United States-China rivalry intensifies after withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan

The withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan last month finally put an end to the 20-year mission sparked by the terrorist attacks on US soil on 11th September 2001. But the move has also set the stage for Washington to turn its attention and refocus its energies and resources on continuing and even intensifying its strategic rivalry with China.

President Joe Biden alluded to it as much when he acknowledged that the withdrawal will give the US the opportunity to focus on countering Russia and China, particularly in meeting the “stiff competition” from “an increasingly assertive China”.

Afghanistan has already emerged as the latest arena for the rivalry, with China pledging to donate US$31 million dollars worth of aid, including food and coronavirus vaccines, to the war-torn country. 

Apart from the possibility of sending a peacekeeping force to Afghanistan if the security situation worsens, Beijing also made clear that it was ready to maintain communication with the Taliban.

China used what it calls the US “abandonment” of Afghanistan to remind America’s allies in Asia, especially Taiwan, not to rely on the US for protection, arguing that the island is merely used as a card to contain China.

Not to be outdone, the US has promised to continue humanitarian aid to the Afghan people through United Nations agencies and non-governmental organizations, including providing a further US$64 million in new humanitarian assistance.

US Vice President, Kamala Harris headed to Singapore and Vietnam to offer reassurance that Washington remains committed to the region, and she outlined the Biden administration’s Indo-Pacific strategy, which in recent months has become a buzzword for countering China.

The Americans also sailed the USS Kidd guided-missile destroyer and Coast Guard cutter Munro through the Taiwan Strait last month, and over the weekend deployed the littoral combat ship USS Tulsa and Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group, said to be a tit-for-tat move after four Chinese warships were spotted sailing in the waters off Alaska late last month.

In a brazen flexing of its military muscle, the US joined forces with its three allies in the Quad security grouping - India, Australia and Japan - in holding joint naval exercises off the coast of Guam, featuring anti-surface, anti-air and anti-submarine warfare drills.

The US is even considering the possibility of allowing Taipei’s US office to change its name from the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office to the Taiwan Representative Office, prompting Beijing to issue a terse warning to Washington not to challenge the one-China principle.

The relations between the world’s two highly disagreeable powers are so tense that cooperation in other areas, most notably in climate change, has taken a beating, with Beijing mincing no words when it declared that China would follow its own plan rather than bow to US pressure.

As both nations face pressure to improve ties, Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed in their first phone call in six months to manage the growing rivalry and to stop it from devolving into a conflict. While Biden focused on the way forward for the troubled bilateral relationship, Xi said “getting the relationship right is not optional, but something we must do and must do well”.

These are the most reassuring words that the world has heard in a while, but under the “new normal” in US-China relations, few concessions are likely, relations will remain hard-nosed, while hostile and prickly impulses will continue to undermine mutual interactions.