Crouching Dragon, Weakened Eagle

The New York Times
By MARTIN JACQUES
Published: February 16, 2010

LONDON — The spats between the United States and China appear to be getting more numerous and more serious.

The Chinese strongly objected to Washington’s latest arms deal with Taiwan. President Obama accused the Chinese of currency manipulation, while at Davos, Larry Summers, the director of the White House’s National Economic Council, made an oblique attack on China by referring to mercantilist policies. The disagreement between China and the United States at the Copenhagen climate summit in December has continued to reverberate.

Then there was the spat over Google’s claims that cyber attacks against the company had originated in China. The U.S. is increasingly critical of China’s opposition to sanctions against Iran. Now Beijing is fuming over the meeting this week between Mr. Obama and the Dalai Lama.

For the most part, however, the issues of contention are not new. The Chinese reaction to the Taiwan arms deal was entirely predictable, the only novelty being a threat of sanctions against the firms involved. Beijing’s response to the Dalai Lama meeting in Washington is equally predictable.

Mr. Obama’s statement about currency manipulation and the comments by Mr. Summers about mercantilism are a little different. True, they are not entirely new — the Treasury secretary, Timothy Geithner, accused the Chinese of currency manipulation a year ago. But since then, the U.S. administration had until now chosen to be more discreet.

Google and climate change are relatively new disputes. But we should not be surprised by them. China’s rise means that it is now involved in areas of the world and on issues where previously it had little or no stake. As China becomes a global power it is bound to come into conflict with the United States on a number of subjects.    more …