Zheng Yongnian on the Balloon Incident

Zheng Yongnian, “The ‘Balloon Incident’ and the Future of  Sino-American Relations”[1]
 
Introduction and Translation by David Ownby
 
Introduction
 
Zheng Yongnian (b. 1962) is the Presidential Chair Professor and the Founding Director of the Advanced Institute of Global and Contemporary China Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, where he relocated in 2020 after spending much of his career at the National University of Singapore.  He has been a prolific scholar and commentator in both English and Chinese (a partial CV is available here).  I do not know the extent to which he is an influential voice on intellectual opinion or on elite politics, but it is clear that he is hoping to have an influence.
 
In the text translated here, Zheng talks about Sino-American relations in the wake of the “balloon incident” (Zheng of course does not say "spy balloon"), which dominated discussions of the topic over the past few days.  Zheng is clearly exasperated that yet one more thing has gotten in the way of restoring some basic stability to relations between the two countries, a problem he blames basically—at least in the context of this piece—on the externalization of American domestic politics, in other words, “things are going bad at home, so let’s beat up on China.”  There is surely some truth to this charge, but the same thing surely happens in China, where Xi Jinping has fed a populist nationalism that means that it is very hard for China to back down, however slightly, on anything.  In the first days of the spy balloon affair, China did uncharacteristically apologize, before returning to form and talking about American spy balloons passing over China, among other things.  Of course, Zheng is subject to the same populist, nationalist pressures, so he cannot simply come out and say that China should perhaps say less on occasion.
 
Zheng does finally say that China must act if it wants to see an improvement in Sino-American relations, which China, the US, and the entire world clearly need.  At the same time, he is at a loss to suggest precisely what concrete actions China might take, at times suggesting that China should ignore American blathering, at other times suggesting that China should not be “led by the nose” by anti-China hawks in the United States.  The problem is that ignoring the other partner in a troubled bilateral relationship is not really possible (try this in a fight with your spouse), and that it is virtually impossible to find any American politician who is not hawkish on China, at least in public.  Zheng seems to dismiss problems in the South China Sea as basically manageable, and to suggest that the “one China, two systems” formula be reheated and reserved to Taiwan, although it was a spectacular failure of a meal in Hong Kong.
 
If Zheng is incoherent, it is less due to intellectual failures on his part and more to the fact that it is genuinely difficult to imagine avenues of even short-term improvement in Sino-American relations, to say nothing of finding solutions to the large number of real problems that plague the relationship at present.  I am convinced that many Chinese intellectuals would be open to a completely new approach, should a Chinese leader genuinely attempt to “restart” Sino-American relations on a much more cooperative basis, but have no idea what the popular reaction would be in China, or if Americans would accept it and go along. 
 
Allow me a moment of fantasy.  What if Xi Jinping’s eventual replacement, who will surely have born in the 1960s or 1970s, depending on how long Xi hangs on, speaks decent English and wears a nice suit?  Is that possible in the CCP context?  Would it change anything if the next Chinese paramount leader grew up watching American sitcoms?  Sadly, it seems to me that there is more possibility of change coming from China than from the US, where there is little reservoir of good will toward China and no authoritarian power to impose an unpopular—if necessary—change in policy.
 
In any event, articles like Zheng’s where the authors wring their hands over the state of Sino-American relations are very common in Chinese media these days, reflecting a general malaise, and, in the text translated here, a nostalgia for better days under Deng Xiaoping.  For more of the same, check out recent additions to David Kelly’s Beijing Baselines, and Thomas des Garets Geddes’s Sinification, both of which are on Substack.
　　
Translation
 
Looking Back on the Evolution of Sino-American Relations　　
 
The Sino-US relationship is a matter of concern to both countries and to the world.   The bilateral relationship has deteriorated in recent years, and the situation is complex. During the G20 Summit in Bali, the General Secretary Xi and President Biden met in a friendly atmosphere and arrived at a consensus on major issues, one of which was Secretary of State Blinken's scheduled visit to China. Unfortunately, the "balloon incident" has once again brought Sino-American relations to a standstill.　
　
To see where the Sino-US relationship is headed, we must first take a brief look at the history of this relationship.   Sino-US relations in the reform and opening period have not been easy. The relationship began with a ping pong ball.  How did a ping pong ball initially lead to such positive changes? It was largely due to the general environment. Similarly, that a balloon can prompt another change in Sino-US relations today is also the result of the general environment.
 
The story of how ping pong diplomacy contributed to the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and China during the Cold War is one that people like to tell. From the point of view of geopolitics, the most important world feature at the time was the triangular relationship between China, the United States and the Soviet Union, in which the United States needed China to be on its side to respond to Soviet expansionism. China had not yet launched reform and opening, its economy and technological strength were very backward, and its overall national power was still very weak. Although China had little external influence, its geopolitical significance was nonetheless obvious. In such an environment, it proved possible to improve Sino-US relations. Nixon and Kissinger focused on China's geopolitical role, and ping-pong diplomacy thus opened a new era for Sino-US relations, which reached its golden age during the period of reform and opening.
　　
The golden age of Sino-US relations did not happen by magic, and can be divided into two phases. The first phase was the reform and opening up of the 1980s. From a grassroots perspective, China launched an era of economic marketization and political reform. At the time, some US politicians, as well as people in policy research and academic circles, imagined that China could eventually evolve into a Western-style country, i.e., meaning that China would embrace a market economy and Western-style politics. Although China’s economy began to grow in the 1980s, reforms during that period were limited to a number of domestic initiatives, such as the responsibility system in the rural areas and certain reforms of urban institutions, and the “opening” component was not very strong. Most foreign capital entering China during the 1980s was overseas Chinese capital from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore, etc.
 
Foreign investment really began to flow into China after Deng Xiaoping's Southern Tour in 1992.  After 1989, the United States had led the West in sanctioning China, but Deng’s Southern Tour once again changed the direction of China's reform and opening, after which China truly opened its doors to the West.   In this second phase of reform and opening up, China's drastic reforms led to a change in the West's perception of China, and Western observers came to believe that China's economic development and integration into the global economic order would lead to an evolution of China's internal system that would make it acceptable to the West. In particular, the United States pinned its hopes for institutional change in China on its accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO). In order to join the WTO, China proposed to "integrate 接轨" into international community. Consequently, China amended tens of thousands of domestic laws and regulations from the central to the local level to achieve this goal of integration. After China entered the WTO, its economy experienced double-digit growth for many years, making a huge contribution to the growth of the world economy.
 
So on the one hand, China integrated into the world economy during reform and opening; on the other, the US always believed that reform and opening would make China into the country it had imagined. Some US political figures, including Robert Zoellick, who was president of the World Bank under Obama, even envisioned the concept of a "G2" (Group of Two), in which the US would recognize China's rise and China would take on more international responsibility, i.e., the "stakeholder" concept. At one point, Chinese and US leaders talked for more than eight hours at a summit in California, reaching considerable consensus as to how they should get along. General Secretary Xi also said back then that the " Pacific Ocean has enough room to accommodate the development of the two great powers in the world, namely China and the United States."
 
However, the changes the US expected from China's reforms did not materialize. Faced with China's post-WTO double-digit economic growth and its own deep financial crisis beginning in 2008, the US felt that it was not only incapable of continuing to change China, but also that China was beginning to "educate" the US, and started to adjust its policy toward China. Obama proposed his “Pivot to Asia” strategy. Of course, the United States had never left Asia, but the degree of importance attached to Asia has varied from administration to administration. When Trump came to power, populism soared in the United States, and Trump reduced US attention to Asia, even ignoring America's allies in the region. US policy toward China during this period was determined by American domestic affairs, not China's behavior. This continued until Biden came to power, at which point the United States returned to its original alliance system and made China its main target. Biden took over the Sino-US trade war started by Trump and gradually expanded it to include China's high-tech sector, leading to strangleholds and decoupling.
 
Under Trump, the United States treated China and Russia as America’s two main competitors or challengers. After Biden took office, however, Russia dropped out of the picture, China being seen as the sole major power willing and able to challenge core US interests. Although the Russo-Ukrainian war has led to multiple crises, such as the energy crisis in Europe and the nuclear proliferation crisis, the US continues not to see Russia as it major enemy, a role reserved for China, as always.
 
US foreign policy is about realism. As the leader of NATO, the US is deeply involved in the Russo-Ukrainian war along with European countries, and we do not know when or how the war will.  Beginning with Trump, the US has withdrawn from Afghanistan and intends to reduce its security promises to Europe, shifting its military focus to the Indo-Pacific region and trying to build deeper military alliances with Japan, India and Australia. Recently, the US National Security Strategy added Singapore and Vietnam to this list, with the ultimate goal of establishing an Asian version of NATO. After the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war, the US administration has, on the one hand, attempted to devote its main efforts to dealing with Russia and conducting a proxy war through Ukraine, and at the same time, it wants to open a second front in Asia. However, if a conflict breaks out in Asia, then the front will become a battlefield. This is not something that the US administration can stomach. Therefore, although it is difficult to improve relations between China and the United States, the US is trying to temporarily ease tensions, for example, by setting up "guardrails" on the Taiwan issue.
 
As the war between Russia and Ukraine continues, the United States and Europe are most concerned about whether Russia will use nuclear weapons and are waiting to see where China stands. After former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan, Sino-US relations went south. But at the summit between the two heads of state, China still expressed its clear opposition to the use of nuclear weapons, improving Sino-US relations to a certain extent. Blinken’s visit to China was decided at the Bali summit last year, but unfortunately, after the balloon incident, both the US and China are each blaming the other for damaging the relationship. China’s position is that it was only an unmanned balloon carrying out climate observation, and is accusing the US of making a mountain out of a molehill, arguing that certain political forces in the US are deliberately damaging Sino-US relations because they have no desire for stability. The US is saying the same thing about China, especially part of the US media, which is making malicious speculations about China’s intentions. The mutual accusations relate to the issue of political mutual trust between the two countries.
　　
The Key to the Future Development of Sino-US Relations is How China Acts
 
High-level communication between China and the US has diminished in recent years, with only low-level aspects of conflict prevention continuing, and we see a gradual decrease in political mutual trust. The general environment explaining the downturn in Sino-US relations caused by this unexpected incident is mainly related to domestic changes in the United States.
 
The US is facing an domestic crisis of governance. Since the last wave of globalization, that is, after China's accession to the WTO, the US has seen a shrinking middle class, political polarization, and a lack of effective government action to deal with America's domestic problems, which has led to an externalization of these problems.
 
The polarization of American politics has had a huge impact on the relationship between China and the United States. Now, it is difficult to say whose China policy can represent the United States, whether it be the Democrats, the Republicans, the White House, the Congress, the federal government or state governments.   In fact, US China policy has become more and more individualized, with different political figures having their own policies on China. It is not difficult to understand that even Biden and Pelosi, who are both Democrats, have differences on the issue of visiting Taiwan.
 
New House Speaker McCarthy has also long indicated that he would visit Taiwan, but due to the reaction of China to Pelosi’s trip, he may postpone doing so, and will reportedly pick a more appropriate time. Meanwhile, members of Congress and state governments will continue to visit Taiwan. However, the Biden administration is still cautious and rational in dealing with Sino-US relations.
 
At present, it is difficult to find rational elements anywhere in the entire US political scene when it comes to China policy, making the prospect of Sino-US relations as uncertain as the movie "The Wandering Earth."  If we wish to find any certainty within this larger uncertainty, it will depend on how we deal with things. The Sino-US relationship is not solely up to the US. As the second largest economy in the world, China must not enter into a Cold War just because some hardliners and anti-China elements in the US declare that they want to fight a Cold War with China. We can’t be led by the nose. US hardliners are creating opportunities for conflict with China, thus provoking China into a conflict with the US.  This means that China’s stance is critical.
 
How the Sino-US relationship evolves depends on what China does. However, we do not have much choice. When Biden came to power, he defined the Sino-US relationship as a battle between "American democracy" and "Chinese dictatorship" from an ideological point of view. This is deeply revealing of what the US wants to do. The current US strategy toward China is to polarize the world, aiming for what they call "one world, two centers," one centered on the United States and one centered on China, or "one world, two markets," one centered on the United States and one centered on China.  It’s not hard to imagine which side is meant to dominate.   We cannot enter into what Biden calls the battle between "democracy and dictatorship," the terminology used during the Cold War between the US and the USSR, which at the time were completely divided ideological camps.  At present China and the United States interact in countless ways, which is very different from the relationship between the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.　　
 
As Secretary of State Blinken said, the Sino-US relationship can be seen as being divided into in different realms, meaning that they can cooperate, compete, or confront another, depending on the circumstances.  Of course, we don’t always have a lot of choice here either.
 
Although China does not want to use the single word "competition" to define the Sino-US relationship too simplistically, in practice we do not have many tools at our disposal. Furthermore, we can divide "confrontation" in two: "controllable confrontation" and "uncontrollable confrontation.”  Controllable confrontation remains confrontation, but uncontrollable confrontation is conflict, or even war.
 
It is important to emphasize that we should not be ruled by emotions, and we should increase and consolidate the areas of cooperation with the United States. In fact, there are many such areas of cooperation, such as addressing climate change. Currently, China and the US account for nearly half of the world's carbon emissions, and if they do not cooperate, the climate problem will not be solved.
 
Nuclear non-proliferation is in the interest of the United States, and in China’s interest, too. As a great power, we are surrounded by states that possess nuclear weapons, so nuclear non-proliferation is even more in China's interest. In addition, it is in our common interest to respond to public health and maritime crises.
 
At the same time, we also have to squarely face the competition. When the United States resorts to strangleholds and decoupling, China must invest a great deal to compete with them. Even as we compete, we should promote benign competition, meaning basically economic and technological competition. Bad competition is the kind of military competition between the United States and the Soviet Union that we saw during the Cold War. We must avoid this kind of bad competition. At present, the US Cold War faction is trying to lead China and the US toward this kind of bad competition, so we have to be clear-headed. We must modernize our national defenses according to our plan and at our own speed, and even accelerate our modernization, but we must avoid bad competition with the United States. Once there is a military competition between China and the United States, the whole Asia-Pacific region, especially the South China Sea and Taiwan, will become a powder keg, which is a situation we do not want to see.
 
As we compete, we can do so in terms of how we functioned during the Deng Xiaoping era – “struggle without breaking 斗而不破” – meaning that the competition does not lead to the end of the relationship.  We must continue our policy of openness, even if it is unilateral. As we deal with our relationship with the US, we must use the logic of technology, or the market, and of capital.   I have always stressed that the nature of capital is mobile, and as long as the United States is still a capitalist country and as long as China is still open, decoupling between the two will be slow, if not impossible.　　
 
China has a middle class of four hundred million people and is still the largest single market in the world. US capital will not easily give up on the Chinese market. The logic of technology is the same.  American technology is always cutting edge, and even if the US denies China the use of the newest technology, as long as we remain open, the old technology will still continue to flow into China, perhaps not directly, but through third parties.　　
 
The development of technology depends on openness and intellectual exchange. If we close ourselves off and actively engage in decoupling with the United States, we will be isolated by the West just like pre-reform and opening China, or like Russia is now. So we must by all means avoid doing things that will allow the US Cold War faction get its way.
 
In terms of conflict, we must also respect the notion of “struggle without breaking,” meaning that we can struggle but must avoid war.  At present, there are not many issues that could easily lead to conflict between China and the United States, and the main ones are the South China Sea and Taiwan. My impression is that in terms of the South China Sea, both sides have been holding steady in terms of mutual interactions since 2016.　　
 
From a scholarly standpoint, the South China Sea issue is actually a question of emancipating the mind. We can go back to Deng Xiaoping's principle of "setting aside disputes and pursuing common development 搁置争议,共同开发" to solve the problem of the maritime economic zones. We have to look at the construction of islands and reefs by Vietnam and the Philippines separately from the issue of China and the US in the South China Sea. We must not see the problems of Asian countries in the South China Sea as a conflict between China and the United States in the same region.
 
The Taiwan issue is a tricky one. Taiwan is at the core of China's core interests and we have no room to back down. But will Taiwan evolve into the Ukraine of Asia? Both Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg have recently been instigating for Taiwan to become the Ukraine of Asia. As we develop our economic strength and modernize our national defenses, we can neutralize US and Western interventions on this front. We need to unilaterally open up to Taiwan. The people we want to target are a few independentist groups in Taiwan, not the ordinary people.
 
Therefore, the bigger the stick, the sweeter the carrot. As long as relations with Taiwan develop in a sustainable manner, there will be more and more hope for a peaceful resolution of the Taiwan issue. Many US think tanks, as well as the administration, have misjudged China's policy toward Taiwan, always believing that China will enter Taiwan as Russia did Ukraine.
 
Our claim on Taiwan is one of sovereignty, not governance. Under the "one country, two systems" framework, it is the people of Taiwan who will govern Taiwan. Mainland China’s claim is only to sovereignty. Looking at past international experience, there is still a lot of room to deal with the sovereignty issue, but what is missing are cross-strait communication and consensus.　　
 
Look at the Sino-US Relationship Logically, Don’t be Led by the Nose by the Anti-China Faction　　
 
The state of Sino-US relations as it exists today is something that no one wanted. This relationship is in fact not a simple bilateral relation like others in the world; the US and China are the two pillars of the world order, and neither can function without the other.   Neither can defeat the other in a war, neither can rebuild the world order on their own, both have their own respective regional, limited spheres of influence.  Sino-US relations are now difficult to improve because there is no positive competition between the Democrats and the Republicans on China, but only negative competition, and both are competing to be the most anti-China. The party in power at present, the Democrats, might be more rational, but the opposition party, the Republicans, are not.   If the Republics come to power, they might be a bit more rational, but the Democrats will ratchet things up against China once they are in the opposition. 
 
In any event, we must make sure to understand that in our relations with the United States, we are not dealing with individual hardliners or anti-China factions, much less a few anti-China political figures. We have to see the United States as a whole and not be led by the nose by a few anti-China political figures.
 
China and the US have been engaged in verbal battles over the past few year, which means that to a large degree, the Sino-American relationship has been manipulated by other people.   We need to learn our lesson from this, and not allow individual political figures among the hardliners and the anti-China faction in the US define the our relationship. We must also find the power to redefine the relationship, and the key here is to exert the power of reason, and not that of emotion. If we can do this, there is hope that the relationship may find a certain stability.
 
China is the world's second largest economy and still needs to continue to develop, and the central government has recently shifted its focus once again to development. “Development is the only hard truth,” it’s good for us, it’s good for the United States, it’s good for the whole world. We need to go back to the way we used to do things, and make diplomacy serve the needs of our country's development, and not the other way around. The recent Twentieth Party Congress proposed the objective of a Chinese-style modernization.  Beginning right now, we  need to focus squarely on economic development. Once China stops developing, many problems will arise. In fact, it is the United States' inability to deal with domestic problems that has allowed the Sino-US relation to suffer. We need to grasp this point, and understand that only by taking care of China’s business properly in China, on the basis of achieving sustainable development, will there be room for progress in Sino-US relations, and peaceful development in the world will be guaranteed.
 
Notes

[1]郑永年, “’气球事件”与中美关系前景,” published on Aisixiang on February 13, 2023.