China’s economic progress has engendered apprehensions that it may overtake the USA and emerge as the new hegemon. The USA harbours a love-hate relation with the Chinese dragon. Smaller countries under US influence also envy (Venice Complex) or fear China.
The cognitive dissonance in US-China relations is obvious. The USA looks upon China as a copycat trying to equalise the USA through cyber-espionage. Simultaneously, it extols China’s economic leapfrog, as long as it suits US interests.
Debt trap: The US has reservations about Chinese investment in Pakistan and Sri Lanka as elsewhere. It surmises that Chinese loans, disguised as investments, are predatory. Such loans lead to ‘asset seizures’ like that of Hambantota port of Sri Lanka.
The factual position is that Chinese infrastructure loans have not led to the forfeiture of a single valuable asset abroad. The US view is based on the Rhodium Group study, which mentions only Hambantota port as the lone instance of seizure. The claim of forced lease or seizure is questionable. The Hambantota port lease, held jointly by the Hong Kong-based China Merchants Port and the Sri Lanka Ports Authority, was negotiated over 2016-2017.
Payments of the principal and interest for the port loans included only about 1.5 per cent of Sri Lanka’s external debt repayment obligations. The Sri Lanka Ports Authority promptly paid dues using revenues from Colombo port, which includes a container terminal run by China Merchants Port.
The alarmist or envious view of a rising China has engendered many misperceptions. China has no territorial ambitions. China is preoccupied with removing the urban-rural gulf (2020 to 2050), and providing adequate food and clothing to its population
China holds an estimated nine to 15 ..
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