American policy towards China is now up for grabs, with hardliners and soft-liners battling for the upper hand. The hardliners view China as an existential threat to American security and interests. The soft-liners regard China as a powerful counterpart, on occasion friend, competitor, or adversary, but not an existential threat. In my view, the official adoption of the hardline approach would prove disastrous, creating a self-fulfilling grave risk of future conflict.

American views of China are highly unstable. China was an American ally in World War II, but then quickly became an implacable American foe after the communist victory in China’s civil war. Mao’s China was a military adversary of the United States in the Korean War, and was viewed as a hostile nation by policy makers until 1972. China increasingly was seen as an American friend and an important counter-weight to the Soviet Union following Richard Nixon’s surprise visit to China.

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