New Delhi: The single best thing for China would be President Xi Jinping resigning as it would transform the country’s image abroad overnight, said scholar, columnist, and anchor Fareed Zakaria.
Zakaria made the comment during his conversation with ThePrint’s Editor-in-Chief Shekhar Gupta during a virtual Off The Cuff session, where the international relations expert spent a substantial amount of time talking about how Xi has made strategic choices that are fundamentally bad for his country over the long-term.
According to Zakaria, Xi’s three biggest mistakes have been China’s discrimination against Western companies, antagonising the US military by militarising South China Sea, and its treatment of neighbours, who all share a degree of hostility towards the People’s Republic.
However, Zakaria also acknowledged that the rise of China is now a reality, and the world is now moving towards a US-China led bipolar order in which these two countries will be far more stronger than the rest.
Also read: India needs clear foreign policy as world heads to US-China bipolar order, Fareed Zakaria says
Xi’s strategic mistakes
According to Zakaria, Xi Jinping has made some major strategic miscalculations, which would be bad for China’s power and influence in the long run.
“I look at Xi Jinping and ask myself … imagine China without Xi Jinping and you would imagine a very different trajectory and a very different set of reactions around the world.”
Talking about what he thinks are the three major strategic miscalculations, Zakaria said, “(The) first thing he does is create more and more favourable treatment for Chinese companies and discriminate against western companies … The effect this has is that he takes the single most pro-Chinese element of Western societies (which is big business) and he turns that around. And he loses that support.”
According to Zakaria, big businesses used to be the “single biggest cheerleaders for a good US-China relationship”, but they are now increasingly frustrated with China.
Second, Zakaria talked about how Chinese and US military used to have pretty good relations that “drew out of the Sino-Soviet split, and the US’ opening to China”. He said the two militaries had a non-hostile outlook towards the other.
“But now, not only have the Chinese been doing aggressive things in the South China Sea but (they) also lied about it,” he said. For instance, the Chinese government said they were not going to build military bases in the South China Sea, but they have built them.
As an effect, the Pentagon, which is the US’ military centre, now feels cheated. “So while the Pentagon wasn’t actively hostile towards China, now they are in a much more adversaries position,” he remarked.
The third mistake, Zakaria pointed out was China’s mistreatment of its neighbours.
“It’s not just India … from Vietnam to Philippines to Malaysia to Australia … they have been bullying, they have been demanding, in some cases buying off the elites, such as in the Philippines. But in most cases, they have built a certain allergy (against Beijing),” argued Zakaria.
“If Xi Jinping were trying to weaken China’s position abroad, he couldn’t have done a better job,” said Zakaria.
“He has taken all the constituencies that were favourable and turned them neutral. And all the constituencies that were neutral, he has turned them hostile,” he added.
Watch the full interaction here:
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Fareee Zakariya ,a Islamic columnist. Good one. I have seen read lot your column during my says in middle East. You always spill venom on Hinduism and specific ally Indian prime minister.
You need to study more and correct you fact and perspective towards. You can’t see everything with radical islamic eye glass.
India is going better than you expect and that your problem to compare India with a confused country like turkey.
You try to work on some of your neighbours in Arab world. They need serious help.
These are not “mistakes.” These are actions That show the true nature of thee CCP regime. They are not bugs, but features
How did a lightweight like Fareed Zakaria get a job on TV?
Fareed Zakaria is an immigrant, and on top of it, a minority Muslim. He, therefore, appears more ‘American’ than Americans. His criticism of America is always understated, and his admiration, overdone.