US President Donald Trump might claim to pursue the ‘America First’ agenda, but China is emerging as the real beneficiary of his foreign policy
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As US President Donald Trump has cut foreign aid, ditched traditional allies, and made a new ally in Russia, China appears to emerging as the real winner.
Under Trump, the United States is retreating from the world. While he and his allies pitch the exercise as part of their
‘America First’ philosophy, it is actually ‘China First’ that is creating a power vacuum in the world that China is itching to fulfil. Whether it is multilateral institutions like the World Health Organization (WHO) or the developing world, the United States is in retreat and China is racing to fill the vacuum.
It’s not just Trump’s isolationism and abandonment of allies that’s helping China with the creation of power vacuum. The purported approach that Trump has taken to counter China, which involves
withdrawing from Europe where the United States counters Russia to reorient to the Indo-Pacific to counter China, is also fundamentally flawed as it fails to understand the nature of challenge from China.
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Moreover, with the expanionist foreign policy agenda, Trump has strengthened China’s hand for its territorial ambitions in Asia and Indo-Pacific.
As US under Trump retreats, China fills vacuum
The United States was the major contributor to the WHO and humanitarian causes in the developing world.
In Africa and elsewhere, the USAID funded healthcare and education programmes to serve some of the poorest communities.
To be sure, the USAID had problematic aspects, such as the
funding of risky viral research at the Chinese institution from where the Covid-19 virus is suspected to have leaked, but observers have said reforming the organisation is a solution and not killing it and demonising it the way Trump and his principal ally Elon Musk have.
In any case, the developing world needs humanitarian partnerships and aid. If that would not come, it would turn to other parties. That’s where China comes in.
Trump’s crackdown on USAID and foreign aid is a self-goal that serves China a victory on a platter. Whereas previously China had to fight bitterly for influence in the developing world, it now has a clear field as the United States under Trump has retreated.
Prof. Tej Pratap Singh, a scholar of China at the Department of Political Science, Banaras Hindu University, said that humanitarian operations are the instrument of state to peddle soft power the world over and the shutting down of humanitarian operations anywhere is a self-goal by that country.
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“Developing countries need assistance. If the United States withdraws, China will reach out to these nations and they will be glad to have Chinese support. China has been making inroads in Africa for many years and the US withdrawal is set to increase that. India has been countering Chinese influence in the Global South but countering China needs joint efforts and, in the absence of US involvement, China is set to make good gains,” Singh earlier told Firstpost.
Trump’s purported reorientation to counter China is flawed
Trump and his allies have pitched the witdrawal from Europe as part of a reorientation to the Indo-Pacific to counter China, but the approach is fundamentally flawed.
The approach is flawed for three basic reaons.
Firstly, China is not alone in the Indo-Pacific region but is
working in a bloc with Russia, North Korea, and Iran, in all theatres of the world, so withdrawing from one theatre to counter it in another is not a workable appraoch as all theatres are linked.
“The China-Russia-Iran-North Korea bloc is competing with the West everywhere. In every theatre, one of these partners have taken up lead and others play a supporting role, such as Russia taking the lead in Europe with Iran helping with missiles and drones, China with the economy, and North Korea with weapons and soldiers. Similarly, Iran has taken the lead in West Asia and China in the Indo-Pacific. The withdrawal from any theatre to focus elsewhere is therefore not a realistic approach,” geopolitical analyst Swasti Rao previously told Firstpost.
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Secondly, while Trump looks at the world in terms of money, the challenge from Russia and China is deeply ideological. Both Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping of the Communist Party of China (CPC) are ideologically committed to the restoration of their countries’ lost greatness. Trump’s transactional approach does not stand a chance against them.
Thirdly, as the China is challenging the US supremacy in the world with a bloc, the US response should also come with a bloc, but the United States is going to the fight solo under Trump —if it is going at all— as Trump has ditched Nato and has long had a