Will the US Election Affect China Policy?
John McCain's victory in the Florida primary makes his eventual nomination likely, which is bad news for this Democrat. McCain is clearly the most electable Republican left in the race, and coupled with a Democratic nomination of Hillary Clinton, the Arizona Senator would give the Elephant Team a fair to good shot at retaining the White House this November.
What would a McCain presidency look like? Ignoring his positions on social and economic matters (areas in which the president has less influence anyway), what would a McCain foreign policy look like? In particular, how would a President McCain conduct American policy toward China?
For the most part, very little will change. President Bush's policy toward China has been relatively uncontroversial, and in fact most observers feel he handled the one Sino-American crisis of his presidency (the 2001 air collision over Hainan Island) fairly well. Bush also has solicited Beijing's help in prodding North Korea toward disarmament, though without success so far. Mostly, American policy toward China has been consistent since the re-establishment of diplomatic ties in the 1970s. McCain probably won't deviate very much, and for good reason.
What troubles me about McCain is his extreme militarism. I would worry that he would respond to a Cross-Straits crisis with calls to action, and it seems that his solution to every global crisis is to send American troops along. The adoring media gave him credit for calling for Rumsfeld's resignation, but many fail to recall that McCain's objection was that there were too few, not too many, troops. In McCain's view, militarism and imperialism are virtues that Americans are honored to have. Few in China would agree.
On the other hand, McCain doesn't seem to jive with the neo-conservative* notion that the US is obliged to spread "freedom" by force. He seems to be more of a realist than Bush, and backing off on democracy promotion as an official policy would do wonders for America's image in the developing world. One task the next American president will face is repairing the nation's "soft power", a necessary skill in an era when the Chinese conducts a charm offensive throughout Africa and other poor regions.
Fortunately, China is a stable country and the odds of a hot war over Taiwan are slim. Financial ties between the two countries are such that neither side wants a falling out, and China is decades away from attaining the same degree of global supremacy that America now possesses. I would be surprised if US-China relations were to suffer much no matter who is elected president.
All the same, I'd still say that a President Clinton or President Obama would serve America's interests abroad far better than their Republican counterparts, if only marginally in the case of China.
*Speaking of neo-conservatism, one silver lining in McCain's victory tonight is the imminent withdrawal of Rudy Giuliani, the erstwhile Republican front-runner whose aggressive foreign policy would have made Bush seem like a piker. Nonetheless, Giuliani will apparently endorse McCain and I'd expect most of his supporters will transfer their affections to the Senator.
January 30th, 2008 - 13:23
I spent the last couple days watching as many of the primary debate youtube videos as I could in an effort to catch up a bit. I’m inclined to vote democrat anyway, but among the dems, I gotta say my vote is going to Obama.
I really like that guy. Although he’s criticized for doing a lot of talking, in my opinion, it’s damn good talking.
I’m with you on fearing McCain. I’d take Hilary over him in a sec.
(btw, Americans abroad will be able to vote via the world wide web this election! Can’t find the exact link right now, but I read it on Reuters about a couple weeks ago.)
January 30th, 2008 - 19:41
Looking at your post, I think the unique triumph of John McCain this election season is not in his victory over Romney in the early primary states but in his magical ability to get people to perceive him in a way that doesn’t correspond to his public statements. The Reaganites love him but he’s not really a Reaganite, and you’re praising him in part for not being a neoconservative militarist while acknowledging him as a realist militarist, yet McCain, in 2000, was the favored candidate of the so-called “National Greatness Conservatives,” aka the neoconservatives. In fact, I don’t hear or see a lot of difference between McCain’s positions and the neoconservatives except for the fact that McCain doesn’t wrap it up in Bush’s stumbling but flowery language. I also agree that McCain would ratchet up the tensions with China more than a Romney would. And I can even see McCain pushing for a broad and strategic US-Vietnamese alliance in Southeast Asia, using his POW status for Nixon-goes-to-China cred.
As for the Democrats, while Hillary is promising to be hawkish like a Republican but not as bad as Bush, Obama’s foreign policy is hard to know. He says he’s against the war, and this I understand, and he’s often protectionist, especially with regard to China (what was up with his knee-jerk “ban all toys from China” posturing two months ago?), but aside from these planks, what are the characteristics of an Obama foreign policy? Even after reading his Foreign Affairs essay it’s hard to say how he differs radically from the status quo. Even when confronting an issue that should have been “his,” namely, talking about what the US should do to end the bloodshed in Kenya, Obama has been very low-key. The rap on Obama is that he has the ability to sound beautiful while saying very little, and I think that extends into his foreign policy.