THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2025 17 critical supply chains and offering alternative development incentives, i.e., shaping the strategic environment, I believe that we must also get more countries to recognize the serious risks of Beijing’s continued challenge to the values of the rules-based international order and its eventual effect on peace and stability in the region. Finally, we need to point out more broadly that if Beijing does not fundamentally change its policies, it poses an existential threat to the long-term interest of the entire global community as Beijing continues to assist other powerful and aggressive authoritarian states that transgress and violate the rights of other countries and erode the rules-based liberal international order. This threat is becoming increasingly clear today, with China first declaring its “no limits” partnership with Russia at a Xi-Putin summit meeting in Beijing just before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and subsequently refusing to impose sanctions on Russia while continuing to provide critical assistance that has allowed Russia to expand its war against Ukraine. In a continued show of defiance, Xi and Putin held three summits in 2024, each time reaffirming their partnership against the United States and the West. In October, Xi traveled to Kazan in western Russia, where Putin hosted a meeting of BRICS, the intergovernmental organization of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates that has now expanded its membership to include Iran. Separately, Xi traveled to France, Serbia, and Hungary last May in an apparent effort to sow division within Europe and weaken U.S.-European ties. As China, Russia, and other autocracies join together to expand their influence, we are facing the very real risk of a return to an even more dangerous “Cold War” that could potentially have devastating consequences for the entire world. The Bottom Line The bottom line of my argument is that the United States itself must adhere to and continue to promote the rulesbased liberal international order. And we must underscore that if Beijing continues to violate the values and principles of this order, China’s continued rise will eventually, directly and indirectly, pose an existential threat to the peace and prosperity of the global community. Understanding this, the United States must be forthright in stating our strategic objective, which is to induce China to change, and we must try to get our likeminded partners and others to understand the seriousness of this challenge. “Not taking sides” is taking sides. This will not be an easy task as Beijing continues to promote its narrative and wield its considerable economic power and influence, especially among those who do not share these values or those who continue to focus solely on their immediate economic interests. Nonetheless, I believe that greater strategic clarity regarding our goal with respect to China is especially critical at this time, because Beijing’s increasingly assertive and expansive policies have begun to raise concerns in the region and around the world. Within China, we must continue to speak up for universal values and contest and dispel the notion that the United States wants to suppress China’s rise or seeks regional hegemony, understanding that it will ultimately be up to the Chinese people themselves to choose their own path forward. n
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