OpinionUS needs to start seeing China not as an enemy but a contributor to peace and prosperity

Name: ‘Welcome back America’: world leaders react to Joe Biden’s victory in US elections
Uploaded: 2020-11-16T19:30:15.000Z
Duration: 4 min 35 s
Description: ‘Welcome back America’: world leaders react to Joe Biden’s victory in US elections

After decades of neglect and bad choices, if the United States now concludes it has a China problem in Asia, it is in part of its own making

Now is the time for Biden to rebuild the State Department, make the right appointments, re-engage and reassess foreign policy

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Premier Li Keqiang applauds as Commerce Minister Zhong Shan holds up the agreement during the signing ceremony for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership trade pact on Sunday. China’s growing importance in and integration with the Asia-Pacific region requires the United States to reassess its foreign policy. Photo: AFP

Tom Plate

Published: 3:30am, 17 Nov 2020Updated: 6:18am, 17 Nov 2020

The truth about China’s growing importance in Asia is that, without America’s help, the improvement of its position would not have happened as quickly. Perhaps it began in 1997 with the collapse of the Thai baht, when Washington did not rescue an Asian nation that had been loyal to its Cold War campaign against communism.

It left the clean-up to cold-hearted institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, whose dogmatism exacerbated the region’s suffering, while halting Tokyo’s bid to charter a big, stabilising regional bank.

Then came 2008. While Beijing was orchestrating a largely gorgeous Olympics, Washington looked away while Wall Street’s own “wolf warriors” went to town on the world and plunged it into financial darkness. An alert Asia was taking it all in.

My charge sheet is long enough, but I almost forgot one other big thing: the general insolence of the Trump administration and, specifically, the policy primitiveness of the trade war with China. For the foreseeable future, this idiocy will stand out as dumb and dumber.

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‘Welcome back America’: world leaders react to Joe Biden’s victory in US elections

If the United States now concludes it has a China problem in Asia, isn’t it in part of its own making? Why blame Beijing for not wanting to ignore a vacuum?