Layne, Christopher

Abstract
The Soviet Union’s collapse transformed the bipolar cold war international system into a “unipolar” system dominated by the United States. During the 1990s, the US foreign policy community engaged in lively debate about whether America’s post–cold war hegemony could be sustained over the long haul or was merely a “unipolar moment.” More than 15 years after the cold war’s end, it is obvious that American hegemony has been more than momentary. Indeed, the prevailing view among policy makers and foreign policy scholars today is that America’s economic, military, and technological advantages are so great that it will be a long time before us dominance can be challenged.
There is mounting evidence, however, that this view is mistaken, and that, in fact, the era of American hegemony is drawing to a close right before our eyes. The rise of China is the biggest reason for this. Notwithstanding Washington’s current preoccupation with the Middle East, in the coming decades China’s great power emergence will be the paramount issue of grand strategy facing the United States.
Whether China will undergo a “peaceful rise”—as Beijing claims—is doubtful. Historically, the emergence of new poles of power in the international system has been geopolitically destabilizing. For example, the rise of Germany, the United States, and Japan at the end of the nineteenth century contributed to the international political frictions that culminated in two world wars. There is no reason to believe that China’s rise will be an exception.
However, while it is certainly true that China’s rise will cause geopolitical turmoil, a Sino-American war is not inevitable. Whether such a conflict occurs will hinge more on Washington’s strategic choices than on Beijing’s.
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