Xi Jinping sees Thucydides Trap as 'best diagnosis' of US challenge
L'essentiel
- Chinese President Xi Jinping views the Thucydides Trap as the "best diagnosis" of Beijing's challenge with Washington, according to political scientist Graham Allison.
- Xi reportedly raised the concept with Donald Trump, signaling an awareness of the risk of conflict if current diplomatic paths continue.
Résumé généré par IA
Pourquoi c'est important
The Thucydides Trap is a concept describing the danger of war between a rising power and an established power. Chinese President Xi Jinping reportedly discussed this concept with US leader Donald Trump, signaling an awareness of potential conflict.
Chinese President Xi Jinping viewed the Thucydides Trap as the “best diagnosis” of the challenge Beijing faces with Washington when he raised the concept with US leader Donald Trump this month, signalling an awareness that their current path risked conflict, an eminent American political scientist said.
“My impression is that he sees this as the best diagnosis of the challenge he and President Trump face,” said Graham Allison, the founding dean of Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
“He understands that business as usual [and] diplomacy as usual will produce history as usual. And history as usual will be a catastrophic war that neither China nor the US will survive.”
The idea is not new but has gained greater salience in US-China relations as China’s global footprint has expanded.
Xi talked about the theory as early as 2013. In 2015, while he cautioned that major powers “might create such traps for themselves” through mistakes of strategic miscalculation, he insisted that “there is no such thing as the so-called Thucydides Trap in the world”.
Questions ouvertes
- What was Donald Trump's reaction to Xi Jinping raising the Thucydides Trap?
- What specific 'mistakes of strategic miscalculation' does Xi Jinping fear?
- How has China's expanding global footprint influenced its perception of the Thucydides Trap?
- What are the specific 'current paths' that Xi believes risk conflict?
