As a risk maker, the United States hypes up "de risk" hegemony | Risk | The United States
Mingdysprosium
For a period of time, the United States and the West have been enthusiastic about constantly coining new words in their strategy towards China, and the term "risk reduction" has recently received considerable attention. After European Commission President von der Leyen first mentioned "risk reduction" to China in March this year, the Biden government was eager to follow up the hype. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Finance Yellen even advocated "risk reduction" before and after their visit to China.
Replacing the impractical decoupling
"Risk reduction" seems to be replacing "decoupling" as a phased new mainline of US policy towards China. "Risk reduction" may sound more "relaxed", but replacing "decoupling" with "risk reduction" is not a shift in US policy towards China, but rather a deep calculation by US policy makers to seek greater benefits in strategic competition with China and achieve the strategic goal of "winning against China".
The reason why the United States wants to replace "decoupling" with "de risk" is because it realizes that traditional "decoupling" is no longer feasible. Whether it is the Trump administration launching a tariff war, technology war, and sanctions war against China, or the so-called "small courtyard high wall" style "precise decoupling" against China adjusted by the Biden administration, the two problems have never been solved. On the one hand, decoupling will backfire on the United States itself. Under the long-term influence of economic and market laws, China and the United States have formed a highly complementary economic and trade relationship with deep integration of interests, which has greatly enhanced the well-being of enterprises and people in both countries. According to statistics from both China and the United States, the bilateral trade volume reached a historic high in 2022, demonstrating strong resilience. Similar to the "competition theory" with the intention of confrontation and suppression, it is not realistic for the US government to forcefully promote decoupling from China through administrative means. It is difficult to gain the recognition of many stakeholders involved in China within the US, and the US itself cannot bear the serious consequences. This is evident from the continuous opposition within the United States after the Trump administration launched a blatant trade war with China.
On the other hand, decoupling would harm American allies. History has fully shown that it is difficult to solve the "third-party dilemma" by artificially blocking economic connections and creating factional confrontations through "economic warfare". Whether it was manipulating the Paris Coordinating Committee to impose trade restrictions on socialist countries during the Cold War, or implementing unilateral sanctions and "long arm jurisdiction" after the end of the Cold War, the relevant actions of the United States have sparked a lot of questioning from its allies, and even prompted it to "vote with its feet" to withdraw from the so-called "embargo alliance.". Moreover, as a major trading partner of over 140 countries and regions, China's economic development prospects, market size advantages, and opening-up pattern today have a strong attraction to countries around the world, including its US allies.
The essence is still "de sinicization"
If "decoupling" means active attack or even "reckless punching", then "de risk" is disguised as "passive defense", which sounds more "gentle and rational". The US government values the deceptive and provocative nature of "risk reduction", attempting to use this rhetoric to address the issues of "identification" and "following" within the US and at the level of allies.
The Biden administration used the term "risk" with strong value judgments and emotional connotations to stigmatize China, distorting normal economic and trade exchanges with China into fallacies such as "losing cooperation with China", "relying on risks with China", and "China's economic coercion". At the same time, it repeatedly used "risk" as a synonym for "insecurity", and replaced the misconception that "decoupling from China is beneficial" with the misconception that "decoupling from China is harmful". By promoting a "threat inflation" of understanding of China, it attempts to more effectively "unify thinking" and "unite forces" within the United States and its allies.
The hype of "de risk" is actually "packaging old wine in new bottles", and there is no essential difference from the promotion of "precise decoupling", which is promoting "de sinicization". According to the existing explanation from the US side, "risk reduction" includes continuing to use "small courtyards and high walls" to prevent the outflow of technology in key areas, promoting the diversification of key industry supply chains, highlighting the importance of industrial policies, and strengthening cooperation with alliances and partners. This is actually a reaffirmation of the Biden administration's ongoing "decoupling" measures from China's economy and technology, attempting to "compete with China" by curbing China's growth in key and emerging high-tech fields.
The United States is the real source of risk
Since the Biden administration took office, the United States has repeatedly imposed restrictions on China around the entire chip industry chain, seriously threatening the stable operation of the global industry chain. The industrial policies of the United States promoting the return to the domestic market and "friendly outsourcing" are full of political manipulation of "pan security" and "pan ideology", which not only hinder the recovery of the world economy, but also harm the interests of its allies. The long-awaited new regulations on direct investment restrictions in China have recently received new news. Yellen stated that the US government will increase scrutiny of US investment in areas such as semiconductors, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence. The House of Representatives' China Special Committee has also launched an investigation into investment in China directly targeting multiple US investment institutions.
At a deeper level, the United States attempts to cover up its continued decoupling from China under the guise of "de risk", as well as its selfish nature of pursuing "America first". As the initiator of the old version of the Washington Consensus, the neoliberal rhetoric vigorously advocated by the United States has caused serious economic difficulties in many regions such as Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe. In order to meet its new interests and demands, the United States has now launched the so-called "New Washington Consensus", advocating for increasing the role of the country and government, strengthening "unity" with allies, and focusing on industrial policies, all of which are aimed at further promoting the politicization of economic and trade issues. Under the pretext of "risk reduction", the United States claims that it cannot support a free and open world economic and trade system and cross-border flow of production factors as it did in the past. This is precisely the major risk facing the world today.
The United States has been creating risks for the world for a long time: in terms of ideology, it vigorously engages in hegemonic hegemony, constructs an alliance system, concocts a narrative of "democracy against authoritarianism", stirs up opposition between factions, and exports color revolutions on a large scale; Militarily, obsessed with excessive military tactics, launching unjust wars, and causing continuous unrest and unrest; Economically, utilizing the hegemony of the US dollar to harvest the world, imposing unilateral sanctions and "long arm jurisdiction", and frequently resorting to economic coercion
The United States does not reflect on the harm its actions have brought to the world, but instead hypes up "de risk" towards China, fully exposing its narrowness and paranoia of disregarding global interests and adhering to zero sum thinking, which is destined to contradict historical trends and the overall trend of the times, and will only make the international community more clear who is the true risk maker.
