A new Cold War with China? Probably not

The idea that China is 'the central threat of our times,' as Mike Pompeo put it on July 21, is laughable. It’s a formidable competitor economically, although demographically speaking it has feet of clay, but it’s simply not interested in a classic military confrontation.

The only ideological tool available to Xi Jinping is nationalism. He would deploy it if necessary to defend his own power, just as Donald Trump is doing now, but for a sustainable cold war there needs to be a more credible sense of threat than is currently available to either party, writes Gwynne Dyer. Photograph courtesy of the Kremlin/Flickr

Opinion

BY GWYNNE DYER

July 27, 2020

LONDON, U.K.—Is there going to be a new Cold War with China? Probably not. Consider the case of Huawei. Mike Pompeo swept into London on July 21 like an overweight Darth Vader, while his local satrap, Boris Johnson, waited nervously in Downing Street for judgment. People swore they could hear Pom...

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