The United States remains “clear-eyed” about China’s growing military capabilities, but China’s overall rise is more likely to boost American creativity and ingenuity than lead to the United States’ demise, said Vice President Joe Biden. “I remain convinced that a successful China can make our country more prosperous, not less,” wrote Biden in his New York Times opinion piece Wednesday. The United States has every intention of remaining a Pacific power, wrote Biden, who believes that leaders from both countries are committed to building a stronger, “stable” relationship. “Some here in the region see China’s growth as a threat, entertaining visions of a Cold-War-style rivalry or great-power confrontation. Some Chinese worry that our aim in the Asia-Pacific is to contain China’s rise. I reject these views,” he stated. (See also Pentagon: China Years Away from Effective J-20.)
Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III chaired a China-focused military briefing Oct. 27, part of a biweekly series of briefings with senior military commanders about China’s growing threat in the wake of an orbital hypersonic weapon test that elicited public worries from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. “What we…