Biden Ratchets Up Military Tensions with China
Post on: February 27, 2021
Maryam Alaniz
Like his predecessors, Joe Biden is committed to a harsh line against China’s hegemonic ambitions. Recent military exercises in the Taiwan Strait show that imperialism is a bipartisan affair and that Taiwan could serve as a backdrop for the growing tensions between China and the United States.
On Wednesday, the United States sent its second warship this month, the USS Curtis Wilbur, through the Taiwan Strait. This contentious waterway separates mainland China from Taiwan — which China characterizes as a breakaway province, even though Taiwan has de facto independence from the mainland.
Biden ran a “tough on China†campaign, so his administration’s recent military exercises aimed at China (including exercises in the South China Sea) come as no surprise. The ruling class — both its Democratic and Republican wings — are united in their project to deter China’s economic and geopolitical rise in the context of U.S. imperialism’s diminished hegemony.
As the pandemic deepens the economic and political trends that have developed since the 2008 global economic crisis, interstate tensions — such as the competition between the United States and China — are likely to intensify. That means the growing rivalry between the two countries is a strategic question for the United States regardless of who is president. Trump’s aggressive rhetoric poured fuel on the U.S.-China relations fire, and his trade war signaled a marked escalation in tensions, but it was the Obama administration — of which Biden was a part — that architected increased U.S. military presence in the Pacific through the so-called “Pivot to Asia.â€
https://www.leftvoice.org/biden-ratchets-up-military-tensions-with-china
