In amongst all the pageantry that accompanied Donald Trump’s state visit to China this week, one comment seemed to stand out.
At the state banquet welcoming Trump to Beijing for his second state visit since 2017, China’s President Xi Jinping mentioned an increasingly popular comparison used to discuss the relationship between the two countries. “Can China and the United States transcend the so-called ‘Thucydides Trap’ and forge a new paradigm for major power relations?”
The notion of the trap – which deals with a dominant but declining power’s fear over the rise of a powerful rival, ultimately leading to war – is something China has clearly thought about in terms of its own relationship with the US. The idea, after all, is that the best way for a dominant power to deal with a competitor is to attack and degrade its capacity. That is something China clearly wants to avoid.
Shorts
But by raising the topic, many saw XI echoing the belief that China’s time has come – likely at the expense of the US.
