Beijing to React After Biden Defense Strategy Declares Economic and Tech War on China, Scholars Say

The Pentagon released its National Defense Strategy (NDS) on Thursday, which said China remains the US' top competitor and warned that Beijing and Moscow collaborating might threaten US interests. The document also characterizes Russia as an acute and more immediate threat to US interests and values than China, which is characterized as a "pacing challenge."

"[The strategy] confirms and supplements the US declaration of economic and technological war against China," former Assistant Secretary of Defense Chas Freeman, who held the post under President Bill Clinton, said. "China will react. It will be interesting to see how."

Freeman also said the new strategy was in fact a continuation of long-held, deeply embedded policies in the US national security establishment determined to maintain global hegemony.

"It's steady as you go on US defense of global primacy against both Russia and, especially, China," he said.

US President Joe Biden meets with China's President Xi Jinping during a virtual summit from the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC, November 15, 2021.

Biden's new strategy relies far too much on the direct threat of military escalation and will not reduce tensions or increase the possibilities of peace in the Indo-Pacific region, Freeman said.

"The 'strategy' typically equates deterrence with military confrontation, though it requires reassurance of potential adversaries as well. It adds nothing to the prospects for peace," he said.

Los Alamos Group Director Greg Mello said the strategy would increase the dangers of confrontation and conflict in the Indo-Pacific region between the United States and China rather than reduce them.

"While none of this will be news to China, being formally named, again, as an adversary and nuclear deterrence guarantees, again, being provided to US allies in the Indo-Pacific region cannot but encourage China to continue expanding its own nuclear and conventional military capabilities," he said.

The new strategy just repeats many of the worst impulses already clearly previously expressed by different bodies in the US government, Mello said.