China’s rise is a greater war risk than fault line conflicts

Evidence

Perhaps, as Friedberg suggested, Europe’s past is Asia’s future. More probably, Asia’s past will be Asia’s future. The choice for Asia is between power balanced at the price of conflict or peace secured at the price of hegemony. Western societies might go for conflict and balance. History, culture, and the realities of power strongly suggest that Asia will opt for peace and hegemony. The era that began with the Western intrusions of the 1840s and 1850s is ending, China is resuming its place as regional hegemon, and the East is coming into its own. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 653 (#complicates, via linked claim)

A civilizational paradigm thus sets forth a relatively simple but not too simple map for understanding what is going on in the world as the twentieth century ends. No paradigm, however, is good forever. The Cold War model of world politics was useful and relevant for forty years but became obsolete in the late 1980s, and at some point the civilizational paradigm will suffer a similar fate. For the contemporary period, however, it provides a useful guide for distinguishing what is more important from what is less important. Slightly less than half of the forty-eight ethnic conflicts in the world in early 1993, for example, were between groups from different civilizations. The civilizational perspective would lead the U.N. Secretary-General and the U.S. Secretary of State to concentrate their peacemaking efforts on these conflicts which have much greater potential than others to escalate into broader wars. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 78 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Nor is it the most dangerous. It appeared so at one time when rival super­ powers were involved, but it was precisely that involvement that made it less dangerous, in that the superpowers were able to exercise some restraint and, thanks to them, the dangers were known, measured, assessed and managed. The limits were set; it was dangerous and destructive to the participants as are all such conflicts, but it had long ceased to be dangerous to anyone else. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 1597 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: US rivalry with China relies on military might while China uses economic investment — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 1007; Superpower involvement paradoxically contained the regional conflict’s danger — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting…, 1597; Cross-civilizational conflicts have greater escalation potential than intra-civilizational ones — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 78 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Asia will likely choose peace through Chinese hegemony over balanced multipolar conflict #complicates (0.75) — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 653
• Cross-civilizational conflicts have greater escalation potential than intra-civilizational ones #complicates (0.74) — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 78
• Superpower involvement paradoxically contained the regional conflict’s danger #complicates (0.72) — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 1597