurate assessment of their strengths and weaknesses? They may be jingoistic, but they don't have Nazi Germany levels of hubris.

It's been a long time since I scanned through "Art of War" , but I remember it being not about battle tactics and campaign strategy. Instead it was all "lies and spies" . Have better intelligence than your opponent. Always put out misinformation. When strong, appear weak,;when weak, appear strong. Never do the obvious. And always try to win without fighting a battle at all, by maneuvering your opponent into harming himself.
Now, imagine that China isn't just like any other Western Nation, competing hard but (mostly) fair with a common set of rules (even if some are unspoken) .
But instead they :
a) know they are the chosen nation to rule the planet. A few hundred years of English speaking dominance is an anomaly.
b) Play a very long game.
c) Have no concern for individual lives, even their own, much less barbarians.

So, yeah. They won't make any military move until they are certain it's just a coup de grace.
But they very definitely will conduct a long term campaign of using misinformation, lies and manipulation to get their ememies to harm themselves. And absolutely use a disease to help that.

This is a good analysis, and probably also completely wrong about the long term plan part. I bet they think they have great long term plans, but reality might disagree.

The Chinese aren't a race of self-effacing strategic supergeniuses, they have the same problem every other country has with rampant corruption, selfishness and exceptional behavior by their leaders.

Except in China's case, it may be worse in some ways because cheating each other is engraved on their DNA. Superpowers don't build brand new skyscrapers that immediately fall apart because everyone involved was cutting corners to make a couple of extra bucks, but China does.

There's no reason to believe the Chinese leadership are any less good at making rash, stupid decisions based on hubris, fear, or greed. Before they decided it'd be a good idea to eat flying rodents and infect the planet, the Chinese Communist Party was about to make a massive strategic error by crushing Hong Kong.

Before that, they were taking a terrible beating at the hands of Donald Trump over a few tariffs, and facing a terrifying run of domestic bank failures. (The Coronavirus recession might expose mountains of more bad debt in the Chinese economy caused by decades of CCP exceptionalism and cronyism)

Before that, they were doing exceptional shit like causing famines by accident and losing a war with Vietnam.

China could easily, because of inscrutable Oriental reasons to do with internal politics, economic difficulties, losing face, and miscellaneous chinky dinkery, find itself in a shooting war over Taiwan or any of their other territorial disputes. It doesn't even need to be a CCP master plan - just takes one gung ho Chinese navy captain or air force pilot to get an itchy trigger at the sight of a USN carrier and the game's on

 

[TowinKarz]

Why 20th Century? Why trade deficit? He said bad trade deal. That's some serious goalpost shifting.
20th C. While not strictly a trade deal, the economic effects of the treaty of Versailles directly led to Hitler & WW2 .
19th C : Opium War was explicitly about trade deficit as I understand it. The chinese sold stuff for gold, but never spent it. A shortage of literal gold coin was fucking with the British and other western economy.
18th C: American revolution was about many things, but unfair restrictive terms of trade was a big part of it.

It's not goalpost moving at all, he specifically said unfair trade deals could trigger a war, I wanted proof.

Versailles was a bad PEACE treaty that guaranteed it would fail, not an economic agreement.

The Opium War may qualify, but go back that far, and now you've got Colonial ambitions in the mix, and the waters get muddy.

The lack of recognization of local governments that were nevertheless loyal to the Crown was the real problem that sparked the Revolution, the taxes and unfair trade deals were done to recoup the costs of the French Indian war, and were so unpopular they were repealed for the most part, Parliment kept pushing them to demonstrate that THEY were in charge, it was really a problem of distance from the seat of power, American colonists didn't see why they couldn't, as Englismen as free as the next, set up local government to handle affairs quicker than waiting six months to ask Parliment and another six to wait for a response..... even if they had delegates in Westminster, they'd be surely outvoted anyway. To them, it was about not respecting thier rights as loyal subjects simply because they weren't on English soil, even though they talked, worshiped and lived as English. "Taxation without Representation" was just the pithy way to condense all that down.

I really don't see any modern conflict that starts as a sole result of "Remove these tariffs by midnight or it's war"

20th century? Can't name one. But do trade deficits alone represent the full spectrum of getting/making bad trade deals?
Also I don't think there are very many wars you can attribute entirely to one specific cause. Things aren't usually that cut and dry.

Exactly my point.... nobody goes to war over a gripe with a trading partner, there's got to be other things in the mix.